Erasing the wrinkles

April, 2008 - Back from the Media-Blaster - she took it all off!! All the undercoat, wheels, steering and suspension and panels are clean as a whistle. At least now it is all one color - metal. Unfortunately, she found more holes in the driver's floor, cowl panel, rear window channel, truck opening, trunk floor and lid and, a surprise to me, the bottom of one door skin. Oh well...






































Night before John's 53rd Birthday - what a way to deal with middle age crisis! Welding and grinding the pinholes.


























Note how much Augie loves welding! I'm doing this for my dog (let's not forget that large dog area that AMC designed into the back of this two-seater.)

Off to the Media-Blaster

AMX takes its second ride in a year and a half on Paul's ramp truck. The lady at Specialty Stripping says "Our best customers just let us do our job." Sounds good to me.

Floors & Fender

More welding on the the floors. I decided to do the patch method since the holes were only here & there. I used the pointy body hammer to find the evil weak spots & cut sheet metal to fit. The metal was cut to fit the holes exactly (yeah right) & butt welded. Lucky for me the mig welder is a tool I'm comfortable with (how to make a car out of .023 wire).

The left front fender on this rig is from a 1970 car. I had already cut out a 68-69 side marker light recess from the Javelin I got the roof from. In 1970 the marker was flush with the fender. I measured, cut & butt welded in the recessed section. I also welded up the 2 badge retainer holes on the aft section behind the wheel well & that makes the 68-69 fender.

Why would anyone remove a lower radiator support?

Half inch square stock and upside down upper radiator support are welded in to replace MIA lower radiator support... finally.


















Finish welding and grinding the roof. Leftover from last year. Yeah, I'm buying time before another attack at the rear floor buckets. But, I did win two bids on E-Bay for standard shift pedal cluster and assorted standard shift tranny brackets last Tuesday. Yippeee!!

12/18/07: Javelin hood time again

Latch installation time - it might be a good idea to see if things line up. Out to the back shed to drag out the Javelin hood, freed up the seized hinges (sure one of the springs popped off and nearly missed hitting my head) and with Rick F's help, got it installed. Pretty close, don't forget to keep 3 1/4" between the radiator core and bottom of the lower arm of the latch bracket. And, believe it or not, my fabrication was right on the money! Lucky...
P.S. It is snowing like hell outside. This could be a distraction.



Hood up!













Hood down, time to plow again and rake the roof(s), YUK!!!

12/2/07: Fitting lower radiator support

These are the extra reinforcements previously mentioned. These pieces of square stock fit perfectly behind the used upper support about to be flipped over and installed in the lower support position.
























Fresh off the '71 Javelin, cut and ready.













Hey look, it fits! Ouch, vicious dog attack.