Love seeing the progress, Mitch! Lookin good!

Last week, I was digging thru boxes, looking for stuff I wanted to take to a swap meet on Sunday and came across the steering column parts, I had prepped months ago. Yesterday was calm at 6am, with NO CW seeds flying around yet, so I did final prep, hung them on the parts tree and got them covered. I was in a groove and went to the back building and found the left seat frame I had dismantled about 15 years ago. No memory of the springs, but most of them had the broken stubs still on the frames, so I assume I trashed the old stuff. Anyway, I ran them thru the blast cabinet and got 1 side covered and was waiting for it to set enough to turn over. While I was waiting the wind came up again and they have some trash in them and by the time they were dry enough to turn over it was too windy to continue.
So I went in the house and ordered new springs. They will be here long before I ever order the upholstery for them, but finding the frames bare was a bit of a surprise, so eliminating that repeatable event for whenever it comes about...:smirk:
Before I put the body on the subframe I had to clinch speedo cable tabs over and 1 was directly behind the heater box, so that had to come out. I had replaced the heater core about 12 years ago and had no intention of removing the heater and was OK with leaving it "as original". Oh, well, such is life. It had a turn in the cabinet and is now in new black SPI black. It actually had more of a Bluish/Graphite Gray color, but I don't have any of that, so it will stay black. Hmmm, as I was typing this, I think I MAY have some rattle can Graphite....now I have to go digging in the paint cabinet and see if I do and spray some out to see if it is closer to original. Dang project creep.

Looking good Mitch!

Tell me about it..........I feel your pain :grin:

Yeah, this started as a trunk floor and right quarter with new paint....and look at it now, fresh off the rotisserie. That's why Tim and I tease you about a frame off. You'll have darn near done that without removing the body...:smile:

I like this on heater boxes Mitch...

Project creep??? My most recent restoration began as refreshing a 25 year old restoration. Next thing, the body is off....:beers:

Hammered ?? I haven't been hammered in 44 years, don't think I want to start now...:grin:
I found a can of Dupli-Color Graphite in the cabinet, but haven't had time to try it yet. Spent the day fighting a losing battle with upholstery. Bottom cushion was missing a listing sleeve at the very front that took me a while to figure out it needed one and my wife came to the rescue, again, and modified it for a wire. Waiting on a long nose hog pliers to reach down into the recess of the foam to attach the vinyl to the listing at the sides of the bottom spring. What a fight with a short handle, short nose pliers I have.

Here's the finished product, it matches up well with an original paint box.
The pic doesn't show the full "hammered" effect.

I repainted the heater Graphite and it looks very similar to yours now. I don't seem to have taken an "after" pic... maybe later.
I was starting to install the right fender and realized I hadn't aligned the frame with the body. I had looked this up in the Aim a couple months ago and was going to find some .610 rod for that step and forgot until Tuesday afternoon. I ordered a 3 ft piece of .609375 tool steel shaft Tuesday and received it today and cut it in 3 pieces. I had both floor jacks holding the frame and body with minimal weight resistance and used the pins to move the body around until they would both fall right out. I then held them in place with some blocks and gradually tightened the bolts until I had them torqued to 75 lbs/ft. and the pins still fell out. That should be pretty darned close, but as I assemble the sheetmetal, I will be cross measuring to be certain it is all sqaure.

All but the hood is on, that is still at the bodyman's shop. I'm not impressed with the fit of the NOS fenders. The gaps at the doors are rather poor. I suppose they were stamped later, after the die was well worn and the folds at seams aren't as clean as the originals. Had to do some hammer and dolly work for the door gaps, as they wanted to rub in a couple areas. Anyway the clip is on.