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57 Chevrolet 210 Build

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218K views 797 replies 93 participants last post by  Teamchevy  
#1 · (Edited)
The time has come for me to start a thread on my 57 project. My car is a 57 210 2 door sedan. This car began it's life when it was built in the Oshawa Car Assembly plant in Oshawa Ontario. It was delivered to Fee's Motors in Lindsay, Ontario. From there it toured around though it never strayed too far away from the area. It started out in the factory as a straight 6 with a three on the tree. It had a deluxe heater, but no radio. The original colour was two-tone Laurel Green and Colonial Cream. The interior was ivory and black. The front seat was long gone and a '68 Impala was now in it's place. The motor had been replaced with a early 70's 350 and a saginaw 4-speed manual. I found it in January of 2010, but buying it wasn't really in the plans at the time. We were just moving and I wanted to build a garage first. Fast forward to 15 months later, I was away on business and saw it again on Kijiji. I called the owner and asked if I could come look at it again, this time I brought some money with me.

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We talked, kicked the tires, talked some more and then closed the deal. The next day he brought it to the house and I parked it in the garage.

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Dave
:bowtieb:
 
#2 ·
The next phase of the build was reading a lot of threads on Tri-five and asking questions, seeing other builds and planning. I tried to develop a timeline for the project, more as a guideline than anything else.

http://www.trifive.com/forums/showthread.php?t=63696

Now this project won't be done this summer, in fact, I'm forecasting a 5 year plan. I'd love for it to be done sooner, but I'm trying to be realistic, based on life getting in the way, lol!

Next up was to decide to buy or build a rotissorie. I've looked at plans for years and finally decided to build one after seeing the plans for one that Robert (MP&C) designed.

http://www.trifive.com/forums/showthread.php?t=80359

Now that that's pretty much done, I figured I should get around to tearing the car apart.

Dave
:bowtieb:
 
#3 · (Edited)
I did start taking some of it apart after Christmas. I took the hood off, all of the front trim.

This past weekend I finally dug in and fought the good fight against the rust gremlin.

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Boy, those bumper bolts were definitely a pain. Once the bumper came off, the rest wasn't too bad.

Dave
:bowtieb:
 
#5 · (Edited)
The inner fenders are pretty rough:

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The air vent tubes from inside the fender are rough, but I think they are salvagable:

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After I cleaned up, I found of this on the floor, not sure if I can put it back on the car, I think I'll toss it:

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Dave
:bowtieb:
 
#11 ·
Brings back memories of when I started my 210 project. I hear your pain on removing the bumper. I've been asked many times "How do you take a 57 apart ?" My answer is " PB Blaster, a long pri-bar, and a saws all". Good luck with the project. I planned to take 4-5 years for my build but I've gotten obsessed with getting it finished and I'm now 14 months in and hopefully scheduled to have it completed within a year. :anim_25:
 
#17 ·
Dave, just the other day I was looking at your 'timeline' thread and wondering 'yeah, but where's the build thread?'

Glad to see you're jumping into it.

Looking forward to watching this one.

Steve
 
#19 · (Edited)
One thing I forgot to mention, I did find a seat for the car last fall. At first I thought I'd just use the seat that came with it, but it's a little too wide. I started looking for a replacement seat. I checked out a few local ones, but most were 55/56 and in poor shape for the money they wanted. I had a offer from California, but shipping pretty much killed that deal. The one day out of the blue I received a pm from a member here (55for65) who had one for sale. It came with his 55 and it was a seat for a 57. He was going more modern with newer style seats. We talked over phone and made a deal. The next week I was on vacation, so Jen & I rented a trailer and drove to upper Michigan for a two day trip and visit. We met Gary at his place and spent about two hours visiting. Great guy! Showed us around his place, showed us the 55 he's working on, his shop and some of his other projects. After a cup of coffee, we loaded the seat up, headed to the closest hotel for the night. The next day we stopped in Flint for some shopping and another overnight stay, then headed home. Great all round trip, got a new seat and new friends!

The seat in storage, up off the ground, at Gary's:
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Back at home on the ground:
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Dave
:bowtieb:
 
#22 · (Edited)
Nothing major, but I spent some time today taking out the rear seat, the inside trim and sill plates, door and rear panels. Gotta soak the rear bumper bracket bolts and nuts and the tail light housing nuts, all going to be a pain due to the rust. Vacation time coming up soon and hope to get some time in the garage to get more done. Need to pull the glass all of the way around, strip the instrument panel and stabilize the body for removal.

Dave
:bowtieb:

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#23 · (Edited)
Started a weeks vacation. Plan is to get into the shop by 6:30 am, work until Jen comes home, maybe 12:30 -1:30 each day.

This morning we had a severe thunderstorm come through, so instead of getting into some welding today, I went back to the interior. I drained the anti-freeze while I started on the inside window trim, mirror, sunvisor brackets, dash trim, steering wheel, etc. Then onto the cluster. Before I took it out, I made a crude drawing, numbered the holes, with or without attach points, then labled the wires. Cluster is out, radio and clock delete plates, dash name badge, ashtray. Now onto the small gage package and the vent controls.

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Dave
:bowtieb:
 
#24 ·
Dave, if the weather holds out for you, you will be surprized how much work you can get done in such a small amount of time each day. Get into it and keep them pic's coming.
 
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#25 ·
Hey Dave, I will watch your progress! nice to see that you have started your ´57 project...i´m also back on the 56 project of mine after the long frustrating winter...:tu
 
#26 · (Edited)
Thanks Guys! Finished getting the switches out of the dash and went in to have a bit for lunch. Storms gone but now it's getting warm and sticky out. Anyways, here's some more pictures and back to work.

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I found a link talking about removing the switches and that really helped!

http://www.trifive.com/forums/showthread.php?t=45011&highlight=headlight+switch+removal

For those that haven't done it yet, here's a couple of pictures to help to remove the light switch:

To remove the knob on the light switch:
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After that just undo the front bezel and disconnect the electrical plug. Now back to work.

Dave
:bowtieb:
 
#27 · (Edited)
Made a little more progress this afternoon. Finished pulling out the headliner and trim around the door opening and windows. What a mess up under the headliner, sure think it was a rodent home at one time! Vacuumed up the mess and put stuff away. Jen's home from work and the sun is out, so work is done for today.

LHS trim edge is rotted away at the bottom, RKS is good, can be used as a reference for repair:
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Headliner coming down! Watch out!:
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Back seat area:
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Front Floor area, holes are OK, replacing to whole floor anyway:
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Oh oh, looks like some more repair work. Anyone know if replacement parts are available for the front roof bow? If not, it looks like it may be salvagable:
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Thanks for looking in!

Dave
:bowtieb:
 
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