I "inherited" this job from a friend who started it, and later moved away. Unfortunately, the prep and some of the work wasn't up to standard, so I had to reweld, and hammer/dolly a lot of the old work. As for the "Kustom" part: The usual nosing, decking, shaved door handles. Tunneled antenna. I fabbed up a tube grill out of square tubing, to be different. I also cut the tubing in half, and used it to make a similar look at the rear of the car. I sunk the license plate into the lower bumper panel, as well as having the exhaust exit there, after welding up the huge back-up light holes.
The car was pretty low mileage, so we just disassembled it, rebuilt brakes/suspension, and cleaned and painted the engine and trans.
1961 Olds Kustom
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Joined: Fri Feb 03, 2017 7:36 am Country: USA |
I've been working on this Olds for a few years, on and off, and it's almost ready for paint, so these pics are old news.
The entire center of one of the doors was rotten, so I had to fabricate new sheet metal for it. I filled the firewall hole for the stock heater, made some other changes, too. painted it, and the wheel wells Candy Pagan Gold. |
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Made a custom power steering reservoir, to tuck inside the wheel well. On the engine, I put the AC compressor where the generator was, an alternator, where the PS pump was, and used a Corvette small pump. Lots of detail on the engine, including a smoothed off intake manifold. Made and air filter housing from scratch as well, following the shape of the cove on the quarter panel. With a grill opening to mimic the square tube grill on the car.
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Wow, some very nice detail work. Good job.
cheers Good judgement comes from experience, and often experience comes from bad judgement.
Yugoslavia '94' , Israel/Syria '99 , Bosnia '02 , Afghanistan '08-'09 |
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More details:
Made some tail light lenses. We are using Lucas style headlites up front, very popular in the early 60's on customs. The ones with the diffuser cone in the center of the headlight. I decided to make tail light lenses to match. Red Plexi, clamped into a form, heated in the oven, blown up with compressed air, then a chrome bullet trimmed and glued in. Tunneled antenna. Candy Pagan Gold dash, being pinstriped but the great Anthony White. Steering wheel being restored. |
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Joined: Tue Sep 16, 2008 1:17 pm Location: Pahrump NV. Country: USA |
Very cool stuff
Love the air cleaner and the Tail lights! and Grill. Would really like to know more about how you did that with the Tail lights ? Did you have to control the air pressure with a Regulator? or just hit it with a air gun till it looked about right? what was Oven temp ? how long do you leave in oven before hitting it with air? I have just as many questions on the air cleaner, Did you use a wood form or steal? I am still having problems getting steel to role over like that on the inlet, very cool. Dennis B.
A&P Mechanic, FCC General radio Telephone Operator Line Maintenance A&P Mechanic and MOC Tech specialist. |
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Joined: Tue Jun 09, 2015 12:11 pm Location: Cleveland/Fort Myers Beach, FL Country: USA |
Very cool, nice work!
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Dennis, about the tail lights: I just looked up the melting point of the material I used, don't remember if it was plexi, acrylic or lexan, and set the over for about 20* below it. I did use a regulator, to slowly bring up the air pressure, and had to heat it up a second time to get the correct profile, I guess the incoming air cooled it quickly.
I used a non-contact thermometer to check the temp before pulling the tail light out and hooking it up to the air.. The front of the airfilter housing I just used the old trick of welding a piece of brake tubing on it to get a nice rolled edge. When working on a customer's car , often I can't use complicated, or time consuming techniques to do the job, it would cost too much. |
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Seems I lost about half the build pics I had on the computer.
So, on to paint! Orion Silver, as a base, with Pagan gold over it. But in the body cove, I mixed the Silver with a tiny bit of root beer candy concentrate, for a subtle 2 tone. First shoot came out blotchy, so I cut it back to primer and did it again. with my Iwata LPH 400. Much better! |
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I've been away from here for quite a while, had 2 surgeries on my hand, and it's been very frustrating getting anything done! With the help of a couple friends who come by on weekends, we finally got the Olds finished. Unfortunately, the owner passed away back in May. So now it goes to his family or estate. Thought I'd share the finish pics with you before it goes away.
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