Just in time, the new rear panel turned up. Admittedly just a rear valance would normally have done, but someone had replaced the valence in the past so everything was a complete mess and it seemed more logical to replace the rear panel whole. This consists of the valance and the area between the rear wings below the tailgate.

That morning I had drilled out the spot welds that held the rear panel to the rear wings, and cut off the old valance. I had cleaned and primed all the remaining flanges, and adjusted and repaired the flanges on the ends of the rear chassis rails. Holes had also been drilled in the rear of the boot floor for plug welding to the new valance, so all was ready.




Yip-Yay. Fully repaired inner and outer rear wings, leaded at the top. The rear panel has been removed, it's obvious what it welds onto. My new rear axle has just arrived as well, note it's made a huge puddle of oil all over the floor already, so it's a good'un. Actually it's nearly new, to replace my old one which shredded itself. And the car too, nearly.

The panel turned up and it was quickly unwrapped and the Heritage paint removed and the edges primed. A bit of tweaking and fitting and it was possible to slot it into place, a bit of a fiddle because it goes behind the rear wings sandwiched between wing and boot floor extension.

There it is in place, all new and lovely. The interior still looks an awful mess with the flash rust etc, although it won't be long now....

Weldy time, most of it was attached apart from the seam welds between valance and wing which I decided to do once the car was mounted on the spit again for painting. Final grinding of the welds, will take place later, as more work was required making the small panels which fit underneath the light cluster.

Now the rear panel was on, she was starting to look very car-like again. Some lead loading would be required, to make the joins between rear wing and rear panel seamless (some cars had a visible vertical line at the join each side, some had them filled in, including mine) and over the rear wing/valance join, which also needed to be seamless. This was also to be done when the car was on the spit, as it is a lot easier lead loading on a horizontal surface than a vertical one!

This is the rear wing to rear valance join. It has a small overlap which would have been spot welded originally, but I have seamed from the outside, flipped her over, and seamed rom the inside. Smoothed down, it's time for some lead. Nothe the area under the rear light cluster still needs more work, this will be done later as the spit brackets get right in the way.

Solder paint....

And some lead. After all the practice, I can use the minimum of lead to get the right shape, meaning less has to be filed away. Filing then sanding will still be required of course.

In the evening, with the rear end now as solid as it had ever been, she was hoiked up and put on the spit again. Careful placement of the spare wheel and a couple of blocks of wood meant I could tip her over 90 degrees from horizontal and rest the top of the A post on the wheel and blocks to keep the shell from rotating any further. It was then easy to roll the shell up to horizontal again, kick the spare wheel over the other side, walk around the car holding it steady all the time, then lowering it down on the other side. Thus in less than a minute I could single handedly roll the whole lot one way or another, resting on whichever A post was downwards. This was safe and sturdy enough, there is not a great deal of force exerted on the A post and indeed the shell could be lifted up and over easily and comfortably. If shoving, hammering or other such violent activity was to take place, the locking bracket provided with the spit could be bolted on for added safety.

The spit proved its worth over and over again. Firstly there were the last repairs to make to the rear chassis rails, and the rear axle check strap mounts to weld in place. The plate at the back of the transmission tunnel between the floors had been removed so I could chisel off some of the layers of rust, and now I could weld it back on then cut off the temporary spacer I had welded beside it to remove the possibility of anything shifting. Final welding of castle rails to floor and rear spring hangers took place. More grinding, then the removal of underseal, paint and rust from the rear battery boxes, which was a lot of work. Deeming it a waste of time trying to get the battery boxes perfect, due to their intricacies and difficult corners, I removed as much rust as possibly then used Rustbuster’s rust converter, and when dried I removed any excess from clean steel. The rust converter chemically anchors to any remaining surface rust, stops further corrosion taking place and can then be overpainted. It is very effective over rust, and grips very well.

The entire underside was now bare metal, apart from small areas in etch primer which would do no harm. I went over the whole thing with various types of wire brushes and poly wheels in the drill, followed by a going over with a coarse twist knot brush in the grinder to give a slightly less-than-smooth surface for the paint to key into. Ready for paint underneath, at flipping last.

Oh yes. I wish I had had the time to get some better photos of the bare metal underside, however time is not for wasting at this stage.

Looking almost liquid.... Everything seen here is my work, apart from most of the transmission tunnel.

All work listed above was immensely easy once I had the car on the spit. It must have been turned over a lot more than 100 times while finishing off underneath, so I could weld or grind from above, or get into difficult areas far more easily with the drill and brush. And if it was useful then, it was to prove a blessing during painting the underside.