Creating a KREEP..
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Thanks for sticking with me fellas. As you can imagine, I owe a great debt of gratitude to a good number of folks who have helped me along the way and I regularly try to return favours, so I am often off to someone’s garage instead of keeping a regular update regimen on this post. More pics to come!
Dave
Jus' creepin' along..
What a neat idea and a great tribute! I hope that did’t get painted over and is still in the car.
Dave, I left that there for the next carchiologists to find.. I’ve thought about the little discoveries that folks find when tearing apart old cars and thought I’d surprise the next owner. That, and give tribute to those that did the work of course! 😉
Dave
Jus' creepin' along..
Not long after getting the Merc., it developed a substantial radiator leak. Here’s the original with coolers mounted in front for trans and an air conditioning setup which was no longer with the car. I wonder how the engine stayed cool in the hot and humid southeastern U.S.. Oh, and visible here is the Harley lamps which, for some reason, people did not recognize as signal lights when they blinked..?
A good friend of mine has a beautiful 1947 Mercury coupe which has all kinds of room between the lower radiator and the chassis crossmember – not so with this ’41. If one of you fellows knows why this is, I’d really be interested in the answer (they are both 118s). Anyway, due to the tight confines, the original rad was fitted with a cast lower hose fitting for clearance. This shot looks down over the passenger front fender and you can see the space is spare requiring this unique(?) fitting:
The new rad from Walkers was ordered with the trans cooler in the lower tank and small condenser in front in case we add air at a later date. A local rad shop removed the cast lower hose extension from the old rad and soldered it to the new rad.
The newer rad once again in the car..
With the rad in this time around we could install the hood latch mechanism, release cable and panel.
Dave
Jus' creepin' along..
The G.M. HEI dizzys work well, but are not particularly attractive to say the least; but on top of the look, having that big red hunk showing just wouldn’t do. To help push it to the background I painted it black..
Dave
Jus' creepin' along..
Back to these bits..
Also visible in the pic above is one of the ’54 Caddy wheel covers. I stripped the red paint from the ribbed area and replaced the chrome bullets in the centre with proper Cadillac badges from McVey’s. I also unearthed a pretty decent pair of caps for the rear to replace the Dodge(!) ones that were on the car. In all honesty though, you wouldn’t know what the rears are behind the skirts.
Filling, sanding, priming, repeat, etc..
Man!!
Okay, all that appears to have been worth the effort!
Dave
Jus' creepin' along..
The 350 in the Merc came with faux Olds covers, but the wire cover bolts were stripped so it was a major task to get to the oil filler under those wire covers.. I did, however, like the steel air cleaner!
I thought the idea of hiding the identity of the engine for one’s first glimpse wasn’t really all that bad, but the Olds thing was too “common”. While trying to imagine what overhead engines might be available to someone customizing in the late ’40s early ’50s I thought of all the usuals until I came across the under hood pic of an early ’50s Packard. The Packard even had a very similar air cleaner to the Cadillac/Olds one that I was using. Eureka!!!
I drew up some decals in Illustrator and had the fellows responsible for the gauge lettering also cut me some gold vinyl “transfers”. After Warren painted the cleaner and covers the lettering was added and then buried in clear..
The Illustrator file:
The results:
And of course I fooled nobody! 😉
Dave
Jus' creepin' along..
Well, the quarter window garnishes went in nicely..
And the rear window seal and stainless (no garnish on the inside of these).
The windshield garnishes were a bit more troublesome as there was a bit of a fight to get the centre bars cinched up through the new rubber. Two guys pushing with all their might – one outside and one in – while trying to get the screws through and seated.. whew!! Of course, we had to be careful to cut the rubber so the holes ended up where they needed to be due to the chop.
The wind wings have to be installed in the window garnish before the assembly goes in. I cut the necessary length out of the rubber seal and fused the two pieces together at the indicated point with O-ring glue. It’s never coming apart as that stuff really works!
Into the garnish..
Taping the “fuzzies” in place..
And on the door – stay!
There we go!
And I believe it was the Jessie Lopez re-creation that suggested the small, flexible, half round chrome trim for the quarters.. Finishes them off to perfection!
Dave
Jus' creepin' along..
Great posts Dave.
Other then someone that has built a custom, I wonder how many people know just how much work it is when they are admiring one at a car show.
Torchie
The Merc came to me with heavy vinyl over foam on the running boards and of course I wanted rubber ones. I was extremely lucky as the boards were in pretty good shape and new rubber was available. Once again there was the issue of contact cement removal raising it’s ugly head – darn!
After cleaning and sand blasting I sprayed the undersides with rubberized undercoating.
The timing was right as I came across an ad for new ’41 rubbers AND cement (hazardous chemicals can’t be shipped across the border) sold privately. Although it’s just contact cement (!) it was nice to get the stuff the manufacturer was recommending..
Trial fitting..
Instructions say to scuff the back of the covers.
Then glue from the outer flange toward the back edge two inches at a time..
Glued, set, mounted and they look pretty good!
Dave
Jus' creepin' along..
A friend of mine had access to an adhesive-backed rubber in the form of two hollow “Ds” which could be torn down the middle to give me a sticky “D” gasket about 3/8″ across. This was ideal for around the fender skirts.
You might be able to see where Neil added about 4″ to the length of the later ’46-’48 box skirts I had picked up.
This style rubber seal proved to be just what was needed around the doors as well:
Dave
Jus' creepin' along..
Thanks for the detail pics…no one ever covers this part of a custom build. I have the task of gluing running board rubber too. I have the rubber but have been dreading the job.
BTW, I don’t suppose you know, but with the chop changing the angle of the side glass, did you do anything with the run channels to compensate? I’m figuring I’m going to have to mock up wood templates to test. This is a problem with taking a section out of the height of a dome shape!
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