Straightening, Aligning and Fitting the Doors

So now the real body work begins…
First order of business is to get the doors even with the rest of the body, then adjust the door gaps so that we have an even reveal around the door, then work all of the dents and dings out of the panel. Sounds easy eh?

Straighten and Align Rear Passenger Door

The gaps at the back of the rear passenger door were in places almost 3/8″ wide, while the gaps on the front side of the door were less than 1/16″, and this was with the door hinges adjusted so that the door was moved as far back as possible. The rear gap on the front door was excessive as well. Rather than spend a lot of time on the problem, using the TIG, I welded a piece of 1/8″ rod to the rear door edges, front and back. I stitch welded the rod every 1″ or so, then ground down the weld to .005-.010 proud, then hammered the weld flat. Working slowly to not over heat the panel I finally had a new edge to work with. I used a combination of 4 1/2″ grinders, cut off wheels and files to remove metal from the back of the doors until I had a uniform 3/16″ reveal.

Aligning Door Gaps

More work was done primarily on the front door this time.

Install and Align Front Fenders

Ran into a slight problem with the front doors… I needed the front fenders on the car to set the front door gap! To get the front fenders where they needed to be, I needed to install the core support, splash pan, inner fender panels and the hood. All which needed to be aligned and gapped as well… the hood was a lot of fun, it has 23 different bolts that can be tightened, loosened, moved or tweaked to get the hood located properly.

Working out a Crease in the Front Passenger Door

Adjusting the Front Passenger Door Gap

The Door From Hell!

After I got the gaps in decent shape, then I set about to get all of the doors to sit flush in the door opening, three out of the four doors fit quite well, then there was the rear passenger door again. When I got the two lower corners and upper rear corners flush, the front upper corner was almost 3/8″ low! with no good way to split the difference. I decided to place a hard wood wedge in the upper corner of the frame, then slam the door until I had tweaked the upper front corner back into alignment. Everything was now great, except the door skin was oil canning now.

At one time the passenger side of the wagon hit something about six to ten inches up from the bottom of the door the crease ran from about midway on the front door to the end of the rear door and then into the quarter panel. I am guessing that at a different time, another crease was put into the rear door about ten inches higher than the first. Sometime later, someone tried to repair the creases.

1960’s era Joe Bodyman apparently didn’t want to spend the time to remove the interior door panel and the window glass so that the repair could be made properly. Instead he hammered a body spike through the rear of the door frame and used it to try and prise the crease out. In doing this he bent the damn door frame. He never did get the crease worked out, so he filled the crease with lead, then a bit of bondo and called it all good.

Unfortunately after I straightened the door frame, the metal that had been stretched in the accident, was now oil canning. To solve the problem I had to shrink the door skin sheet metal, which I really could not do until I removed the damn lead from the door. So all of the work that I had done previously on this door was for naught and I had to start over again… arrrrrrrrrrrrgh!

I finally removed enough lead to where I could work the panel back to about where it needed to be. I then filled the area with Kitty Hair and blocked it straight again.

Luckily, the driver’s side only required some time spent moving and adjusting the hinges to get everything in decent shape. After all of this, I made the decision that I would not be removing the doors to paint them and the jambs. Even with guide holes drilled in the hinges, the chance of getting this mess straight again would be slim.


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