The Crusty Cuda: Whole lotta Shakin' (N96) Goin' on!

[A12pilot]

Rust repair has started! I'm splicing in a new floor pan and after it's butt welded there won't be any seam and it'll look factory. This part of the floor has the speedometer retainer loop welded to it, so that's going to come off the old floor and will be welded onto this newer piece.

This next week I'm moving the folks up from Florida to their new ranch next door to us, so more updates later this month! The plan is to have all the metal work done and the car down to 180-220.

More to come!

Cheers
Dave

[njsteve]

I got the new grill painted in the correct dark grey argent "sparkle" paint. The grill is manufactured in a light grey plastic. It took half a day to tape the whole thing off just to paint the center black grill portions from the front and back side. Then, the next day it took an hour to remove half the original masking tape and then tape off the black grills so I could paint the dark agent. I made sure the outside and back were completely masked off too.

Thankfully it was around 75 degrees out today so I could spray it in the driveway on a large cardboard box so it was at a high enough angle to get the metalflake to lie down right.

I did the headlight buckets too.

The only problem with the reproduction grills is that the stainless trim that goes around the grill and buckets is not very good. The two bucket trim pieces are 3/8" too long on both ends so that will need to be removed with a Dremel tool and disc, then sanded smooth. That's the next phase of the project. Oh, and they also don't snap into place like the originals do. They either are too loose or so tight that it risks breaking the grill plastic to get them in place.

Here's the grill after painting, with the red bar and "Plymouth" emblem installed.