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Thanks for the reply Kev. I'llsend you an E-mail explaining my problem.
Terry

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BigKev,

Your blog shows that this car is obviously a labor of love... particularly your attention to details, and your infinite patience and faith that it will all come together. It's hard for most anyone to tackle a project like this without first getting it to the point of tooling around the block in it. Unfortunately, that often becomes the end of the project... "runs and drives." Your patience will probably result in a very complete and satisfying car, much sooner than most would get beyond the tinkering stage (myself definitely included in that group).

Best of luck to you.

Quote:

I totally agree! Your patience is unbelievable. I don't know how you can keep whacking away at it without even testing the transmission yet! I really admire you! I know I definitely don't have the patience for that. That's also why your car is going to come out so nice compared to mine. You are making rolling art and I just want to roll. BTW I also want to thank you for showing the clock fix. I'm hoping it will not only help with my Packard but also the clock in my other car.

Thanks guys I appreciate the compliments! Hope you get your clocks going, may just need a little lubrication and a nudge to get them going again!

Some more progress this evening. Got the grille extensions back on the car. All the fasteners were media blasted, and painted with some cadmium paint. I bought all new rubber washers to replace all the old petrified ones.

Then I moved on to install the '54 Clipper Deluxe/Super only special grille trim. These were only used on the '54 Clipper Deluxes and Super, and not used on the Clipper Specials or Senior models. But in the process of reinstalling them I discovered that not all 53/54 Junior grille shells are created equal. The grille shells for the 54 Deluxe/Supers have two extra holes drilled on each side in the lower bottom corners where the grille trim is attached. They bolt to the fender just forward of the wheel opening, and the overlaps the bottom corner of the grille matching the opening shape, and then screws to the front of it.

I never noticed it until now, but this grille must have come off of a '54 Special or a '53 car as it is missing the trim holes. So I will have to carefully drill the holes for the trim in the grille. Does anyone know if the holes are tapped, or was there some kind of nut of the backside?

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Looking at the parts manual (which has an application typo in it), it looks like the same outer grille shell was used across all the '54 Clippers. So that means the grille shell had the extra trim holes drilled in it on an as needed bases, similar to replacement fenders I suppose.

The parts list for that special trim had listed a left and right trim, (4) 10/24 5/8" screws, and (4) 10/24 nuts, and (4) rubber seals. The nuts and seals attach to the threaded posts that are part of the trim itself and mount through the holes on the fender near the wheel arch. That means the the 4 screws attach directly to the grille shell itself. So I just need to drill and tap the holes for the 10/24 stainless screws in the grille shell itself.

Only had about 45 mins in the garage tonight. So I just got a few minor things done. Fits I drilled the holes in the outer grille shell to mount the special trim. Then I can across an issue with one of the pieces of trim. The end of the trim where it attaches to the fender near the wheel arch are two posts welded to a strip of metal. That strip of metal is then soldered on it's ends to the thin sides of the stainless trim. Almost ever one I have seen at a swap-meet has been missing this mounting strip as the solder fails. The one on my passenger side failed when I started to tighten down the nuts. So I am trying a little JB Weld to see if that ends up being more durable in the long run. But I applied the JB along the entire mounting strip, instead of just on the ends like the factory solder. Hopefully this gives it a bit more surface area to hold on to. I am going to let in cure till tomorrow night, and then I will see where we are at.

Next I installed the grille emblem. I used some push clips to hold it on, but wonder if twist on style speed nuts would be better.

Finally an artsy retro photo taken my some program on my Android based phone.

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Finished getting all the grille and associated trim bolted in and aligned. Getting all the bolts on the back side of the grille in was a pain in the butt and required me to loosed up all the fender bolts in the front to allow me to nudge things around. Once everything was aligned, I tend back over and tightened up all the bolts.

The JB Weld fix for the fender grille trim worked perfectly and it is much more solid than that factory "spot" soldering.

Hopefully this weekend I can get the front bumper back on. Some of bracketry still needs to be cleaned up and painted. The front bumper needs some dings taken out of it, and rechormed, but that will wait to later on. Right now I am just going to clean it up, and get it back on the car.

It is getting to look more like an automobile every day. Great progress!

Thanks Randy. My kids are no longer referring to her as "Rusty".

I had my daughters sitting in the car working the headlight switch, and turn signal switches when I was checking all the taillights and parking lights. I think it was the first time they realized it was really going to be a viable car, and not just old Dad tinkering in the garage.