'49 Ford glue bomb restoration

[dino246gt]

I'm going to try and build a stock '49 Ford from a bunch of junk I've had for decades!

Here's what's in the box, the green one I've have for over 40 years!

The black one I bought for parts.

[dino246gt]

The first step is to remove the "glass" held in by half a tube of the good old Testor's type of cement!

Well that was AFTER I removed the interior, which was also heavily glued in, of course!

After some scraping and prying the windows broke loose, although in parts, that's okay though as I was going to cut it into pieces anyway.

Then I used the Dremel to grind away the left overs, that old glue really holds!

Finally I cut up some nail file emery boards and wet sanded the headliner mostly smooth, removing ejection marks as well.

Edited April 10, 2022 by dino246gt

[bisc63]

Looks doable!

[dino246gt]

I reshaped the glass units, I'll re-use them as this is not going to be a contest model, just one for the shelf.

I sanded them with a 2500 sanding sponge to remove paint and glue.

Couldn't quite remove the glue that once held a rear view mirror!

I'll just glue a new mirror in the same place!

After sanding some Novus 2 returned the "glass" to as good as new, if not better!

[dino246gt]

I needed the interior, along with other parts, from the parts car, the grey one in the background is missing a floor!

I had to remove the rollbar which left it's mark on the floor.

This type of file helped me get in there to get rid of the glue and rollbar bottoms.

[dino246gt]

The body did need some cleaning up, plus I re-scribed the trunk and door lines.

While I was doing that, I added the line at the bottom of the front fenders to separate them from the rocker panels.

After an overnight soak in Purple Power, most of the paint came off, especially on the body!

[espo]

Except for the excessive use of glue, who every built the green car originally did a pretty nice job overall.  

[NOBLNG]

Nice start on that one Dennis. I have a set of those curved files too that I use almost exclusively. I beveled the edges on one end so I can get tight into a 90 degree corner.?

[slusher]

Very nicely done in handling the excessive glue on your project….

[Vintage AMT]

Will be following along, have a few of thses old survivors myself to redo.

[dino246gt]

Working on the interior, I started to make window cranks, so I bent some wire, added the outer coating from single strand wire for "knobs" and a bead to each one.

This is just a shelf model remember? So they're not what I'd use for a contest car, but better than the almost non-existant ones molded to the door panels! I scraped those off, then drilled for the new ones.

I also added some .025 styrene strips for more visual depth.

[slusher]

Really nice scratch built window cranks..

[moparfarmer]

I want to do a Ford and I picked a 49 next to do..Dennis beat me to it..I painted one about 30 years ago then gave it to Dennis and now would like it back..He said we could work something out..I still want to do a custom with Meteor front grill and stock rear bumper..Slight rake and a bright metallic orange(Nissan color) with maybe red rims and wide whites..Maybe two tone interior..Won't be as nice as Dennis' but I don't have his skills..This one will be killer when Dennis is finished for sure..

[oldnslow]

I really liked that green , do you happen to remember what you used ? 

Great work on the rebuild .

[dino246gt]

I stripped that old paint and primed the body and chassis with Tamiya white primer then mixed some Mr. Color Leveling Thinner with AK RC232 acrylic lacquer and airbrushed it.

 

[slusher]

Real nice shade of green!

[Jantrix]

Looking at the first pic, the black flamed body looks like it's in decent shape. maybe just polish that out some? Some great work going on though.

[dino246gt]

I cut down the center of the front seat back.

I thinned the horn ring.

I removed the raised details from the dash where I hope I can find decals to fit! Also drilled holes to replace the "knobs" with something more pronounced.

I added a turn signal lever and detailed the dash, a bit, good enough for what I want.

Made up the door pulls and some detail for the steering wheel.

Nothing here is an accurate '49 Ford interior, just my take on a fun model restoration!

Cheers!

 

[dino246gt]

I soaked the engine in Purple Power, but it remained as is!

I filled the axle hole, yeah of course I did, with various sized rods and a bit of putty, it won't even show so, not great, good enough!

So I drilled for plugs, mixed up some acrylic paints I had on hand and ended up with this color, not quite right, but I ran out of paints on hand!

Oil pan got sanded and I made some sort of exhaust manifolds from parts box headers.

Then I added some basic fuel lines and simple linkage

[dino246gt]

I had one old exhaust pipe and one un-used one! I opened up the ends in both.

I cleaned up the mold lines and sharpened the muffler ends and clamps, then sprayed with Alclad Aluminum over grey primer.

But of course they didn't line up with my parts box manifolds, so I made some little pipes to make the transition.

A little putty and some sanding and they're together, paint touch-ups to follow.

[afx]

Enjoying this project - nice work.

[Vintage AMT]

Coming around real nice.

[espo]

Great looking interior. I like the window crank ideas. The engine is also looking good, except for something that may or may not make a difference to you. Starting in 1949 thru 1953 the Ford flathead had the Distributer moved from the front of the engine to the passenger side and had what could be called a conventional looking cap and wires. Now that's not to say someone could not retrofit any earlier setup and use the '49 or newer heads on the engine. Just didn't know what your intent is on the engine details. The exhaust is a niece addition compared to the lump that AMT provided when this kit was issued. 

[dino246gt]

18 hours ago, espo said:

Great looking interior. I like the window crank ideas. The engine is also looking good, except for something that may or may not make a difference to you. Starting in 1949 thru 1953 the Ford flathead had the Distributer moved from the front of the engine to the passenger side and had what could be called a conventional looking cap and wires. Now that's not to say someone could not retrofit any earlier setup and use the '49 or newer heads on the engine. Just didn't know what your intent is on the engine details. The exhaust is a niece addition compared to the lump that AMT provided when this kit was issued. 

Yeah, I'm just trying to do a quick build from junk to replace the one I have in my display case. That one was painted by Wayne Farmer but he was never going to build it, so I bought it and built it, probably 25 years ago! He asked if he could buy it back from me now, so I'll need a replacement. I'll sell it back to him for what I paid for it un-built back then, can't remember but it wasn't much! Here's a picture of that one:

Edited April 17, 2022 by dino246gt

[dino246gt]

Here's the usual airbrushing situation:

One hour masking,

One minute airbrushing! 

LOL