Ace-Garageguy

The odds of a general-service collision-repair shop even knowing what to do are staggeringly small. The car is a unibody, so structural rust issues need to be addressed by completely removing the affected elements on the factory spot-welds, and new panels and members built up as the factory intended. Doing this right can run into really serious money. And scabbing in slabs of steel plate and angle-iron, as is the common "repair" in situations like this, is patently unsafe if the damage is close to any suspension attachment points. HOWEVER...if the rust is just, say, some holes in the trunk floor from water ingress, and not in the primary load-bearing structure, then somebody ought to be able to do something for reasonable money.

It's entirely possible for those rear bushings to appear "ripped" and be perfectly serviceable...which means functionally fine. And the sway bar bushings can look fine to the uninitiated, and rattle and bang to beat all hell when the car's going down the road. Plus, never assume any dealer will use OEM parts. I've been in the business now for over 5 decades, know all the scams, and was trying to maybe save you some money. Buyer beware...because contrary to what people want to believe, the majority of car-repair shops are crooked, incompetent, or both. https://www.simple-car-answers.com/Dealership-Parts-Scam.html PS: My long-time PT client would have spent at least five thousand bucks on "necessary" repairs that were either mis-diagnosed or fraudulently recommended if she'd not always brought the thing to me for a second opinion. Control arm bushings, an engine management computer, power steering pump and rack, catalytic converter, wheel bearings, and most recently a complete transmission some thieves tried to sell her when she only needed one sensor.

You may want to look again. Though the method above fails to account verbally for the difference in a nominal rim diameter (tire seating surface) and the measured outside rim diameter, it's there.

I envy you having a new one. All of mine were tired when I got them, but after engine rebuilds with new seals, naturally, I also found them to be tough little buggers, mostly leak-free.

The factory oil cooler is visible in that first photograph, directly under the alternator. You can also see how the belt has to turn 90 degrees. Early cars could be prone to throwing them, as already stated, but factory fixes and aftermarket tensioners improved reliability. As the belt drives the charging system, when it goes you get a big red light on the dash. It means stop. One cause of "overheating" related engine failures was thermostatically controlled cooling doors, or the bellows that controlled a "ring" on the fan in early cars...but these were largely seen on abused or very high-mileage cars. Turbo cars used a pressure-retard distributor to limit ignition timing advance while under boost. A failure, or somebody trying to get more power without understanding the possible consequences, could easily result in holes melted right through piston crowns from destructive detonation. Also attributed wrongly to "overheating".

Boy...I'd go if I could. All those in one place would really be something to see.

As an engineer who is also an artist, I can certainly understand your comment. Most people seeing a flat disc in an illustration aren't going to identify it as an incoming missile, nor are their minds going to automatically interpret a nose-down attitude as defining a trajectory that will miss. That is, however, an entirely different species of fruit.

I believe there's either some confusion as to terminology, or somebody's just getting dishonestly hosed. While it is certainly possible for control arm bushings to fail at 66k, in my experience, it's highly unlikely unless the car is abused, hitting every chuckhole and speed bump going stupid fast. I have a client with a 2001 PT Cruiser I've maintained from new. 200,000 miles on the clock. What is notorious for failing early on those is the SWAY BAR bushings, NOT the control arm bushings. The sway bar bushings literally fall out, allowing the sway bar to rattle and clunk against the frame so bad you'd swear the thing was falling apart under you. A pair of bushings is about $40, and take an hour to put in. Zip, zap, fixed, feels like a new car again...still at 200,000 miles. Sway bar end links, also cheap and easy to replace, are also often mis-diagnosed as control arm bushings. Inner tie-rod ends on PTs are another early source of front end rattles and shakes over rough roads, and tipsy steering. In the rear, there is a Watts-link that locates the rear axle side-to-side. The center bushing in those fails early too, again making you think the car is disintegrating on anything but a glass-smooth road. The entire link is about $50, a little harder to do than the front sway-bar bushings. This is another one of those areas where being able to do your own work can save you lotsa money, especially considering how many dishonest and just flat incompetent "mechanics" are out there now. When the control-arm bushings do finally go, complete control arms are available with bushings included. Most shops and DIYers are simply not technically competent to replace just the bushings, which requires using a press, so the high cost is for replacing the complete arms. NOS MOPAR parts are still available for these cars, and in most cases, they are FAR superior to cheap Chinese-made knockoffs.

Always reminds me of Tobor the Great for some odd reason.

Wait...huh?... Palindrome...ain't dat da have-gun-will-travel dude?

Muy beautimus.

Rick Dore is credited as having designed most of Hetfield's builds, and working closely with the builders themselves. The '32 project was different, in that Mr. Dore had almost no input in it, other than locating an "original" body which turned out to be a nightmare. The body shell, far from being nice, arrived in black primer covering gallons of bondo. It had been hacked together from several shells apparently, and was so badly warped that getting it to sit on the chassis correctly took a lot of juggling, jacking, twisting, cutting, welding, stretching, and sweat. Josh Mills himself is responsible for all the design work on the '32, including the dead-perfect lines of the custom top, and was given pretty much of a free hand, by Hetfield, to build the car exactly as he wanted. Mills was chosen for the project because of his well-earned reputation as a master of period-correct hot-rod building, and his encyclopedic knowledge of vintage parts. An interesting point...the aluminum cylinder heads on the engine are uber-rare Osiecki parts, actually cast in Atlanta in the late 1940s.

Looks fine to me. I can't see any difference at all. Dammed rivet-counting nit-pickers.

Yeah...I've been getting it too. Seems to have cleared up, though.

Big block or small block? Kinda makes a difference.

Beautiful. Sure wish we still lived in a world where there were car colors other than resale-silver.

This one was built entirely here in Georgia by Josh Mills and his two-man crew, plus Bert Litton who performed all the upholstery work and built much of the custom top. The top has a steel under-structure designed and fabbed by Josh. The car was a contender for America's Most Beautiful Roadster in 2017. Everything not fabricated in the shop during the 3+ years of construction was either vintage (the body shell and frame are real steel gennie '32 Ford), or NOS, with nothing newer than 1949. The car is actually a very dark brown, with the frame and running gear finished in black. This period-perfect piece is a collection of subtle design elements that are largely lost on anyone who's not a 70+ year old rodder who really knows his parts, and though it's turned out to a beautifully high standard, obviously, it's a car that could be built by a real guy in a real garage behind the house. I was privileged to witness the entire process (I had nothing whatsoever to do with this '32 Ford build), as I was employed during the period to build a '33 Plymouth coupe and a '47 Caddy convertible for Josh's clients, in Josh's shop. Working alongside the talented guys who built this thing, who all had the same high standard of commitment to quality, and where cutting corners was an unknown concept, was one of the best times of my life.

Very nice. I've been wondering if I wanted one. You sold me.

Yeah, there's some of that going on, but if you shop wisely there are still plenty of smoking hot deals. There's lots of total ripoffs, too.

Keep a good attitude, try not to worry. My father had 2 uneventful bypass surgeries many years ago, and they're much better at this stuff now. Sure, it's a kinda big deal, but you'll be fine.

Very, very cool.

Thanks. Now I'm going down the internet rabbit hole, trying to get a few good pix. I could almost swear I remember a Pontiac housing in those years that did have a bolt-on rear cover, but I could very well be wrong. It's been a long, long, long time since I've had my hands on one. EDIT: I found a Rodder's Journal article identifying the Olds/Poncho housings and pumpkins. Looks like the pre-'57 housings had a round rear cover stamping, while most of the later housings had the cover with the stamped in ring-gear clearance dimple. Pumpkins on the right. Close enough for model car work.

2nd grade. No wonder kids can't make change from a dollar, or get whether 1/8 is bigger than 1/25...or not.

The Revell SWC Willys was the first in the line. The real car used a truck axle when it was modeled, and the model correctly reflects that with six-bolt wheels. It looks like Revell elected to copy the axle tooling for the Anglia and Thames, but the kits have 5-bolt wheels. Other carry-over tooling is much of the engine, and gearbox. Though there's a lot of talk around about the Anglia and Thames having Olds axles, to the best of my real-car remembry, the desirable '57 and later Olds axle does not have a removable rear cover...as the Anglia and Thames rear ends do. The '56 and earlier Pontiac/Olds axles do have removable rear covers...I believe. EDIT: Maybe not EDIT 2: SEE 2nd POST BELOW So the Anglia kits can probably be said to have pre-'57 Olds/Pontiac rear ends. EDIT: Apparently not...still checking. EDIT 2: SEE 2nd POST BELOW BUT...file the bolt heads off the rear cover on the Thames and Anglia rears, and file the right half of the rear cover flat, and they'll look close enough to a '57 and later Olds/Pontiac to pass. Like zo... For what it's worth, there's plenty of confusion in the real-car world when it comes to positively identifying these old rears, even when there are cast and stamped-in numbers as clues. EDIT: I'll happily be corrected by anybody who actually knows.