Building my first car. 66 Malibu 4D

[1930fordpickup]

Looks great Dave. Always nice to see those normal cars built. 

[Dave72]

17 hours ago, 1930fordpickup said:

Looks great Dave. Always nice to see those normal cars built. 

Thanks Andy! I appreciate it. Just finishing up on removing the molded in rocker trim, then add the drip rail, and finally into paint hopefully soon!

[Dave72]

Finally got back doing some work on this fun project. Removed the last part of the molded in rocker rear quarter moldings. I added new drip rails with .025 styrene round rod. After all of these years in the hobby, I took a tip from one of you guys here on the forum and used Tamiya Extra Thin Cement. This stuff is fantastic!!! Used it when adding the drip rail and been using it on numerous other builds. I know I’m a little late to the party on that one! 

[Dave72]

Finally a full coat of primer to see all of the imperfections. Spotted a few, hence the spots of glazing putty. I see I missed a spot! Now to add the .040 styrene to the back window for the glass trim. Let me know what you think. Good or bad. Suggestions or tips.

[Biggu]

Wow, that is really coming along nicely ! I love this..... watching with great interest....

Jeff

[Dave72]

9 hours ago, Biggu said:

Wow, that is really coming along nicely ! I love this..... watching with great interest....

Jeff

Thanks Jeff! I appreciate the compliment. Just ordered the Artesian Turquoise paint. Getting closer and closer to that stage. 

[espo]

I like how you have done this conversion. At this point you would never know this body started out as a two door hardtop. 

[Biggu]

To my old weak eye, it is the roof line that nails this conversion...... before you finish the build, you should resin cast a few of these just for giggles...... ?

[Dave72]

3 hours ago, espo said:

I like how you have done this conversion. At this point you would never know this body started out as a two door hardtop. 

Thanks David! I very much appreciate the compliment. It’s not perfect to the actual 1:1 but I’m pretty happy the way it’s turning out just using reference pics. Just gotta add the rear window trim yet and I think I’ll be done with filing and grinding!  I found the grill, bumpers, and stock hood conversion kit from Hart’s Parts Resin. Gotta get that yet. 

 

2 hours ago, Biggu said:

To my old weak eye, it is the roof line that nails this conversion...... before you finish the build, you should resin cast a few of these just for giggles...... ?

Thank you very much Jeff! I have dabbled in resin casting some small parts in the past but casting a whole body is way out of my league! 

[TransAmMike]

Fantastic job on the window frames and drip rail Dave. Again, so many of you guys' do amazing work?

[Spottedlaurel]

That looks excellent, like it was always meant to be that way.

[espo]

I have used Hart's Parts before to recreate my 1:1 '67 El Camino and found his parts to have an excellent finish and fit perfectly. 

[Dave72]

22 hours ago, TransAmMike said:

Fantastic job on the window frames and drip rail Dave. Again, so many of you guys' do amazing work?

 

20 hours ago, Spottedlaurel said:

That looks excellent, like it was always meant to be that way.

 

45 minutes ago, espo said:

I have used Hart's Parts before to recreate my 1:1 '67 El Camino and found his parts to have an excellent finish and fit perfectly. 

Thank guys for the compliments! Much appreciated. Good to know on Hart’s Parts! Their stuff does look pretty nice.

[wrenchr]

Very nice job Dave!!! 

[GLMFAA1]

Nice project. My brother bought my mother a brand new 1966 Chevelle Malibu 283 automatic. we had the car in the family until last year with 58,000 mile on it. Many a time my mother came out of church and found notes on her car from wanted buyers.

A real four door 66 Chevelle project is on YouTube where a mechanic is dropping a Jaguar v12 in it. Interesting is that he states that only 19,000 4 door Chevelles were built in 1966 as opposed to 129,000 2 door Chevelles. Seems your model is going to be as rare as the real cars.

greg

[Dave72]

1 hour ago, wrenchr said:

Very nice job Dave!!! 

 

50 minutes ago, GLMFAA1 said:

Nice project. My brother bought my mother a brand new 1966 Chevelle Malibu 283 automatic. we had the car in the family until last year with 58,000 mile on it. Many a time my mother came out of church and found notes on her car from wanted buyers.

A real four door 66 Chevelle project is on YouTube where a mechanic is dropping a Jaguar v12 in it. Interesting is that he states that only 19,000 4 door Chevelles were built in 1966 as opposed to 129,000 2 door Chevelles. Seems your model is going to be as rare as the real cars.

greg

Very much appreciate the compliments. A friend of mine at work just acquired a 66 Chevelle SS396 4speed from his dad. Needs restoration but is a driver. I love that car!     My Grandma’s/ my car, I can see why only 19,000 were made in 66. Not that attractive of an automobile! Funny, now being out of high school for 30 years, I kinda wish I still had that car! By the way, putting a Jaguar V12 in a Chevelle IMHO is sacrilegious!!!! But, to each his own! LOL! 

[1972coronet]

WOW !! That conversion is coming along nicely ! 

That 19,000 four doors -to- 129,000 two doors seems about right . In my 50 years , I've seen more 2 doors (including a few of the 300 Deluxe Coupes) than I have 4 doors .

[Repstock]

Looking forward to seeing it in paint!

[Dave72]

1 hour ago, Repstock said:

Looking forward to seeing it in paint!

Thanks Tom. I can only hope it turns out half as good as yours did! 

[charlie8575]

What an incredibly nice conversion you did on this. I'm looking forward to seeing the rest.

Charlie Larkin

[Dave72]

Back on this little gem! Doing some work on the interior. I found someone selling the interior parts I needed from the Lindbergh Chevelle kit to make another bench seat for the front. I cut the seat base from the rear interior panel for the base of the new front bench seat and shaped the area a little more where it fits around the trans tunnel. I added some styrene pieces to the curved cut outs on the seat to make the sides solid and then added some angle to the back edge. I then added a piece of sheet styrene to close up the back. I also filled in the area of the trans tunnel where the floor shifter would have been. Looking pretty good I think.

[Dave72]

Upon further review of some reference pics, I had to add a little curve leading up to the bottom of the rear window. I added a piece of .060 styrene with the flat of it parallel to the angle of the rear pillars. Then I began the filling and smoothing process! Much easier on a 1:1 car! Had to be very careful not to sand on the top edges of the rear quarters. I covered them with painters tape during that process.  As soon as this is done, I’ll add in the window trim with .040 styrene square rod. 

[doorsovdoon]

Nice work, man. I'm liking this!

[Dave72]

Thanks Gareth! I finally got the rear window trim done, final coat of primer and now I need to find the time to final sand and paint! 

[Tom Geiger]

I think I know where some of them went! Back in 1969-72 I lived on a US Army post in Germany. We lived in a four family house and the local head of the American Red Cross lived upstairs from us. All their staff cars were 66 or 67 medium blue Chevelle 4 door sedans. 

I doubt any survived because American forces destroyed obsolete vehicles because they couldn’t go on the local market.

Edited January 21, 2021 by Tom Geiger