After 49 years of working, I have decided to retire Oct 14th of this year. As a retirement gift (with my wife's blessing) I purchased a 1930 Chevy three window coupe. It needs work but I will have plenty of time now. I'm looking for some guidance. The doors are sagging significantly. I'm guessing this is a common occurrence with these wooded frame cars. The wooden hinge screw holes looked to be rotted. Otherwise, most of the pillar looks to be in decent shape. I was thinking of injecting epoxy around the screw holes, then once harden drilling through holes and making a metal plate with threaded holes to sandwich the pillar between the hinge and the steel plate. The other two options, I can think of, is replacing the hinge pillar with the new one, not sure if a new pillar would even be available. Or replace the wood with steel square tubing. I really don't want to totally disassemble the cab.
Any suggestion before I start. I attached a few pic to help explain the issue.
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May not work on your car but did on mine and others have tried it also, but I drilled out the rotted holes and inserted hard wood dowels with glue. Then when set up I drilled the holes with a small bit and inserted the screws. Worked great and not much work.
If the rest of a wood part is good and solid but the screw or bolt or nail holes are compromised many have inserted new wood into the area. Drill and glue in hardwood dowels, just filling the hole with new wood tapped into the hole and injecting epoxy (or urethane) have all been successful. Which one or complete replacement depends on the condition of the parts. A search of wooden boat repairs can be very helpful in understanding the best option.
Many of us have cut out deteriorated wood and spliced in new sections.
