Even though I wasn't at the point where I truly needed the fender and door, you buy stuff when you find it, and you keep the lines out for stuff you know you're going to need, even before you're ready for it.
Well, I responded to an ad on the Koolhouse message board. The post stated that the seller had a lot of parts from a 49 Chevy for sale. Since it's the same door as a 51, I asked if he had a door. He responded that he had one in "workable" condition that he would let me have for 50 bucks.
"Workable" is a rather broad term. What is or isn't workable varies a lot by the talent level of the builder. I asked for a picture, and was shocked by what I saw. The door wasn't pefect, but it was better than I expected to find, and it was a LOT better than what I expected to fiond for 50 dollars. I e-mailed the seller back telling him that the door was worth more than 50 dollars, and offered him the chance to raise the price. After a joke, he said no- he'd stick with that price. I arranged to go get it that Friday.
Oh, I forgot to mention where he was located- Carol Stream, IL. Yes, it's a long haul, but those doors don't grow on trees, and the price was super right. So, Leigha and I hopped in the Ford Almighty bright and early, and headed North.
Dale turned out to be a great guy. Very much what you'd expect from a Chicagoan. His pride and joy was a SWEET '49 Chevy styleline deluxe. We loaded up the door, and decided to go to an Italian place for lunch. He wanted to go dutch, but after the sweet deal he'd given me on the door, I couldn't let him buy his own grub.
We sat and talked cars for a while, then we left to try and beat the rush hour traffic. As I thanked him for the great deal, he said "just don't let me see that door on eBay." I told him the only place he'd be seeing it was on my car, and probably soon.
How's this for "barn fresh?" It still has the coating of bat shit!
When we finally got home, I was worn from all the road time, but I still hit the garage. I started stripping out any useable part from the old door. The next day, I went ahead and did the swap.
I DID clean the bat poo off of it before I installed it
Please notice the lack of construction cleavage
Dale found this picture in his inbox the next day.
I mentioned that the old door was bad. If the pictures of it on the car didn't illustrate how bad it was, these might help
Notice the the entire bottom of the door is gone.
I mentioned that on the HAMB, people can be opinionated, and love to throw verbal crap at one another.In my build thread, I commented on dealing with some of the rust issues in the car, and had a coupleof guys trying to tell me that this car is too far gone, and I should get something better to start with. Well, those of you who know me know that this sort of talk only fires me up.
So
I fired back a little smartassery about having enough skill to bring it back, and I posed for this picture of me "putting the car out of its' misery." This picture has been my avatar on that site ever since.
Note that I've treated myself to a bit more dabbling in bodywork by starting to nose the hood.
No comments:
Post a Comment