1972 Body Mystery

[Marc Wilborn]

Hello

We are in the beginning stages of disassembling our 1972 convertible for restoration. We bought the car because of the body fit and originality. We are the second owners.

While stripping the paint, we have discovered a yellow paint underneath the original paint on the rear clip. The yellow paint is not noticable anywhere else. The layers are 1) glass, 2) reddish primer, 3) yellow paint, 4) reddish primer and 5) blue paint.

The rear lower valance has a grease date approriate for the build date of the car. The spare tire tub is marked 2-72 which I assume is a date. The car is a late Sept '71 car so that looks funny. Also, in front of the left rear wheel well is a joint in the glass about half way up.

We are wondering if the rear clip was replaced early on due to an accident and the yellow paint was from the donor car. Is there any way of determining if a rear clip has been replaced? The panel fit on the rear clip is perfect and no goobers around the bumper holes.

Thanks

Marc

[Mike M.]

Re: 1972 Body Mystery

remove seats and carpets in front, then look for evidence of the car having been "clipped" in its past. it was common place in the 70's and 80's wherein a rear clip from a donor vette replaced the original rear clip that was damaged in a MVA.the splice usually occured under the front edge of the seats and extended side to side. i've seen them clipped where the rocker panel steel channel wasn't welded at the junction of the donor and recipient rockers. good luck and let us know what ya find. mike

[Harmon C.]

Re: 1972 Body Mystery

Marc
With the paint off body repairs should be easy to see as all you should have are bonding seams and fiberglass. Old repairs on the underside were not finished as a rule and show up easy to the trained eye. Look for torn fiberglass or mat material. Lyle

[Chuck S.]

Re: 1972 Body Mystery

Marc, what orientation is the "joint" in the left wheel well; i.e. is it vertical, horizontal? There should only be only one joint in the rear fender, and that joint runs horizontally from door edge to the tail light panel a couple of inches or so below the fender crown.

If your car sustained a rear-end collosion adequate to force replacement of the rear fiberglass, you can expect that the rear cross member, gas tank, and maybe the spare tub would have also required replacement. Check the frame rails near the rear cross member for evidence of bends that have been straightened.

[Marc Wilborn]

Re: 1972 Body Mystery

Thanks to all for your responses.

Chuck, the joint is about 45 degrees and is "pointing" towards the rally center cap. The glass below the joint is darker than the glass above the joint.

The car sat for quite awhile before I bought it and the gas tank was recently replaced. This could be its third gas tank though if the original was trashed in the wreck. I am surprised that the rear valance has the correct grease markings date and all of the lenses have the correct dates.

Marc

[Chuck S.]

Re: 1972 Body Mystery

Yep, sounds like you have some new glass on it. I'm surprised you can tell the difference in color between the fiberglass...I would think everything would be mud color or undercoated.

Depending on which way the 45 degrees is leaning will determine which fiberglass is original. The original fiberglass color was changing from about 69(?) until 73(?). Early cars in this period will be primarily a dark charcoal gray or black, and later cars will be almost entirely of a light gray fiberglass. It sounds like the donor car may been an earlier model with the black fiberglass. What happens at the bonding strip between the top deck surround and lower fender? Your next puzzle will be to outline all of the bonding points/joints to find how much of the rear fiberglass was replaced. Of particular interest would be if there is a seam across the deck area on the inside. It's possible the entire rear clip wasn't replaced, but only the left rear fender from a rear side collision.

I am also surprised that the rear valence is apparently the original and undamaged...maybe a tree fell across the rear deck area and left the valence undamaged. Once you have the bonding strips at the corner of the tail light panel and fender exposed, you will be able to immediately identify any monkeying around there. Factory bonds are not necessarily pretty (some slight squeezing out of bonding compound), but they will be more, uh..."efficient"...than body shop repairs. As Lyle describes, body shop repairs can be pretty messy where they can't be seen.

Dates on the lenses are not conclusive...any model years having the same lenses will have the same date molded into them. In some cases, these dates can be a prior model year if the lenses are the same as the previous MY.

[Michael W.]

Re: 1972 Body Mystery

Are you sure that the numbers you see written on the panels are dates? I would expect to see a factory job number, but not a date or date code.

[Mark #28455]

Re: 1972 Body Mystery

I have several cars with a date on the inside of the rear valence

[Marc Wilborn]

Re: 1972 Body Mystery

Hello

The mystery gets worse. The lower half of the left fender has no yellow paint underneath the blue paint. The yellow paint disappears at the horizontal line consistent with the red marker lense.

I will keep all up to date on what I find as I remove more paint.

Marc

[Chuck S.]

Re: 1972 Body Mystery

Mikey, hand-written dates on the inside of panels is typical. I had the date on the valence (exhaust) panel, right rear fender, and hood. These dates are usually in a month/day/shift format but can have the year (hood) instead of the shift. These dates will be written on the bare glass and underneath blackout or any other finishes. The car will still have the job number and option codes in the ususal spots.