It's been almost a month since I posted anything to this thread. I wish I could say all has been going well, but this is not the case. At times during the month I would have sent the car to a body shop to resolve the problems. But no shops around here want to work on my car.
These are some of the problems I have been dealing with over the last month.
1) Found out the Endura bumper I had was bent.
2) Passenger fender mount to body (the one you open the door to get to) was not positioned correctly. I did not have enough adjustment. It was nearly 1/4" off.
3) Driver fender still had plenty of twists and bends and would not align with the bumper.
4) Hood/Driver fender - Hit the side of the hood hard. Bolts couldn't be inserted.
5) The top of the passenger fender is not shaped correctly on my fender. It does not match the contour on the Endura Bumper.
6) Valence panel was bent up more that I thought.
7) Aligning the front sheet metal has been a nightmare.
Bumper
Starting condition
I spend several days working on this. This is the end result.
Passenger fender
I ended up removed the mount from the inner bracing and relocating it to the correct position. That is based on measurements of three other fenders. I also had to fix the incorrect contour. The profile gauge shows the shape of another fender. The profile gauge also matches the contour of the bumper.
The results of splitting and re-welding the fender
Driver Fender
There was still numerous problems that were not apparent until trying to install and line everything up. The hood channel was bend near the Front of the fender. It should be about 90 degrees but was maybe about 80. This meant the slots on the fender ran out of adjustment before the fender was aligned with the bumper.
This was my solution when a BFH is just not good enough. The 2x4 distributes the force of the jack so as not to bend the passenger fender. With a little jacking the hood channel was moved back into position.
Hood
No pictures here but I had to add 1/4" of spacers between the driver fender and the hinge in order to insert bolts into the hood. I then found there was not enough adjustments in the slots and had to add 1/4" of spacers between the hinge and the hood. Everything aligns now, but I don't think its proper to use shims between the fender and the hinge.
Valence
Typical restoration issues, it was beat up more than I though. Driver's turn signal opening was also bend. Not obvious until trying to install turn signal. In the end I spend about 5 hours beating numerous dents out.
You can see one of the bends here. This thing was also caked full of filler. Some of it a 1/2" deep.
The passenger turn signal fits fine.
The driver turn signal not so good. It looks better in the picture than it really fit.
This should be flat.
And how do you flatten this. Clamp it to a thick piece of metal at tap it flat with body hammers.
Fits as good as factory now. Not great but this how they all seem to fit.
I didn't take a picture of the valance panel but you can see it pretty good here. Dents removed and back to original shape. It shouldn't take more than a light skim coat of filler. Nothing is off more than the thickness of card stock.
It's too late to post more tonight. I will post my pictures of the final gaps tomorrow.