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1967 Galaxie 500 Project, aka Jules


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20 hours ago, ]2eDeYe said:

Gonna be able to drive this one soon

 

Probably not.  😄

 

Still need to sort out the hydraulics for the brakes, install the new wiring harness, then get started on swapping in the new engine/trans. 

 

Biggest hold up now is budget. Got a few things I need to buy like dizzy, carb, intake, headers, stuff to make an exhaust, then on to buying and fitting new gauges. Then have to sort out a fuel system, and probably a few others things I am forgetting...  🙃

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We had an old seat from Tim's van that I liberated a big chunk of foam from...

 

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I cut it down to the size of the air bag...

 

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Shaved it down level with the surrounding foam and put the cover back on...

 

large.20210203_165615.jpg.c44399173a0c30

 

 

I also painted the harness surrounds with some wrinkle black, but it did not turn out as well as I wanted it to. Gonna try again Saturday...

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3 hours ago, datsunfreak said:

 

Obviously the passenger side was already handled for me, but I'm really not sure what to do with the driver side bag...

 

Hook it to a battery maybe?  😄

 

That's how they do it at dealerships. Gotta explode them before disposing. I wasn't sure if you knew of a place that would take it for disposal. This is one of the reasons I just left them in the seats I bought. The other being it's a mofo to get out on leather seats.

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39 minutes ago, Draker said:

I wasn't sure if you knew of a place that would take it for disposal. 

 

I think I could maybe dispose of it at work. I work for a large company that recycles this kind of stuff, so they would probably take it from me...

 

But blowing it up sounds more fun.  😄

 

39 minutes ago, Draker said:

This is one of the reasons I just left them in the seats I bought. The other being it's a mofo to get out on leather seats.

 

I only took them out of my Miata leather seats because there was a zipper on the back.  😁

 

These really weren't much fuss to get out. Thankfully...

Edited by datsunfreak
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Some people collect coins, some people collect stamps, I seem to collect hobbies (and hopefully, skills).  😁

 

You may know I have recently gotten into wood working as a hobby, specifically building custom guitars

 

I was ruminating on steering wheels, and oddly this video came up on my youtube feed, wherein a guy makes his own wood-rimmed steering wheel, using an old Grant as a donor...

 

As it happens, I have an old Nardi wooden wheel collecting dust on the shelf. 

 

large.20210204_190920.jpg.af92e80a79b5f7

 

 

One of it's previous owners had foolishly painted it white. Then another previous owner (the guy I got it from) had sanded most of the white paint off only to find the wood had a bunch of cracks in it. There's no chance it would ever look good in it's current state. And to be honest, I don't really like the shape/feel of it. 

 

I think you can see where this is going...

 

And If you're squeamish about destroying vintage Italian car parts, then don't scroll any further...  😄

 

 

 

 

 

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So after watching how that guy in the video did it, I decided to cut into this one to see what it would take to get the old wood off. Once I have succeeded in removing that, I will buff the center and see about making a new rim for it. I am still undecided on what wood to use, though. Nardi used mahogany with an ebony inlay, but if I am going to do this, I might as well do something a little more unique...  

 

We'll see what happens...  😁

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11 hours ago, jagman said:

When I got my jaguar it had a very degraded  plastic cover on the steering wheel. I recovered it with walnut. 

 

Did you just do a thin veneer over it? I thought about that for this, but don't have the vacuum bag set-up to do it on small pieces like this, just big flat pieces like guitar bodies...

 

5 hours ago, ]2eDeYe said:

 

 

Watching 🙂

 

I was thinking about it most of the day, and I think what I am going to try is a laminate of different color woods, but instead of stacked radially, stacked vertically. It'll be clearer when I start and show you what I mean.

 

What made me think of it was a Ruger rifle I had with a gun stock made from laminated layers, so when you remove wood it makes a neat pattern, like this...

 

exotic-wood-gunstock.jpg?w=384&ssl=1

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I cut the wood into 8 pieces ( glued 4 for the front and 4 for the back) large enough to allow me to scribe  circles representing the inside diameter of the steel wheel rim and the outside of the rim.  That gave me the diameter of the circle cut by adding the width of the wood i wanted to surround the steel rim .  I drilled the center to use as a pivot for cutting with the band saw and for sanding with a drum sander.   I used a tethered router to cut the circular groove for the steel rim on both sides (half depth) .  I glued the two pieces together over the rim (some fettling of the fit for the spokes before)  and finished it with the drum sander and hand sanding for a smooth finish.  Spar varnished for 4 coats and re-sanded for the last two coats.

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21 hours ago, datsunfreak said:

I think you can see where this is going...

 

And If you're squeamish about destroying vintage Italian car parts, then don't scroll any further...  😄

 

Deep-ending on how this turns out, there might be another bit of "vintage" Italian hardware run through this ringer. 🤔

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Finally got all the wood and glue off. It wasn't too tough, but it felt like it took forever... 😄

 

large.20210205_182233.jpg.6ba311a1069246

 

 

I then wet-sanded the spokes/face with 2000 grit to get rid of as many sand scratches as I could...

 

large.20210205_182254.jpg.ff7e97e8c71903

 

 

We have a big industrial buffer at work, so I'm gonna try and sneak it in there and polish it Monday. Got to be careful, Mr. Nardi's signature is almost gone...  😁

 

And after looking at that gun stock some more, I remembered I have some pieces of dyed 1/16" maple in several colors. This may be the go...

 

large.20210205_180605.jpg.924e9d06902d0a

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3 hours ago, jagman said:

I cut the wood into 8 pieces ( glued 4 for the front and 4 for the back) large enough to allow me to scribe  circles representing the inside diameter of the steel wheel rim and the outside of the rim.  That gave me the diameter of the circle cut by adding the width of the wood i wanted to surround the steel rim .

 

That's basically how they did it in the video I linked. Seems like a logical path. 👍

 

3 hours ago, jagman said:

 I drilled the center to use as a pivot for cutting with the band saw

 

Definitely want to try that.

 

3 hours ago, jagman said:

I used a tethered router to cut the circular groove for the steel rim on both sides (half depth) 

 

And that. But I think I may just groove one side, since this is a flat piece of aluminum as opposed to a round steel rim.

 

Also giving some thought to leaving the inside edge exposed, the way Nardi did on certain vintage Porsche and Ferrari models...

 

3 hours ago, jagman said:

Spar varnished for 4 coats and re-sanded for the last two coats.

 

I was thinking of coating it with epoxy, just to increase surface hardness and decrease the chances of wearing through the finish somewhere down the road? Not married to any specific  finish yet, just wanting whatever is most durable...

 

 

Do you have any photos of your steering wheel?

 

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Hahaha that video popped up on my feed like 4 days ago and i watched it.  I immediately jumped to the idea of stacking skateboard strips to get like a 12 layer deep steering wheel.  Awesome.

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22 hours ago, Lockleaf said:

I immediately jumped to the idea of stacking skateboard strips to get like a 12 layer deep steering wheel.  Awesome.

 

That's actually kinda what I'm doing, so you'll see soon if it's worth doing...  😄

 

I wanted a sort of "stand in" for the finished product, and I had some 1/2" cork board...

 

 

 

I will use this as I glue up layers so that I make sure my layers are all wide/thick enough for complete coverage...

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Edited by datsunfreak
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Watching as well.  Curious to see how you do this from the strips.  

 

I admire your tenacity to do this to a Nardi.  You probably could have sold it "as-is" for (maybe) $150-ish?

 

The guy that does guitar stuff for me, tried really hard to talk me out of refinishing my Custom Shop Tele.  I think that he thought I was going to spray paint it or something.  He pretty much crapped his pants when I brought the body back to him to assemble the guitar 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

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34 minutes ago, Duncan said:

I admire your tenacity to do this to a Nardi.  You probably could have sold it "as-is" for (maybe) $150-ish?

 

Well, it was free to me, so...  😄

 

And yeah, looking at what restored vintage ones go for, this is kinda nuts...  😅

 

34 minutes ago, Duncan said:

Watching as well.  Curious to see how you do this from the strips.  

 

Decided to go ahead and make the first layer as a "proof of concept". One down, about 12 more to go...

 

 

 

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Edited by datsunfreak
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  • datsunfreak changed the title to 1967 Galaxie 500 Project, aka Jules

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