Passenger fender UGGH!

In my last blog I was going to work on the passenger fender next.  

This is the only fender on the whole car that is still original to the car.  So I wanted to do my best at preserving it and restore it.   I was sort of excited to finally work on a part of the car that had some hidden code or maybe a marking.  With most Mustang's this age, the lower back of the fender would get clogged with road grime and eventually rust.  This one was patched with a panel. 

Found the patch panel and a ton of body filler. I think this fender weighed 20lbs more than the other.  Okay, 10 pounds.  Odd, why the crazy panel welding.  

All that filler is hiding something.

Looks like the same work as the body shop that did the floors. 

New panels welded on top of old rusted ones. 

 And this big sink hole.

 At this point I wanted to give up on even trying to save it.

 The moon has a better landscape.  

The reason why the panel was not fully extended to the back was the fact that they didn't even trim off the front lip of the patch panel.  Slap it on, slather on the filler.

The inside support of the fender is not that bad.

 I bought a new patch and the inside support bottom half.  Not real happy with the metal work of the patch.  It's much thicker than the original. But I moved forward to make my cuts.

 Cut, grind, cut. 

New panel tack welded.

 I only cut off the rusted part and kept the wheel well lip.

I removed the whole support so I could get into the edge to metal bump the lunar landing / moon crater of a fender.

Reassemble the support structure.

Fitting the lower inner support.

 Brought the old one out for measurement.

Lower support welded in place and fixing the edge lip.

After hours and hours of fitting / alignment / cursing / and filler / sanding and paint I think I got it.  Not real happy with the fit so far. 

Side by side, left and right fender.  Very close.  I will know more when I put the doors on and test fit.

If you are wondering why the fenders are a dark brown, I found the bottom coat of paint / primer while stripping the paint off and I always found this color as the base coat in the fender, outside the fender and even on other parts of the car.   

Sorry for the late blog, I did this work months ago. 

Fender work

Been a while since I made a post on my blog.  Promise you I have not been slacking, but held up with other issues.  I will do my best to get you up to date.

I went to tackle the fenders, and thought they would be simple strip, and prime.  LOL!  As we all know it never works like that.  I started with the Driver side since it was replaced when the car was in a wreak.  Looks pretty obvious from all the body work it was hit from behind, went off the road and hit a tree on the drivers side.  They fixed it up and found a victim to buy it. My guess is I am victim number 2 since the people I bought it from had it for a while due to the amount of crud under the fenders etc..

 I start to remove the paint with a wire wheel on a drill.

 I put plastic on the garage door, and hung sheets to help with the dust and vacuum up when done.

I figured it was a new fender and a paper tag on the inside showed it came from a Ford dealer in Delaware.  Which makes sense because I bought the car in Maryland which is close.

As I get to the front of the fender, I find body filler.  They had filler all over the hood in this area.

 Removal of the filler and I find damage to a new fender?  

More filler. 

 I removed the headlight bucket area so I could repair the damage to the front

Welded back in place.

The front edge was a mess.

 Add metal

Shape.

Primer.

Test fit the extension.

 Needs more work.

Shaving the metal

Looking much better.  

Prime the front.

 I found the fender anchor was missing so I welded one in.

I am finishing up the other fender now so look forward to an update.

More Hood pics and on to the Fenders! Yay!

Last blog I was still working on the hood.  Here is the pics of the final work and priming stage.

Tip looked worse before.  Sharpie works great for pointing out the area that need attention.

Add a little metal to the low areas.

Cleaned up and ready for some primer.

Prep and paint.

Remember the inside of the hood when I cut away the skeleton?  Protection being applied.

A little more prep work needed.  The green spray is from the frame coating.

I use a heater under the hood to help the paint dry.  Don't spray with the heater on though. 

Looking better.

More prep on the top.

I brought the hood down to the basement without taking a pic.  Here is the outside edge of the hood.

The inside edge.

Finished.  Because of the pin holes from the rust I replaced one of the oblong holes towards the tip of the hood.

When I cleaned off the hood with the wire wheel, it ate away at the set up putty between the skeleton and the skin.  I reapplied the putty with some Permatex form-a-gasket sealer and lifting up the panel to apply the putty.  Worked well.

On to the fenders!  Another challenge!  Ugg :-(