Matt's '60 Chevy Impala Sport Sedan

[_Matt]

Carrying on from a little over a year ago, finished up the Wilwood caliper adapters.

More rust repairs underway. I think 2 or 3 out of 4 doors needed some sort of repair at the bottom, this one being the biggest/worst.

Rear trunk channel was a bit crusty under the seal too.

Fuel filler tunnel had a bit at the bottom.

The parcel tray had some butchering done previously to fit some speakers, so cut that out and made a new one. Made to suit a couple of 6x9's and some of Dads and Brennan's finned speaker covers.

The firewall originally had a separate cover that was removable that the heater bolted to, it wasn't really needed so made a panel to weld in to smooth it out a it.

The front radiator panel wasn't symmetrical where the battery clamp originally bolted to, so fixed that up since the battery isn't going to be mounted there anymore.

Pressed some louvres into the panel too, to allow for a bit more airflow into the air filter. Filled a bunch of unused holes too.

Mounted the airbag stuff in the boot.

Since the LS1 has an aircon pump, I thought I may as well use that to fill the airtank. Machined up an aluminium adapter to bolt to it and output a couple of hose barbs for the inlet and outlet.

[_Matt]

Over the Christmas break a year ago, I built some stainless headers for it.
Pretty sure they were very close to equal length on the L/H side, but to make the look symmetrical-ish they weren't quite so close on the other side.

Made an aluminium 4" tube intake pipe to adapt to the biggest K&N filter I could find.

This was the point where this car was the last it's going to look like a car for some time. Looking back, probably should of just kept it how it was, got it going and enjoyed it for a bit.

But then one day, I decided to strip the paint off.

[_Matt]

This is about where I bought another '60 Chevy.
I was originally after some sort of 59-60 GM wagon before I bought the flattop, and this came up as a good deal after multiple price drops.

Long story short, spent 7-8 months cutting out rust, welding new bits in and getting it ready for compliance.

At the beginning of the year it finally got complied, wof'd and reg'd!
Might start a build thread for it sometime.

[_Matt]

After the wagon was legal the plan was to get the flattop fully signed off on the repair cert. It had already had a check over once all the repairs had been done, just needed to be coated in some sort of rust preventative on the body, panels and chassis, so I was told. The repair certifier I had used was finishing up at the end of March. A couple of months to get it all stripped, blasted and epoxied, and then roughly bolted back togehter sounded easy enough. 
Got the body all stripped bare, dragged it to the blasters and then off to work to finish stripping what paint was left and blast a few bits a bit better.

2k epoxied and back home. Then emailed the repair certifier to get clarity on what needs doing to be signed off. He replied back saying NZTA won't let us get it signed off until it's at the compliance stage eg: a running, driving complete car. How dumb!
At least the short deadline gave me a good push to get the body blasted and coated.

Had the chassis blasted and epoxied as well. Doors and boot lid also done but no pics.

[_Matt]

Over a year ago I stripped the bumpers, repaired the dents, filed and sanded the bumpers to get rechromed. The repro grill guards were pretty average pressings, so made them fit the bumpers better, and smoothed all the harsh grinding marks out too.

Have so far sent every fastener, clip and component that'll be going back on the car and not replaced with new or be painted.

Made up some radiator panel covers on the pullmax. Also cad'd up a coil/rocker cover and 3d printed. Will get some cast at a later date.

Rounded off the top corners of the radiator as they just didn't look right. Made a powersteering reservoir and coolant overflow each side of the radiator also.

Radiator shroud done with some rubber flaps.

Decided I didn't like how the firewall looked, the heater motor sticking through, wiper motor visible and the seam through it. So made up some wooden bucks and swaged one out on the pullmax.

Old firewall cutout. Recessed the cowl drain flange to suit the new swages. Fitted new wiper motor (old Toyota Celsior one) so it would sit in a similar spot to factory but behind the firewall.

Screwed it all in place with panelbond between the new panel and the flanges, to seal it all up.

Went through and plugged welded up all the screw holes and welded up the outside edge.

New wiper motor mount.

Backside. The panelbond worked well to seal it up.

[_Matt]

I think I've said multiple times that this is rust free now, but there keeps being more pop up!
After blasting showed up these holes in the lower a-pillar/cowl area.

Was a bit worse than expected once I cut the outer off. That's the backside of the lower hinge mount, so had to be fixed to a decent standard.

3d scanned, cad'd and 3d printed a press die to punch out a new panel to repair the hinge pocket backer.  A bit of prestretching and shrinking and it worked really well.

All repaired and painted in KBS.

Outer repaired and welded back in.

Otherside was a touch worse on the inside compared to the outside.

The heater core needed repairing and would of set me back at least a few hundred dollars, so went though Rockauto and found a Toyota Camry heater core for sub $100 that would work with some slight modes.
Had to lengthen the core housing for it to fit and then drew up a new front mesh to suit.

New heater mounts welded in and a 3d printed outlet or some adjustability on the vent.

Over Easter I got the front panels blasted and all in epoxy primer. On to getting the panels all aligned best I can and gapping it right.

Made up a battery mount for in the boot  behind the r/h rear wheel tub.

See you in another year for an update haha