63 gp restoration update
 

Well... after nine years i finally have some pics worth sharing. Wet sanding this week, disassembly and paint next week. The body looks outstanding. The entire month of april was spent getting the fit correct and blocking.

Very nice!

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Progress. Color sand and buffing next week.

Cameo Ivory?

Early production car? (Body colored firewall tipped me off)

Looks great!

Looks awesome!

My arms are falling off
 

If no one else will make a comment, I will. I'm still color sanding and buffing on my 64' because of the fact that my arms fell off during the process, I'm waiting for new arms to grow back just now. Your car is beautiful and coming along very quickly, how are your arms doing??? just sayin'.............Lee :eek:

Arms are doin great except for the arm that reaches for the wallet. O farmed the car out in january to a father n son restoration shop. I cant say enough about how well theyve done. Over budget but i dont think they put enough thought into the size of the car. Pay and see progress weekly. The way it should be done. Comes home body assembled in 2-3 weeks and then i finish the project except for glass and headliner. Cant wait. Been a long time coming.like 27 years since i was behind the wheel. Thanks for the opinions guys. It means alot

27 Years?
 

Ho 421, After 27 years and mucho $$ your Darksider will be a very nice ride and very heart warming to cruise anywhere, just remember to get some time behind the wheel to become familiar again with 60's steering, brakes, handling, etc. PS: New eyewear- hearing aids- and small loan for fuel costs-- and you are good to go-- ask me how I know...............:>) Lee

Very early 63. Pretty much every part ive examined was date-coded as 62. Would be open to opinions on one issue. All markings on firewall were on the red oxide primer somewhat visible thru the white paint. I documented every assembly line number. Should i wax pencil over the white or leave it as is? Car will look stock except for some much needed improvements including visible 15" rims and a period correct hurst shifter

Your car is looking very nice. I owned a 63 GP back in about 71

From what I have seen, grease pencil is underneath the paint. If you've already painted the car there's no point in putting grease pencil over it because the firewall is white.

Car came home yesterday. FINALLY! Now i can get busy. ,

Which final assembly plant?

These markings do vary by plant location -

K

Hubba hubba ding ding baby !! Beautiful.

Jim

beautiful job. i am doing a 63 GP also. where did you gey the sweeper ruber for the outside door & rear quarter window, the ones that fasten to the stainles on the top edge of door . the ones ames sent me werre all wrong. where did you get the rubber seal that goes on the rear fender extensions. keep the pics comming

Pontiac


Only grease pencil markings to exterior were on fender to cowl. Black.
410. Evrrything else white directly over the red oxide and barely visible thru the cameo ivory on thr firewall.

PUI for the window weatherstrips. Extensions still retaining the original seals after the painter and i dug them out of his three bags of garbage. Cant find them. Rear window seal was difficult to find. Steele but is missing the inner lip the meets the pkg tray. Not sure how to deal with that yet.

Bob,

Looking good!!

Check with Restoration Specialties in Pennsylvania. They re-popped the clips for the weather strips and they had the correct "catwiskers" for my '63 both front window and rear quarter. I had to send them my old front window ones, only for positioning of the new clips. They returned them to me as well. Fit was excellent.

They also redid my window channels both front and rear quarter.

Keep up the good work. I finally just got my interior done. When you re-assemble, pay close attention to necessary grounding points. With the new paint job, I had to add about 20 grounding cables as I was not getting good grounds where, in the past, I had good metal to metal contact.

Ziggy

It's great to see the progress...and a great motivator (for slackers like ME!).

Thanks for the tip, Ziggy.

Gary, Ziggy is right on. Had to go out and look for the shipping container. PUI sources their window weather strips (i.e. the complete kit) from Restoration Specialties. Found that out in a round-about way. The first set was pathetic. Window guides were cracked, falling off or missing. The second set was direct shipped by Restoration Specialties in perfect condition in three business days. They stood behind the product. Went with Ames on the glass run channels and had the shop install them before bringing the car home. OK. I had them deal with the weather strip installs to the stainless too. Didn't want to admit that but heck, those staples looked like a PITA. At 30/hr, I thought it was money well spent.

May be a few weeks before I post progress again. Came down with shingles a couple weeks ago and the pain in my shoulder and chest goes from tingling to burning to a knife stab. I've spent two weeks just fiddling with the hurst linkage converting it from T10 to M22. If anyone has installed an AGE M22 DRS in a 62-64 big car with a center console, I'm all ears. My measurements indicate the shifter will be further back 3/8" and will require Fabcraft's ST10 big car tranny mount expanded from 3.15" to 3.25" diameter to fit the diameter of AGE's tail shaft housing. Fingers X'd.

Thanks for the advice on the grounds. Way more paint this time around.