HOOD Restoration question

Roadster62

Roadster62

Well-known member
Fine Point or nice driver, guess the answer may vary. Would removing the hood clips and handles to allow for ease of sanding be a good idea? You could blast the mating surface and rerivet them after your last sanding. Has anyone done this, was it worth the time? Bob
 
I think the answer is No because most people do not have the equipment nor the correct rivets to re-install. I have yet to see a reason to remove them for bodywork. The trick is to tape them off about ½" away until the final priming. Then you have only a slight amount to sand. If there is a mill thickness difference, then that means you have too much primer or filler on the rest of the hood.
 
I say yes because all it takes is a simple buck ground to the shape of the rivet head and a punch to flare the hollow rivet. The punch can be purchased from Model A parts suppliers or you can make one in five minutes if you have a small lathe. The rivets are also available from the same suppliers. It make sand blasting, priming and sanding much easier.

Also, you might consider painting all the parts and then assembling. If you do this you eliminate rust coming from under the clips and handles. You just touch up the rivets with a brush when you are done. I've done it this way several times.
 
I took them off as it does make it easy.

BUT

I have tools.
If you have access to a brake kick rivet tool and a helper you will do great. Takes 2 people to make it happen and the rivet looks great when down. I guess it could be done with a hammer and anvil, but I am certain you will need help from someone that has a clue. You have to have the proper upset tool!!

Rivets are cheap. Practice first to see if you can do it nice.

About the repro rivets. They are not right! The head is a bit wider and gets thinner to the edge. Save the old rivets and chuck the new ones up in a battery drill and use a file make the correct shape. While you are at it, use sandpaper to sand the head. Paint needs scratch to adhere to the metal.

Later you will also need the kick riveter to do the leather corner.

While you are working on the hood, the side panels will have a bow inward. This is because the Z lip is slightly stretched from the hinges. You can only straighten this by doing lots of quick heat shrinks along just the offset edge. You have to just get the edge hot and not let it around the bend and do it in a few places. Let them cool then do it some more.
 
Bob V said:
I say yes because all it takes is a simple buck ground to the shape of the rivet head and a punch to flare the hollow rivet. The punch can be purchased from Model A parts suppliers or you can make one in five minutes if you have a small lathe. The rivets are also available from the same suppliers. It make sand blasting, priming and sanding much easier.

Also, you might consider painting all the parts and then assembling. If you do this you eliminate rust coming from under the clips and handles. You just touch up the rivets with a brush when you are done. I've done it this way several times.
Click to expand...

Actually the correct rivets are not. Remember, Bob said this is for a fine-points or nice driver.

.
 
Kevin in NJ said:
I took them off as it does make it easy.

BUT

I have tools.
If you have access to a brake kick rivet tool and a helper you will do great. Takes 2 people to make it happen and the rivet looks great when down. I guess it could be done with a hammer and anvil, but I am certain you will need help from someone that has a clue. You have to have the proper upset tool!!

Rivets are cheap. Practice first to see if you can do it nice.

About the repro rivets. They are not right! The head is a bit wider and gets thinner to the edge. Save the old rivets and chuck the new ones up in a battery drill and use a file make the correct shape. While you are at it, use sandpaper to sand the head. Paint needs scratch to adhere to the metal.

Later you will also need the kick riveter to do the leather corner.

While you are working on the hood, the side panels will have a bow inward. This is because the Z lip is slightly stretched from the hinges. You can only straighten this by doing lots of quick heat shrinks along just the offset edge. You have to just get the edge hot and not let it around the bend and do it in a few places. Let them cool then do it some more.
Click to expand...


Kevin has it right on the procedure ...but it begs the question, is it easier or "worth the time"? If I weigh the time, I would probably spend about 15 minutes around each of the 4 clips from initial sanding to colorsanding. One will easily have well over an hour of extra labor in the removal and replacement by the time all of the details are completed because one needs to remember that area still needs to be sanded.

One also needs to factor in the topic of "over-restoration" around items such as louvres and clips. Now this is not to imply the paint wasn't shiny around objects like those originally but look at a few original cars with original paint to see what I mean.

.
 

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I really thought this was a given in "Fine Point" quality restorations, or are the original rivets looked upon as better than replacements? Bob
 
I had no choice but to remove most of mine so I removed them all. The hood sides I used were very straight but had come pitting in that area. Additionally, it's almost impossible to keep the paint film thickness as thin as Ford did with all new metal and using lacquer. I can't stand the appearance of paint "bridging" and hiding the definition that was clearly there originally. Also, most hoods look terrible down in the pocket where the hood latch fastens and I didn't want that.

My handles and Hood clip sockets cleaned up nicely after some minor sanding of the steel and then bead blasting again. I sprayed them with thinned DP90 and that was it. I kept the film thickness as thin as possible in these areas of the hood and when the hood sides were ready for paint I spotted the attachment areas with DP90 thinned as a sealer. This added step was necessary because the dark blue single stage urethane I used did NOT like to cover bare urethane primer surfacer. I also scuffed all the DP with a fine scotchbrite pad before assembly so the sealer coat of DP applied just prior to color would adhere well.

As talked about earlier, I also reshaped the new rivet heads in my drill press to match the original 9/64" rivets.

In my opinion it would take just as much time to make most hoods look nice in this area without disassembly as this is just not that time consuming except maybe the added 45-60 minutes to reshape the rivets.

As a final note, I suspect many folks here assume I'm a professional restorer. The only thing I did professionally was interiors and tops. My Roadster is the only car I've ever painted. Fortunately it still looks pretty nice after 18 years.

hood_rubber-1.jpg


hood_rivets.jpg


hood_rivets-1.jpg
 
I should point out that the repro rivets are fairly obvious once you know what you are looking for at the edge.

Why do it?

I am not doing a points car, but I am trying to keep some thing close. In this case I looked at the visibility, very visible, and ease and time cost. Pretty easy and not very time consuming and no cost.

So why not take a little bit of time to make the head look more like original?

I have made many concessions on my car. The time and money budget on my restoration (time especially) as dropped as kids have come into the picture. You have to figure out what is important to you. Now for function, I have spent quite a bit of time figuring out how to make parts function properly. The interesting part is that you get no extra points if it functions perfectly. It does have to function and look right according to JS.

You have the information and you can decide if you want to spend the time.
 
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