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Posted By: Chistech Body wood and Restoration service - 03/16/22 02:26 PM
Well, my company deciding to let a whole division go (200+ people) after 22 years has helped make the decision for me to start my own official business. For years I have serviced, sold, and installed packaging equipment from simple tape machines to very involved food modified atmosphere vacuum machines. While I’ll continue with that side of the business, I’ve decided to also incorporate my antique car restoration “hobby” into the business. While I will no longer offer full restorations in most situations, I will offer many of the services I’ve learned to do through the years. I will still be doing roofs which includes the aluminum moldings, full chassis work, some painting, and wood work. I have updated my equipment and I’m capable now to get wood done fairly quickly. While I’ll make pieces and ship them, I will also take in complete bodies and rewood them, returning them in a body finished state. Here are a few pictures of my recent wood work. A 30’ chevy from RI, a 32’ Olds roadster from Syracuse NY, and a 33’ olds 4dr sedan roof wood from TN. (The picture of the old wood on the red carpet is what I received from the 33’ Olds owner. The wood I made up and shipped to him fit perfectly by his description). The 30’ chevy got all new roof wood and new B pillars made. The 32’ Olds roadster wood is on my spare frame and abou 1/3 made up as I’m waiting on the body that should be here mid summer. I’ve also made up two more sets of 32’ olds lower body wood that shipped to Spokane Washington. The owner said the fit and finish was perfect to his cars body/chassis. This is the types of work I’ll be offering and all the above wood projects were done over the past 8 months. If you have a project and are looking for work that’s done in a timely manner, PM me. Thanks Ted.

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Posted By: 35Mike Re: Body wood and Restoration service - 03/17/22 12:42 PM
Ted,
A friend is starting to work on a '34 Chevy Master 4 door. He has just removed the upholstery to find that his wood is in rough shape. He is a talented wood worker, himself, but thinks this is beyond what he can do.
I have not seen the car since the removal of the interior, but I might get a look at it tonight. Sound like this is in your wheelhouse, but unless you have done one before, you would need the car, rather than making and shipping parts.
The car is in Mid Missouri.

Mike
Posted By: Chistech Re: Body wood and Restoration service - 03/18/22 02:32 AM
Hi Mike,
Yes, it would be best to have the whole car. I’m already busy enough that I couldn’t take it till the end of the year the soonest and possibly fuel/trucking could be costing les by then. Missouri to me isn’t to bad as I have a cousin who drives it in a motor home every year and he says the drive isn’t that bad. I’m going to MI in August but I already have a car on my trailer both ways. If he wanted to pull wood carefully from the car and ship it to me, if it’s there to a degree, I can usually make it up. Things like the main sills and lower wood is usually fairly easy to figure out and would give him a good foundation to start on the pieces he might think he can make himself. If he wants to call me, PM me and I’ll get you my number. If it was just making up some of those major pieces, I usually fit them in when another project stalls because of this or that. Also, if I’m setup making wood, I’ll make up a few cars at a time. That’s how I’ve been doing it now.
Posted By: Lou Re: Body wood and Restoration service - 03/24/22 06:07 AM
. Hi Ted, I am trying to restore a 1923 Light Delivery as pictured in the ad in this post. All the wood appears the be straight cut with no compound curves. The second photo is my attempt to mock up a body from the photo in the ad but the lack of measurements resulted in an incorrect fit. Third photo is a spec sheet with dimensions from a 1937 Salesman's Handbook of a ton & half Canopy Express. Since the cost to ship a body would be prohibitive, could I purchase a spec sheet from you with 1923 Lt Del dimensions?
. . Thank you, . . Lou
,

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Posted By: Chistech Re: Body wood and Restoration service - 03/25/22 03:52 AM
I don’t have any spec sheets. Shipping wood is not as expensive as you might think but currently with the price of fuel there might be a surcharge.
Posted By: Lou Re: Body wood and Restoration service - 03/25/22 06:32 AM
. Hi Ted, Thanks for reply. I'm not sure how you could make anything with out specs or chassis to check the fit. I tried to guestimate dimensions from drawing but only had side view (pictured). What looks and fit right at the rear was too wide at the drivers seat and cowl. Thank you for offering your servics to VCCA members.
. Lou
.

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Posted By: Chistech Re: Body wood and Restoration service - 03/25/22 04:43 PM
There’s actually a way to figure it out fairly easily on depot hack type bodies. I need some dimensions like body to chassis mounting hole locations, width of cowl at the A pillars, etc. not real difficult if I have good dimensions..
Posted By: beachbum Re: Body wood and Restoration service - 03/26/22 02:56 AM
Dean posted the Martin Parry, or Hercules sales brochure from 1928. If you make the allowance for the different wheelbase from 1923 to 1928 you should be able to get pretty close. It had general dimensions for the various bodies sold. I think he posted it in the technical reference area.

Art

After posting this I tried to find the sales manual I mentioned. I could not find any technical references listed here or on the home page. It would be a shame to lose the info that has been posted over many years.
Posted By: Rustoholic Re: Body wood and Restoration service - 03/26/22 04:00 AM
Even though the discussion about Lou's project is interesting, this thread is about Chistech's new business venture.

I suggest that Lou's question and follow-on posts should be in their own thread.

Just to put a period on the previous post, here's where the full 1928 Hercules catalog resides:

vcca.org -> Members -> Vehicle Technical Info -> 1928_Hercules_Body_Catalog

All my best, Dean
Posted By: David_S Re: Body wood and Restoration service - 04/03/22 03:47 AM
Ted had a thought, well a couple actually. At one point I seriously thought about offering to fly you to my place in WI for a couple days to help me get a good start on the wood for my 28 truck. Now in light of this post and getting a feel for how busy you are, I thought would face time sessions be a option for guys that have the tools and skills and want to tackle their own wood? I actually have a good start on mine but I kinda got stuck once I got the cab back done and moved on to the latch and hinge pillars.
I only have halfway good wood in one door, and who knows how true that is and I,m trying to map out the right curvature of those posts off what may be a twisted door. I had no wood to start with except the cab back. The rest has to be reverse engined. I did reach out to two of the wood guys. One just raised his prices recently making it cost prohibitive to even get just the select harder pieces and he won’t sell anything except in pairs.
The other wouldn’t even give me prices when I called him. He asked where I lived and when I told him he said you live close enough, drive on down, bring a bunch of cash, buy or not buy, bring your camera and take pictures if you want, but wouldn’t give me any idea as to cost. He may be as much as the other guy or maybe he would swing a good deal. Maybe would sell one of the pieces maybe would only sell pairs also, don’t know. A 3.5 hour drive one way is too far for to many unanswered questions.
Just babbling I guess.
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