Despite my lack of blog updating, I have been working endlessly (literally, hours every day) on getting all of the parts from the frame back together so that I can reassemble and get it back on the ground. My plan was / is as follows: Take each corner of the car, refinish, replace, reassemble. By each corner of the car, I mean the control arms, the strut mount, the brakes, the wheel bearings, hubs, tie rods and ball joints. I bit the bullet yesterday and made my first order of parts for the car, costing me a whopping $400 for a huge list of parts. Although the price is good, it still hurts the wallet.

I have already sand blasted both sets of control arms for the front end of the car, and will be spraying epoxy primer on them shortly. Additionally, I have blasted the strut mounts which are absolutely giant and took me about 3.5 hours a piece to blast. Those will also be getting the epoxy primer treatment. However, my main focus on the car has been the hub assembly. I currently have everything in pieces, but neatly organized. Bearings are out, trunnion kits are coming, everything that needed blasting has been blasted, masked and repainted a gloss black. Everything looks fantastic.

The control arms needed a little bit of extra attention. The passenger side lower control arm has a plate that connects what would be two separate arms, making one. This plate is resistance welded in three spots on each side, however on one of the arms the weld separated, leaving the hole alignment strictly up to the bolts and generally weakening the arm (again, the strength of the arm would come from the bolt). I fixed up the arm by tig welding the plate back onto the arm on each end, and did so for the other side as a precaution. Both arms had this treatment, as I thought it was preventative maintenance.

As soon as my order arrives, I can already start reassembling everything and have one corner of the car completely finished. I was able to clean up my brake caliper today as well, painting it black. The dust boots were still in impeccable conditions, and the pistons still moved really well so I have no plans on rebuilding those until I have to.

My next goals are to finally sand blast the frame so I can start reassembly, and purchase some epoxy primer to get everything coated.

Lots to come, lots to do!

– Sean