The K_R_A_K_E_N_N : a 70 Ghia Convertible reinterpreted

[Evil_Fiz]

I made some progress on the door repair. My initial efforts with the hammer and dolly were not very fruitful due to the "crease" nature of the damage and the inner door brading getting in the way of the dolly. So I ended up doing the following:
- Work the the damage and low spots with the stud welder.
- Moved on to using an old mallet head as a dolly, and a conventional dolly as well, while I worked the larger low spots with my DIY slapper. The slapper is made out of a piece of 3/16" x 3" flat bar left over from the rotisserie build and a piece of bed rail bracketry bent as a handle. It's crude but it gets the job done for free.
- The final step was to work out the last bit of the creases in a reverse dolly and slapper approach. I placed the slapper on the outside of the door (low side of the crease) and hammers it from behind with a low crown dolly. I know it is unorthodox and unconventional but it worked. I have a shrinking disc on order because there are several areas on the door that need to be shrunken before I can continue to shape the damaged areas properly. There are other repairs on the car that will need the shrinking disk as well. So far I have about five hours invested in the repair.

I'm not sure if you can tell from the pictures below that I actually made some progress but I'll let you decide.

DIY Slapper

Door Repair

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Emil
_________________
“…It's not just about what's interesting. It's also about what's helpful, and it's helpful even if it helps just one other guy working on a Ghia.”
kiwighia68

See my build on TheSamba at:
The K_R_A_K_E_N_N : a 70 Ghia Convertible reinterpreted

[TRS63]

Good progress here, thanks for taking the time to keep us in touch!

Antoine
_________________
Antoine
My 62 ragtop daily driver:
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=728873
My 914 restoration&lightweight project :
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?p=9698432#9698432
Resurrecting a 60 ghia : https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=713906
My 52 Standard Zwitter :
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?p=10086685#10086685

[bobnorman]

Well that was a nasty surprise. Great job bringing it back, looks like you made good progress. I’ve been curious about shrinking discs as well, would love to try one.
_________________
Air does not freeze. Air does not boil.

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=289807

[Evil_Fiz]

[Evil_Fiz]

Long post ahead, TL; DR summary:
I am making progress on the passenger door repair and learning a bunch about panel beating. The shrinking disc is a spectacular tool. Skip ahead to the progress pics.


The Long Version
I have been working to repair the collision damage on the passenger door. So far, I have about 30 Hrs. invested in the process and can say I am close but not there yet. I have made significant progress in getting the door back to a reasonable approximation of its original shape. The tools involved so far are: (All amounts in $ US)
- Hammer and dolly set from Harbor Freight - $30
- Stud puller set from Harbor Freight - $99
- Homemade slapper/ dinging spoon – See previous post
- 30 YO Craftsman ball peen hammer modified with high crown face
- Half broken 4.5” Harbor Freight grinder - $25
- 7” Harbor Freight grinder - $32 (Purchased to accompany the shrinking disc)
- Old rubber mallet head (The handle broke)
- 5” and 9” shrinking disc set from ProShaper.com - $99

I watched, and continue to watch, many YouTube videos on dent flipping and shrinking disc technique. Many videos on YT are not worth 1/10 the time it takes to watch them. The ones that are well done are usually done by well-meaning professionals who have long forgotten what it was like when they were first learning their craft. I am thankful to the many crafts-men/women who have taken the time to share their knowledge and experience and will add what many of them fail to mention:
- Watching a video is no substitute for doing
- It takes a while of “doing” before you have the AHA moment of comprehension
- The real world repairs you do on your car will not be as easy as the ones they chose to use as a demonstration of a given technique
- You will mess up many times before you get something right. Once you get it right you will mess up many more times before you get it right consistently

What I have learned do far:
- Working on doors with hammer and dolly sucks. Murphy’s law is strongly at play here. Damage will occur primarily in places where either the dolly does not fit or cannot reach, or it will occur in places where you can’t get a good hammer swing on the inside of the door.
- A ball peen hammer laying on its side is ideal for beating on dents from the inside of the door.
- The shrinking disk works wonders at shrinking stretched metal. So well in fact that it takes a while to learn how not to go too far and have to stretch the metal before you can go too far again with the shrinking disk.
- Using an adjacent area of the panel you are working on to slow down the shrinking disk will have unintended consequences. IOW, shrunken metal where you don’t want it.
- The 9” shrinking disc is a substantial amount of rotating mass that wants to keep spinning long after you don’t want it to.
- The best way I found to use the 9” shrinking disk is to let go of the trigger before you think you should and let the disk stop in place before moving it to cool the area.
- A wet rag works better than a spray bottle because you can use it to cool the heated metal AND use it as a “cloth glove” to feel the metal for variances.

I said I would post some video of the shrinking disk but the video below (previously posted in this thread by TDCTDI) does a much better job than I ever could of explaining and demonstrating the shrinking disc. I considered the disc sold by the producer of the video but the one from ProShaper.com was highly recommended as well and came in at $40 less for the set with free shipping. The one I bought is well made, balanced, and robust. I recommend it if you are planning on getting one.

Link


Here are some comparison shots of my first pass at repairs and where I am now

Before

After

Before

After

The rest

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Emil
_________________
“…It's not just about what's interesting. It's also about what's helpful, and it's helpful even if it helps just one other guy working on a Ghia.”
kiwighia68

See my build on TheSamba at:
The K_R_A_K_E_N_N : a 70 Ghia Convertible reinterpreted

[Peter D.]

Outstanding work, I think most people would just find another door.
_________________
2019 Golf Alltrack, '65 Ghia Coupe Restoration in Progress

[Evil_Fiz]

[Onceler]

Beautiful work! You should be proud of learning this new skill through shear desire and hard work. Polyester primer might just be enough to get it die straight.
_________________
1972 Karmann Ghia

[TDCTDI]

WOW!!!! Great job!

I guess that I need to invest in a shrinking disc also since there are so many dents on my car (And I’m sure that I’ve probably been voted “most likely to wreck their shit”.).
_________________
Everybody born before 1975 has a story, good, bad, or indifferent, about a VW.


GOFUNDYOURSELF, quit asking everyone to do it for you!


An air cooled VW will make you a hoarder.


Do something, anything, to your project every day, and you will eventually complete it.

[Peter D.]

WOW! Outstanding result! Congratulations
_________________
2019 Golf Alltrack, '65 Ghia Coupe Restoration in Progress

[kiwighia68]

Yep. a near impossible job well done and now you have a door that, every time you open it to get into the car, will remind you of the loving attention you paid it.
_________________
Festina lente - hasten slowly
1968 Ghia named Emiko
Resto completed Dec 2015

[Evil_Fiz]

[Evil_Fiz]

It has been miserably hot and I have only logged 7.5 Hrs. since may 24th. last Saturday I spent three Hrs. on the continuing effort to get the right rear quarter panel into reasonably straight shape. Some work remains but I am getting close. I have given up on my goal of metal perfection and settled on accepting a < 1/8” layer of filler if I can’t get it straight with high build primer alone.

Today I did my best Eddie Van Halen impersonation by spending 4.5 Hrs. doing hammer-ons and pull-offs on the left rear bumper bracket mount. OK, it was just hammering and yanking on the stud puller but I did get the bumper bracket straight and in what appears to be the proper special location within the body opening.

Here are a few before and after pictures

Before/after – Bracket mount

Before/after – Bracket location and orientation

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Emil
_________________
“…It's not just about what's interesting. It's also about what's helpful, and it's helpful even if it helps just one other guy working on a Ghia.”
kiwighia68

See my build on TheSamba at:
The K_R_A_K_E_N_N : a 70 Ghia Convertible reinterpreted

[Evil_Fiz]

I'm back with more questions

I have cut out some rust damage in the left-rear rocker/quarter outer skin. The pictures and video below show what I am dealing with. I would like to avoid cutting out any more metal if it can be avoided. My thoughts are to:
- Flood the area with phosphoric acid
- Abrade the area as best I can
- Repeat
- weld in a repair patch
- Flood the area with MasterSeries then drain

I don't want to go Captain Overkill but I don't want to phone it in either. Your feedback is encouraged.

Internal rocker skin after wire wheel

Internal rocker skin after wire wheel

Outer skin exterior (removed piece)

Outer skin interior (removed piece)

Wide shot of damaged area

Rocker metal integrity testing

Link

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Emil
_________________
“…It's not just about what's interesting. It's also about what's helpful, and it's helpful even if it helps just one other guy working on a Ghia.”
kiwighia68

See my build on TheSamba at:
The K_R_A_K_E_N_N : a 70 Ghia Convertible reinterpreted

[Evil_Fiz]

I did not fall off the face of the planet nor did I stop working on the Ghia. I have been slowly progressing on doing bad, ugly sheet metal welds and getting closer to covering the car in primer. I put together the following rough sketch for Marcdeb of the convertible back seat support bracket. This is not final but I figured I'd share what i have so far.

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Emil
_________________
“…It's not just about what's interesting. It's also about what's helpful, and it's helpful even if it helps just one other guy working on a Ghia.”
kiwighia68

See my build on TheSamba at:
The K_R_A_K_E_N_N : a 70 Ghia Convertible reinterpreted

[fabricator john]

make it from cardboard just to make sure you can make your bends if needed number them in order ,have seen many including myself make a part you cant bend ...any that says they havent is full of poo. fabricator john

[rbsurfguy]

Emil!! Good to see you back in action. That's really cool of you to mock up that design for Marc, I have been lurking through various local ads as well looking for a'Vert being scrapped to see if they have that part for him. I can't wait to see if/when he mocks something up in metal.

Jeff
_________________
1971 Ghia convertible (Body off rebuild)
2019 VW Atlas 4Motion
2012 Passat-Sold


See my build on The Samba at:
Jeff's 71 Vert Restoration/Reassembly http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6...highlight=

[Marcdeb]

Your drawing looks great Emil. I really appreciate your taking the time to put this together for me. I will do my best to pay it forward. This community is amazing. The generosity and genuine willingness to help others is what makes TheSamba so special.

I'm looking forward to seeing more progress on your car. The hammer and dolly work you did on the door is just incredible.
_________________
Marc
68 Karmann Ghia Cabrio Autostick
71 Karmann Ghia Cabrio

Previously Owned:
2011 VW EOS Hard Top Conv
2008 Saab 9-3 2.0T Conv
2003 Saab 9-3 SE Conv
2001 Saab 9-3 Conv
1998 BMW 3 Series Conv
1997 Saab 900 Conv
1997 Mazda Miata

68 Ghia Vert Survivor with 22,350 miles: https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=768107&highlight=
71 Ghia Vert Restoration: https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=726710&postorder=asc

[Marcdeb]

[Evil_Fiz]

I'm back after nearly 4 years to the day since my last update.

I need advice from those who have painted their own Ghias.
If all goes well, next weekend my wife will apply epoxy to the entire bare metal car. I started a thread in the Body/Paint forum and will link it here for reference:
Any tips on how to paint the "Naughty Bits" on a Karmann Ghia?

Here is the text from that post to spare you a trip over there: