Bodyworking Two Project Cars At Once!

Crank this baby over.

Today's show is a blast. Literally everything from media blasting

to metal, finishing punch it.

Hey, everybody.

This is a show about wicked excess. We're talking hardcore American muscle car. American Bronze. Oh yeah, like Torino's Chevelle Goats

and of course the mo

parts like our 70 challenger. Here

we started with the semi

complete 70 Dodge Challenger. One of seven from the movie. Too fast, too furious, bad movie. Great Car

with some help

from Ian and Jessi from our sister show Xtreme 4x4. We were able to get this entire body stripped down and ready for media blasting.

We brought our Challenger to Watertown Tennessee and blast from the past one reason. Virgin sheet metal baby, fresh metal. That's what we wanna see. Media blasting gets rid of decades of wax paint rust. You name it, that stuff's out of there.

What they use is crushed glass, 40 to 60 grit for the rust stuff

and a fine 100 to 120 grit for the top side which leaves a real slick finish.

Speaking of slick, this guy's name here is heavy duty and man, he loves this stuff.

I've been doing this for 30 something years

and it puts goose bumps on me today

just like it did 30 something years ago when I started blasting one of these.

I don't know if it's goose bumps or tears. You think our fenders are straight? Think again, look at that feeling of being ripped away and all the holes that someone drilled in our valuable challenger to pull those dents. We'll fix that with some new sheet metal

and for you guys at home, serious about your restoration media blasting is the only way to go.

It's like you're taking, you're taking something old and you're making it new again.

So now that we've got this baby stripped down to bare steel, we're gonna do what we gotta do to make it nice and Purdy.

Yeah, believe it or not, from what you're seeing, I've actually seen cars in worse condition. This one's not that bad, especially for a car that's this old, you know, you're gonna have rust issues and stuff like that.

Um There are a couple surprises like here. This is an area where there again, moisture has come down and settled and because of the vinyl roof fabric, it, it held it in there. It's gonna be a lot of time. I mean, this is a pretty, pretty involved project. Any time you take something down this far,

you're, you're looking at some work, but the payoff is gonna be great. It's time for us to take this thing and get to work. We're gonna put it on a chassis table and we're gonna get busy on it

with the rotisserie gone and the chassis jigging place, we'll establish ride height and lower it in the place.

Welding some stances between the body and the jig will keep it level and true. Plus it's a good way to determine all of your clearances and attachment points for things like suspension,

oil pan, exhaust. If anything you can tear off them, it's mounted too low.

We know not all you have room for a frame table like ours, but you could use jack stands and some anchor points in your floor and you can get the same thing accomplished.

This part of the jig represents the ground. We're going to reference this point through the entire build. Now, this car is going to be on here until we have suspension under it and it's a roller.

The reason you wanna hang all these parts is to ensure that the gaps in the seams line up the way they're supposed to see, we're a little tight,

which is good

because then all you gotta do is grind an edge weld instead of trying to add to it.

And you can really see how the body lines come together.

Here's a little trick once the fit is good drill some eight inch holes in the hinges. Then after the car is fully painted, you can line the doors up a lot easier during final assembly,

ok? With the body panels in place, we can finally attack some of the problem areas on this thing.

Now, right back here in the window channel is a common problem for these cars. Most body shops are just gonna put filler in there, but to do this right, we're gonna go ahead and replace it with some new metal.

Now, don't be afraid to cut into your prized possession. This must be done in order to fix the damage and just remember to cut small pieces one at a time. So the job doesn't get too overwhelming.

I'll cut a piece of sheet metal and bend it with the brake

to get the piece to fit. We use a shrink or stretcher to curve the metal to fit the window channel.

It's now ready to be tacked, grinded

and finish welded. No doubt this is a big job, but we're looking at it like a bunch of little jobs stacked on top of each other.

We're going to get the entire shell of the car fixed first and then start with things like the trunk floors and frame rails.

Now, before we sent this thing to the blaster, we pulled this little fender tag off. This will tell you everything you need to know about your Mopar.

Ours originally had black high back vinyl seats, 318, 2 barrel pushing a whopping 230 horsepower torque flight 904 automatic transmission and that fashionable color plum crazy purple. It had full wrap door panels and it was built on November

19th, 1969. And the VIN number tells us J is the make M is the price class 23 is the body style G is the engine

O the model year and B the assembly plant in which it was built.

And the last numbers tell us that our challenger was a 98634th vehicle to roll out of that Michigan plant that year.

If any of you guys want to decode your Mo

Park, we'll have a link on our website after the show.

Later on, you want it, Richard Rawlings can get it. We'll go hot riding with this broker and builder of some of the baddest rides.

Welcome back to muscle car. Normally, when you're doing a restoration like this, you're gonna wanna hit your structural areas first, like your window channels the firewall and things like that. But what I wanna show you is the passenger side quarter here as you can see the top of it's pretty good shape. So we're just gonna leave that alone, but the bottom of this thing is full of Swiss cheese. So I'm gonna cut this sucker off. I'm gonna graft in a piece of new quarter panel. But when you do this, take your time because you only got one chance to get it right.

It's nice to have a true body man in the shop. Let me tell you about this guy.

We swiped Jared Zimmerman from Manti

Illinois where he was a member of the rat rides crew, his boss, Troy Trenna,

one of America's premier builders. Case in point, this 70 cooter they call S

fish bill books. Followed you guys around during the build of this uh six fish. What was that like? It was awesome, man. Um

It's the baddest cooter ever. I got to deliver the car to Joe Rogan. I mean, I slaved on it for six months and then when I finally got to give it to him,

he was just pumped, man. All he could say is that the car reminded him of war because it's just so rowdy. What kind of fabrication work? Do you do?

Not much. I just slept on a cot and watched everybody but I took a lot of the credit and then I befriended the guy that did this book. So he took pictures of me

and then I could take the credit for most of the shots.

So

it's a good time.

So for you guys at home, Jarrett's a well rounded kind of guy when it comes to the automotive end of it,

he does fabrication, he does wiring, he does it all. So you know what? He needs to get back to work. I'm tired of you lollygagging.

I gotta listen to Mr Clean

now that our 70 challenge is well on its way to being straight I'm going to jump on the 69 crate Camaro. Now, as we said before, a chassis jig is the way to go. But if you don't have that, you can always use a set of jack stands. The thing is you got to make sure that it's level.

Our first step in getting this thing together is this sexy piece from Chris Austin's chassis work.

This front clip is a direct bolt for 67 and 69 Camaro laser cut and weld it at a seven gauge steel and keeps the tires in the stock location.

We're gonna pre ft the front clip and all the body panels and related parts. Before this baby goes to powder coating,

you wanna make sure all this stuff fits because you don't wanna go grinding on that nice powder coating when you put it back together.

Oh,

look more rust. What a surprise. Well,

as you can see the outer wheelhouse is junk

and before I get to put on my new quarter, I'm just gonna have to go ahead and cut this out and get it fixed.

But once again, I'm only gonna

cut out the bat area and leave the rest of it.

So even though I have a whole new wheelhouse in this shop, cutting and grafting in a section to replace the rot is an easier fix.

I've got a low spot here and a high spot there. So what I'm doing is pushing

the low spot up with the dolly while I knock the high spot down, it's just kind of an even trade off.

You hear that peeing sound. Another way to use the dolly is to stretch the metal back out.

And I'll show you an example

when this is welded, it heats up and I'm sure everybody's seen this and when it heats

the metal wrinkles, that's because it's been shrunk. So you wanna use the dolly and the hammer

to stretch it back out.

We'll finish up our quarter panel with some authentic restoration sheet metal from Good Mark industries.

Once positioned, I'll mark all the trim points,

use the original fender as a guide,

then grind

and cut the new quarter for an exact fit.

Luke, will you jump up in the trunk and give me a hand, please. I can do that. Thank you.

I'll grab a hammer

after the break. This character is determined to make Texas a hot bed for hot rodding. California built some real nice cars, but uh

it can be done here in Texas with a lot more flair and a lot more style.

Some people see something like this in a field and they think it's a piece of garbage. But the guys like us, this thing is gold and there's this cat in Texas, everything he sees is gold.

We're working man shop,

how to make cars. That number one you can drive. Number two are just bad ass scare. Women and Children Cue Montage.

We put in it. His attitude. Richard Ray Rawlings. Get it right. No, Hugos. No. Volkswagen. Don't do that. Don't do it. He's the driving Porsche.

I'm gas

garages. The inspiration. I'm just a local guy building badass hot rods.

I've been in the cars all my life. I mean, I think I used to, uh, tape uh

M eighties onto my hot wheels and try to see if they go faster. I drive down the road every day. Everything I see. I'm like, man, I can do that. I can do this. I think the coolest guy in the world was the first guy to take a boring stock black car

in the, in the twenties and do something with it.

I'm just rattling. So stop me whenever you want to.

This right here,

this next year's Hot Rod, this is my project. It's a uh 1933 Packard Roadster.

It's one of only about nine in the world. I think it's one of only about four to exist. It was custom ordered by King Alfonso of Spain

so that he could uh race on the dirt tracks. I'm gonna make it into a high rod and piss off the purist at Pebble Beach.

Those guys don't have a clue. They probably won't let me in because I've got a ponytail and tattoos, but I'm gonna do it anyways. I'm not here trying to get rich. You don't get rich building cars. This is something you do for the love of it.

This car, uh, was built for road rally cars capable of, uh, probably in the one seventies, one eighties. Uh, we cruise it all the time in the one twenties. Don't send any tickets. It's got a Cadillac big block 507 100 R four tranny nine inch rear end. It's all common basic stuff,

but it's put together in one hell

of a package. All the comforts that you have in the new car just uh with a little bit of attitude and little style and I don't have to wash it as often. I think the car handles.

Bob, get out of the shot, Bob.

You fuck

it all up.

My name's Bob Guest. I do the uh I do the, I'm the resident old car guy.

They've taken the path but they bring their own unique youthful perspective to it that killed out of curiosity and stay out of fascination.

Gas Main Garage. 630. Like usual. Not a damn souls here. We'll go and see if we can get some coffee

morning

morning.

My name is Aaron Kaufman. Shop manager for Gas Monkey Garage, Dallas, Texas.

We're just 100% in your face. We're here to show you how it's done.

Everybody's so afraid of hurting their rods. We build them that we build them to hit things. We're building to drive fast. All right, muscle car fans check it out. There's three people in the world that can have this car and everybody wants it.

This is a 1970

hemi

C

A convertible. It's as bad as they get. Guys.

This particular hemi

was built

to be driven and driven hard. It's got a John Ausa,

approximately 600 horsepower stage five

Hemm.

Any other muscle car just doesn't compare. People. Just freak out when you're driving it,

but not only that, it is fun to drive. Watching the shaker hood go back and forth is fantastic. And when you're cruising it, there's just nothing like it.

We get a lot of flak from my buddies in California and stuff because we're bringing kind of a style out here and kind of an attitude dude like Cali man, California built some real nice cars, but

it can be done here in Texas with a lot more flair and a lot more style. We're coming on Gangbusters, but we're completely broke and uh

I have no ability to sustain myself. See you later, man.

There goes another happy gas monkey tester. Bye.

I'm happy to go home every night. I'm doing what I love. That's all I can ask for.

Richard is gonna give us a stock 348 for the 61 of power.

We're gonna build it into a real ground pounder.

Welcome back. The name of the show is Muscle Car

and we got two projects going on.

Jared's jamming on our 70 Challenger Resto Mod. I think we're gonna have to work on those dance moves, man. They're horrible.

And here I am with our 69 great Camaro project.

It began with a dyno

corn body and no lie. All new parts bumper to bumper.

We've mocked up the sub frame and the body panels and everything's going together pretty good.

I've already made my series of attacks that are gonna hold the panel on. Now, I'm gonna go back and make a solid weld.

Our body comes in the crate.

Our engine comes in the crate.

This is the GM Performance ZZ four makes a whopping 355 horse. It's got a 354 bolt Maine

10 to 1 compression factory angle plug aluminum heads.

She's gonna be a little sweetie on the streets

earlier, I was drilling holes in this panel

because this is how the factory attached the panel originally. And what they did is they just spot well through this

so that these two pieces of metal are fused together,

sharp burst with the meg. Keep it from getting too hot. So you don't burn through the metal and make a hole.

Ok? I got the quarter completely welded on and all I have left is to grind down these finished welds

make it pretty.

This thing's gonna look so good. You won't even know I hung a quarter on this car

when I get started, I like to use the biggest tool for the job and I have a 4.5 inch grinder here. And what I'm doing is making long sweeping strokes. So you don't see

any divots in the metal from where I rested and you gotta be careful to keep moving. I know it's quicker sometimes to just concentrate on an area, but you need to just keep passing over it so that everything gets brought down at one even level.

What do you think, man? I'm liking it, man. I'm liking it.

Hey, next time you see us working on the Challenger, we're gonna be getting after some rotten eight pillars in the firewall and on the Craig Camaro, we're putting in the front suspension

a later.