Project EH-Body - 1976 Plymouth Duster

[Riddler]

I found some time today to get some work done. My goal was to button up the floor. I gave it my best but I failed. I did have a good start and wish some cardboard I can make templates and finally finish the floor.

Here's the bridge over the trans I made. It's 2"x1" C channel and has 1/8" plates to weld to the sheet metal floor.



I've finished welding it up but never got a picture. I also clearenced a few sections so that I've 1/4" or more of space from the trans to the bridge.

I then moved on to messing with the pedals and hydroboost. I took all the brackets off the pedals I didn't need. Anyone looking for heavy duty 340 brackets etc?


Here's what I was left with.



I then mounted up the hydroboost. The brackets were perfectly to the firewall. Just have to take a hammer and smack a buldge down about 1/4". I then however stuck a hemi head on the driver's side and found that the hydroboost won't allow for the room needed to mount the valve covers.


I'm going to run to the laser cutters this week or early next week and see about getting another brackets cut for clock the hydroboost counter clockwise 90*. This will allow me the extra space I want to have to install and remove the valve covers. I'm also going to have to have a bracket made to clock the master back 90* in the other direction so it mounts flush.

Riddler

[Riddler]

Well I was able to get to the laser cutter to get my new improved 3rd gen hemi hydroboost brackets. This setup requires a 3/8" spacer plate and a 90* master cylinder bracket (1/8") on top of a new hydroboost bracket with the notch on the bottom to clock the hydroboost. I'm hoping to get some mockup pictures soon.



I'm sort of working on two ends of the car at once. I'm working on getting the trunk wrapped up as well as the body. For the truck I bought an electric trunk release. I'm not 100% sure how it works yet but I do plan on bench testing and hopefully playing with it in the car.


I then moved on to finally getting the floor completed. I've still got about half more to do but the main portion of the tunnel is completed. Just want to say that the T56 trans is HUGE!

First I spent time making a template till I was 100% happy with it.



I then moved on to tracing the template to 16 gauge sheet metal.



Finally I burned the sheet metal template into position. I'm still planning to clean the welds. I'm also planning to remove the engine and trans and complete the tunnel on the underside.




While I realize this might not be the way you would of done it, this is the way I chose to and it works for what I have in mind. Now to mock up the rear panel and a small sliver of metal for the passenger floor board and the floor should be done.

Riddler

[Riddler]

Well I'm super happy to annouce the floor is completly solid once again. I'd got to get some more seam seal and then lay that down and some POR15 inside and under the car the new tunnel is done.

This was a much bigger job than I expected and much larger than the mini-tub anyday!

Here's the final pics.

You can see small holes here from rust. I cut that out and replaced it.


Banged all the metal flat again the new floor, welded it and then used clamping plyers to hold the seams together while I welded them shut.




Here's the hole I made and replaced with new metal. This was super thin and I couldn't get the welder low enough to weld the holes shut without making more holes.


The final look before seam seal, POR15 and then sound deadener.



So the next things I'm going to work on are:

Shorten Steering Column
Fit hydroboost
Make base for the drive by wire gas pedal
Extend the fuel filler neck.

Riddler

[Riddler]

So believe it or not I found some time today to work on the car. While I didn't get a ton done I have actually touched the car for the first time in 6 weeks. Work and family life have been time consuming.

First thing I did was fabricate a gas pedal mount. I wanted something a little stronger to weld to the floor other than just nut and bolting the pedal to the sheet metal.





This gas pedal is an LX hemi gas pedal. If anyone wants one of the mounts just ask, I can have more cut. Tapping the holes and welding studs in will be an extra cost.

While my drill was charging I decided to finally finish painting the floor with POR15. I now know I'm goint to have to purchase some more POR15 as my gallon is almost gone. I'm guessing I can finish with a quart...




Well I'll keep working on the car over the winter and hopefully be ready for paint by the spring... Let's hope I can afford it.

Riddler

[Riddler]

Well I ended up finding about two and half hours to work on the car today. I ended up using the first 30 minutes to clean up since it's been a at least a month since I've done really anything.

I decided I wanted more room for the hemi underhood and I "borrowed" tincup's inner fender mod idea.

Here's the before...






As you can see everything outlined in black I'm planned to remove and weld flat panels in. I'm also going to remove everything from the firewall that's no longer needed.

Here's where I started...




Well I guess it's time to put some metal back.




As you can see I cut it really low giving me the maximum amount of room for the big ole Hemi underhood.

Here's how I'm going to solve the hole required for the alterKtion.


Once it's all welded in I'll break out the short hair fiberglass and make it look perfect.

Riddler

[Riddler]

I found some more time today as my wife took our son for dinner with friends. I started by burning in the plates for the chassis stiffening bars I made.



I then went ahead and filled all the holes in the inner fender. I'm planning to make it nice and smooth. Fiberglass with assist in that.



Afterwards I grinded down all the welds and made them look much better. It's ready for fiberglass and primer. The little bump is to help cover the top of the alterktion crossmember as I cut the panel too low. Now to match up the other side.



Finally took some time to fit the bar and burn it in. I can see how these stiffen up the car.



My plan is to seam seal this side and get it ready for POR15 or rocker guard. Haven't decided which one.

As soon as I find more time I'll get the driver's side done.

Riddler

[Riddler]

Well I'm mostly done welding up the metal around the engine bay. Enough that I could remove the front and rear suspension parts and take them to my new sponsor JP Coatings (http://www.jpcoatings.com) in Monroe, MI. Jeff know's his coating and can even do ceramic. If you want the number to JP Coating it's on his site or PM me.

Now onto the pictures..

Here are some of the parts stripped down to bear metal.






Now onto the coated pictures. I did the RMS K frame and my custom T56 crossbrace in Chrome powdercoat.


The rest of my parts were done in Tiger Anthracite. Beautiful color!


These covers were from an 03 Hemi and were heavy pitted. Came out pretty good for not really doing anything other than blasting.


Here are the 2 colours next to each other.




I can't wait to go back and have more done.

Riddler

[Riddler]

So I finally found some time to do an update. Most of what I'm showing you is from the last two weeks. After I had all the suspension powdercoated by Jeff's Powder Coating in Monroe, MI, I had to clean every thread. This is slow and tedious work....

Everything went well uptill I started threading in the heim joints into the upper control arms. The driver's arm had some media dust in it and while threading the heim joint in I managed to gall the threads. After about five hours of cursing and heating the part, the heim joint locked up and not even two grow men hanging off a pipe could loosen it. We did manage to loosen the vice off my work bench.

Here's the upper control arm. You can see the powdercoating is gone from the torches we used. This part is garbage!



I just want to say that Bill at Reilly Motorsports has top notch customer service and sent me out another upper control arm. I'll remember to soak all the heims in anti-seize from now on!

Here's the assembly I have done upto this point.



Now just remember each bolt hole and such had to be cleaned of powder.

Finally I needed a tool to screw in ball joints. This is what I had made by my laser cutter. I figured a nice 1/4" piece of steel would be better than the aluminum ones that another company sells.



Riddler

[Riddler]

Well here the info and pictures I missed from the last update. Goes to show I've actually done more work than whats posted.

I posted a while back that I bought the Duster specific Corbeau seat brackets. I was hoping that they would just bot in but that's never the case.

Here are the seat brackets and as you can see they don't fit my 1976 Duster floor that has the area for the cat converter. First is the driver's side and you can see the tabs don't line up with the holes and the bracket is at about a 30* angle. Passenger side is about the same. One hole doesn't line up and the main bracket interfers with the floor.



Instead of cutting the floor out I chose to modify the brackets which was really simple. The white lines you see is where the brackets interfer with the floor. You can also see the tabs I had to cut off and reweld.



Now the last things to to do with the seat brackets is to get them re-powder coated and bolt them in. Once that's done I'll tack weld the nuts on under the car so its easier to install the seats.

Here are the rest of the engine bay pics. I've completed the Tincup mod for the strut towers and makes for a ton of room.





Here's the engine bay as it sits.


I'm saving up for my evaporator box from Vintage Air and then I plan to smooth out the firewall and relocate the wiper motor. A smooth firewall is sexy!

Riddler

[Riddler]

I spent some more time this weekend at the powdercoaters. I have to say I love this place.

This time I went over as he needed a smal hand around the shop. I took with me my seat brackets and wiper linkage.

Here's the pictures of that stuff. Before



After




So today after work I decided I wanted to put the seats in. So in they went. Needed to trim only two plates where the holes were.




I then went ahead and started planning the firewall. My plan is to make it as clean as I can. I took this pictures and labeled it. The large "X" are getting shaved (welded up). The question marks and numbers are the holes I don't know what they are. Can you guys be of some help?



Now remember I'm going protouring and I'll be using modern electronics and a Vintage Air kit for my hvac.

Riddler