VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - GENERAL Body - Sheet Metal, Paint & Wood Quality Workmanship, Can You Tell It From The Orig

In another thread I read a comment buy Gene where he was paying tribute to the work done by one of out members that has passed on; “The workmanship on that car is sooooo good you would swear it was a production model.”

This got me to thinking about how you can achieve this level of workmanship. It’s difficult to describe, I know I couldn’t explain exactly what the look is of original factory workmanship, you just kind of know it when you see it. About every restoration that I see has some sort of or more often many clues that give it away.
Some of the more obvious are the base coat clear coat wet look paint jobs that are the standard now days. Powder coated parts is another one that stands out like a sore thumb. Ideas of what the frames were painted with run the gamut and are also gives up the secret that the vehicle has had a restoration.
Many of the wiring looms that I’ve seen just taint right, the color is wrong, just to bright or worse yet is the plastic insulation wrapped in 3m electrical tape.
Fasteners can be really hard to match and those SS bolts and screws seem to find their way into a lot of restorations.
Sandblasting is a quick and dirty solution for many restorers as is filling those little marks left by the spot welding or the dies during forming. The blasting removes a lot of the drag lines and tooling marks, rounds over once sharp edges and is a sure tip off that we taint looking at an original factory job. A chemical dipped part or simply wire brushed part is about impossible to tell from an original factory part.
The inner skirt treatment are usually a dead give away, it’s very difficult to duplicate the black prime coat used on the original sheet metal. I still have vivid pictures in my head from when I was a teen working for the Chevrolet dealership. The whole attic above the Chevy parts room with its hundreds of black body parts hanging from the rafters like a slaughter house and rows of panels stood up against the walls. There is something very distinctive about that prime coat.

So just exactly what is it that you might look for that makes that rare restoration impossible to distinguish from the factory job?

Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

To make it look original just make it look like a mass produced car with fair shine on the chrome, runs in the paint, things not fitting well and you will have a good example of a new car of the '30's, '40's, '50's and '60's.
If you brought a new 1950 that was perfectly preserved to a meet you would't have a chance in the fit, finsh and quality department.
To be honest most of the well restored cars are over restored.

....Well said.....

at a typical NCRS judging event, approximatly 95% of the judged corvettes are over-restored in terms of fit and finish. and said vettes usually get a minor deduction on their originality in this area being judged. the only corvettes at such meets that display factory fit/finish are those orignals going for the Bowtie Award. mike

You can also include the 1970's on that list. I bought a brand new 1977 Monte Carlo and it was greatly lacking in quality. When purchased, parts were missing on the car and the bottom of the doors (just above the rocker mouldings) were still in primer!! And, there were a lot of other things on the brand new Monte Carlo that the factory overlooked during assembly.

Well now this really has me confused. I had thought that there might have been some sort of secret to how Harry had done that ’39 to get such high praise such as “The workmanship on that car is sooooo good you would swear it was a production model.”
So I guess the way I should have taken it is that the ’39 that Harry restored had a “fair shine on the chrome, runs in the paint, things not fitting well and you will have a good example of a new car of the '30's, '40's, '50's and '60's.”

Not trying to be a smart [bleeped] but I really don’t remember seeing many new cars that were all that bad. Maybe a lemon snuck thru once in a while but the vast majority of the new cars that I worked with when I worked for the Chevrolet dealerships from ’59 to ’64 were not that bad. I worked my first year as a greaser, runner, new/used car detailer, and the rest of the time in parts at three different dealerships till my uncle caught up with me and sent me off to work on Jeeps. For all the cars that went thru the shop in a month, the GSD shelf wasn’t all that big or that full. And most of the time when the Zone rep stopped by it was for a social visit rather than to settle a customer complaint.

And Dog, I don’t see how that ’70 Monte Carlo ever got past the new car prep guys or the sales man that was delivering the car. It never would have at any of the dealerships that I worked at.

I didn’t expect to hear such a negative response, from the tone of the replies it sounds like the judges are giving points for show car embellishments rather than factory originality. Or am I just reading this the wrong way maybe??????
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

The wworkmanship I was refering more to was the modifications required to change the car nto a convertible. There were many hand made and "re-made" items that are required in a major conversion such as this. Not to say teh actual restoration wasn't good and was not up to Ron Wade's '41 for example. Harry drove his cars and had quite a fleet. The only thing I could fault on the '39 was the tappets were so loud you could hear the clacking from a block away. Harry and son always commented as to how quite my '39 was.

And you never told them about the shop rags under the VC did you Gene?? Just kiddin' buddy I’m sure you would never have stooped that low. But it does sound like they were better body men than mechanics. A little bit of clatter is omnipresent with these solid lifters so I just accept it as the price of driving a 60 year old truck, but they taint all that noisy if kept in adjustment.
Yeah that was quite a trick, turning a coupe into a convert. Way more than I would have ever cared to tackle. My brother passed away in July and he was just about finished, ready for paint, with a '51 Olds four door that he had cut down to make a two door out of it. He was one of those there hot rodders all of his life. He always had to have a nice cherry steel body and then commence to chop it down to fit his ideas of what a car should look like. He always did nice work and built many cars over his life but once he got holt of one there was no turning back. Being a preservationist I would cringe and have to bite my tongue every time I walked into his garage.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

I worked as a body man-painter from 1956 to 1963 and I remember painting over a lot of primer on new chevrolets,56 front fenders would not match the body,two different paint companys.holes in upholstery,replace seat skins and door panels.I will say by 63 quality was much better.

I recall in VCCA judges training the chief judge and trainer stated several times that we should bear in mind the vehicles coming out of the factories were not perfect. Furthermore we should not deduct points for blemishes such as fit and finish.

They were correct. The car should be judged as to how it came from the factory, which includes the factory fit and finish, all of the original parts and the original drive train as well.

In another club that I participate in, No points are deducted if the fit and finish is better than factory.There are points deductions for over restoring items such as stainless fasteners when they should be phosphate or whatever. Also for glossy paint under the hood or lack of correct overspray on the bottom of the car, etc.
Some of us just can't leave dirt and orange peel in our paint or paint over factory waves and dents.