1958 FRAME REPAIR decision

[David L.]

My C1 frame is being restored, the fella finds a section on the pass side front that is bad. He says to me " I can fabricate a nice piece and weld it in or you can locate a Passenger side Frame Rail section nose thru past the body mount. Either a whole new frame rail or just a section about 10" on each side of the body mount".
Has anyone seen a fabricated repair (sounds the easiest way), but I don't wan't to say o.k. (and be sorry later) especially if I can find a used section if that's the smarter way ????

[Steven B.]

Re: 1958 FRAME REPAIR decision

David, I have only seen two fabricated repairs. One was done for a Duesenberg by a restorer who was also an ACD judge. It was excellent and undetectable after paint. The other was by a fellow who professed to have done many Corvettes in the past. It looked like crap. If you cannot see a sample of his previous frame fabrication I would find a section. Just my opinion cause you don't want to redo work or pay twice. Steve

[Jerry W.]

Re: 1958 FRAME REPAIR decision

Dave ...we bought a new driver side front frame horn from corvette specialties of michigan

for a our 62...they have the original GM tooling....I have pics of the replacement process

I just changed computers and haven't mastered posting pic.

Rich M. free free to post my pics.

Dave send me a PM with your email

[David L.]

Re: 1958 FRAME REPAIR decision

THANK YOU GUYS for your info, I APPRECIATE your info

[Dan D.]

Re: 1958 FRAME REPAIR decision

I'm going back a ton of years; but there used to be a place called Cannons in Alexandria, VA who had used frames and frame sections. Might be worth a try

[Richard M.]

Re: 1958 FRAME REPAIR decision

It's a common rust through area there, due to the battery leaking over time.

Is the frame local or remote? Can you get photos? If remote, I would ask for close up photos of the damage before making a decision. I'd also ask if his repair would be detectable after recoating.

Replacing a entire section from 10" behind the mount to the front frame horn is a option. But I would certainly hope his jig is very accurate to ensure you don't have a racked frame when you install the front crossmember later and try to get FE alignment after the restoration is complete.

Rich
p.s. Jerry sent me photos of his '62 frame work but need to get them from a different computer later.

[Richard M.]

Re: 1958 FRAME REPAIR decision

David,

Here is information and extensive picture library of Jerry's '62 frame work. As you can see it's not a simple task to ensure that it is done correctly.

http://s684.photobucket.com/user/richmz/slideshow/Misc/1962%20Corvette%20Frame%20Repair

A few pics for tdb database history here....
New frame photos 001 [Desktop Resolution].jpg New frame photos 002 [Desktop Resolution].jpg New frame photos 006 [Desktop Resolution].jpg

Jerry's finished '62 Top Flight at the Texas Regional.
IMG958124.jpg


Jerry, I placed all of your photos on my Photobucket page. Hope that's okay. If not let me know and I could password protect to make private, etc. Below is the transcript of the details of your frame shop communication(timestamped oldest first). Those guys were awesome!

Rich

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Hello Guys,
Here's todays update. I didn't get to do as much as I wanted to at jakes because he was committed to finishing a repair job but thats o.k. I had plenty of other things to do to keep me busy. I did go over there as planned this morning and we basically talked more about our "plan of attack" and did some more measurments with the factory specs. that Jerry sent me. I also showed him Ryans drawings and Jake had no issues or arguments with them. He guesstimates a good day and a half of work from start to finish which means me doing a day and a half of work and him putting in about 4-6 full hours. It will take careful planing according to Jake to get it all in line and like it needs to be. He decided that we are not going to replace the center support rail at this time like we discussed yesterday. However, we will be replacing all the parts that I marked in yellow tape because the replacement section you bought does not include them and the parts are MUCH cheaper to replace than they are to cut off with a side grinder, remove the excessive weld once the pieces have been removed, and then re-weld back on. Plus, it's not too easy getting them off without hacking them up. Like I said, very time consuming which equals very expensive. If needed, I can give you a price list of what the parts cost Ryan and you will see that this by far was the cheapest route. Most of this I got through Paragon so I will get a 10-15% discount. So, I ordered all of this and a battery tray today. I also picked up the sandblasting and powdercoated parts. They look great. I included pictures of that stuff as well. The four brake drums were blasted and powdercoated but aren't in the pictures because I dropped them off to have the surfaces cleaned up. It doesn't look like the surfaces will need very much grinding at all. I guess that was done recently also. I also ordered our primer for the frame along with three different grits of sandpaper through a great friend of mine who always gives me a super good deal, much better than any parts house. Too bad he can't sale paint. So, thats the deal. The sandblasting and powdercoating was only $250 and I havn't gotten a total price with shipping on the frame parts and a total price on the frame paint and sandpaper. I personally think we are getting lucky on prices up to this point. I hope you feel the same.
There are two photos with three horizontal pieces of yellow tape showing the deep bend in the right-hand front frame horn. There should be a very minor factory bend here but not to this degree. We can handle this and aren't worried so once again please don't be alarmed. Call or email with questions and comments. Thanks, Justin

Hello,
Well, today Jake and I straightened out the right-hand frame horn. The enclosed pictures will show the frame strapped down to the frame machine and the upright hydralic puller doing the work. It looks like we just put a couple pieces of wood on the frame machine and then chained it down but it really wasn't quite that simple. The end result was a measurment that was 1/32" of where we wanted it to be. In other words, MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!!!!!! Tomorrow we will cut off the left-hand side and hopefully have time time to make the insert and re-weld the new piece on. By the way, it didn't take us all day to do todays work. Jake tells me when to come over to his shop and he makes a little time for me then. When it comes time to pay him he always cuts me a huge deal just for this reason. Sometimes I wish he would charge me the full rate and work on my stuff full time instead of fitting me in here and there but it is what it is. Justin

Hello Ryan & Jerry,
Well, today we made a little more progress. We got the bad section of the left frame removed finally. Its gone forever!!! We started making the insert to go inside the frame to connect / weld both pieces together and Jake got called out to handle something at his church. By the way, this happens VERY often as he is super involved there including services, maintenence, politics, whatever, but he's not one of those hardcore holy rollers (not that theres anything wrong with that). Anyway, the attached photos will show todays work at his place, not mine. I also over the past few days in my spare time have been sanding down the brake backing plates removing pits and imperfections so I will be taking them and all of the bare metal parts like the a-arms you saw in the photos to the powdercoater tomorrow. I also rebuilt the spindles and they look beautiful. I was going to put the inspection paint on them but my little bottle has dried up so I will have to get some more. I've been doing alot of bead blasting and restoring of small parts that I haven't really been mentioning which tak es a good bit of time. Its amazing how many parts it takes to make up a car. It's nice to get all of this ready for when the frame is done so I can have it right then to bolt on. I need to get you guys some "finished product" photos as I think you will be surprised how much I have accomplished and how well things are looking. I'll put that on my list of things to do tomorrow. Thanks again, Justin

Hello Again,
Today was a better day for frame progress. We were able to complete the fabrication of the frame insert, tack weld it into the original frame section first, slide the new frame horn on, measure it to the angle we desired (no more than 1/16" out of square or alignment at any measuring point), and then tack weld the new horn to the insert. At that point we were more than pleased but we did run into an unexpected but fixable problem. I'll try to explain without confusing you. The original frame is about 1/10" wider than the new piece. Once you put the new piece on, everything butts together nice and flush except one side (about the thickness of a toothpick). Fortunetely it is on the inside but thats still not acceptable to me and Jake. What we have done tofix this is cut a narrow pie-shaped line in the upper and lower outer edges of the original frame section. We then with large u-clamps pulled together the gap to make the original and the repro. parts come together as one and once again tack welded all of this together. By the time we got to this point it was close to 5:00 so I had to go. I wanted Jake to finish all of the welding but he said that he only wants to weld about an inch at a time to prevent the heat from causing the two frame sections from drawing one direction or another and screwing up our work. He says he wants to do a little welding here and there over the course of a day just to prevent this. Makes sense to me since we've come this far. Here are a few of todays progress photos. We will be removing the inner frame section after all (the one closest to the oil pan). In order for us to get everything welded and finished down properly we decided to do this. We will be able to remove it and put it back on without anyone noticing that it was ever removed to begin with. Justin

[Gary C.]

Re: 1958 FRAME REPAIR decision

Dave,

Either way will work. If you select repair, make sure the the rest of the area is sound.

Attached is a '58 frame spec to be used for aligning the frame after the work is completed.

Gary
....

[David L.]

Re: 1958 FRAME REPAIR decision

Rich, Thanks I HAVE Jerry's photos AMAZING to say the least. Thanks I will discuss this with the frame man. APPRECIATED