1959 Peerless Restoration

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HealeyBN7
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by HealeyBN7 »

After seeing all those wonderful cars at Goodwood, I don't know if I am inspired or discouraged...

I decided to take a break from the door and tackle the nose of the car. If you recall it was full of damage and prior repairs. I started to remove all the prior damage, but it became clear that there would be nothing left between the headlights worth saving. Even the fiberglass license plate mounting parts (that came in the original restoration kit :) ) was so badly repaired that is was a lost starting point.
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So I choose a bold move and decided to take a mold from the Warwick. It is the same between the headlights. Figured there was minimal risk given the poor condition of the Warwick paint.

First step is to move the hood to an upright position to avoid applying any products upside down. The front bumpers, plate, grill and badge were removed. Fortunately there was an original Lucas multi-pin disconnect for the lights. I used the rope as a poor mans hoist and lifted the hood up and pushed the car back.
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Next I had to clean the hood and apply several layers of parting wax. This is probably just regular paste wax, but it was sold by my fiberglass supplier, so it gave me a little more confidence that I would be able to separate the mold from the plug. I used clay to define the area that would be molded and fix any blemishes and cardboard to plug the grill and extend the under body work. The area was then sprayed with PVA.
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The scary part starts here. This is a brush coat of gel coat. I am committed now. Two coats covered the paint work. The rope remains attached just in case the hood wanted to tip forward.
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First coat of veil cloth is applied over the gel coat while it is still tacky. This is followed by several coats of 1 1/2 oz mat and probably a quart or more of resin.
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I hope it comes off...
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So it did... And all is left on the Warwick is a little bit of resin that pealed off and some other smudges. I should be able to clean it up as good as new...or as good as it was.
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Considering that I still have to make the real part. This is just the mold, it seems to fit!
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I now have to clean up the inside of the mold, remove some imperfections and prepare it for making the actual part.
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by gorms68 »

Way to go "A-Team" ! :devil:
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by tannyo »

In my best Huel Howser voice, that's amazing! I'm impressed and awed by the work you do.
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by DaveC »

Wow. Lovely work. No slacking off on that couch i see in the barn however... :)
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by DaveC »

Wow. Lovely work. No slacking off on that couch i see in the barn however... :)
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by Fifty Six MGA »

As someone who has done quite a bit of fiberglass work (high end kayaks) but doesn't know how to weld, this is inspiring.

Maybe I should get a Peerless to restore. =)

Awesome work. Feeling like the resin fumes are affecting your cognitive skills yet? :devil:
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by HealeyBN7 »

Fifty Six MGA wrote:As someone who has done quite a bit of fiberglass work (high end kayaks) but doesn't know how to weld, this is inspiring.

Maybe I should get a Peerless to restore. =)

Awesome work. Feeling like the resin fumes are affecting your cognitive skills yet? :devil:
Most definitely I am impaired. But, if you want to play with resin, here's one in a little better shape...

http://losangeles.craigslist.org/lgb/ct ... 33657.html

Photos from the seller...

http://s514.photobucket.com/user/plugso ... t=3&page=1

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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by HealeyBN7 »

After cleaning up the mold with bondo to eliminate the imperfections from the aluminum tape and other irregularities I gave it a couple coats of wax and sprayed on some more PVA.
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Here is it with the gelcoat applied...
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And with the fiberglass mat and resin. Lots of it (about 3 layers at 1 1/2 oz per layer). It took well over an hour just to lay in the mat.
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Trimmed and the pulled from the mold.
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And here it is placed on the car. Next step is cutting out the old body work and grafting it in for good.
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I just realized that I am all set up to make more. Anyone in the market for a Peerless nose :)

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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by spitfire »

I got to the bottom of the post and was thinking just what you said. You now have a mold for a Peerless front end. I am amazed by the work on this car.

Makes me feel lazy when I have had a box of new wires for my B and haven't even started the re-wire.
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by Fifty Six MGA »

I'm impressed by the quality of your work. Had you worked with fiberglass before? Making a mold and getting a good clean part first try is work well done!

I'm sure mat fiberglass is more "correct", but did you consider using woven? Just curious.
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HealeyBN7
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by HealeyBN7 »

Fifty Six MGA wrote:I'm impressed by the quality of your work. Had you worked with fiberglass before? Making a mold and getting a good clean part first try is work well done!

I'm sure mat fiberglass is more "correct", but did you consider using woven? Just curious.
Woven appears to be the cloth of choice for all the prior repairs. I don't have anything against woven, but I have been told that it will witness through the paint (ala '53 Corvette), so I have removed 95% of it. I still have a little more to extract from trunk area.

You could say that I am kind of biased against it in the Peerless since it wasn't used from the factory and the fact that the previous bodymen didn't think it would be necessary to clean the road grime off before applying it. I could be upset at the poor repair work, but dirt and undercoating makes an effective boundary layer so I can tell when I am grinding into virgin bodywork.

Speaking of cleanliness, I am surprised how much "stuff" is trapped in the original glass. There are what appears to be small sticks and dirt. It looks like the bodies were laid up outside in a field - on a windy day.

The other thing that is odd is there is clearly a different kind of dirt under the fiberglass bonding strips. This is a lighter dirt and impacted the ability of the bonding strips to adhear to the bare underside of the mat. I am guessing that the body shell sat around for a while unexposed waiting for a chassis. When it was time to glue the bodies to the chassis and add all the inner panels they didn't attempt to clean the rough mat, or sand/grind the inner surface to promote a proper bond. The result is that in most cases the long mat fiberglass bonding strips just pealed off. Good for disassembly now, but bad for rattles and structural integrity.


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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by nigel c »

once again you put all to shame!
nice work Dean. I did think you could take sections for your "spare car" the other day....but forgot it as soon as I thought of it :x
just back from helping Celia & Ian racing at Angouleme, boy have you and Dave got to come over for that one some day.
I see the car for sale you have flagged up, please, if you find any like this, pass them on to me too. I read with interest that it's #30? but a clearly a Phase 2 car (with admittedly some Phase 1 bits) and a familiar registration number. I own XGO 219! and a left hooker, registered in the UK...and then shipped?? stranger-er and stranger-er.
still, keep up the good work, how's the west coast P&W splitters getting on? oh and don't let Dave drink my beer in your fridge again..............
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by DaveC »

Cheeky Monkey, Nige! The sale of #30 was posted on the P&W forum, and i'll thank you all to let Dean share his beer as he sees fit..... :)
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by nigel c »

I suspect Dean is easily led, must have missed the thread on #30...and havent heard back from the vendor.
just a heads up, I'm half way througha De Dion conversion. new tubes bent, up rated TR6 hubs to fit and then, (maybe) Ford sierra diff transplant!
yea I know but totaly fed up of whining/leaking diff and you cant get a cheaper LSD replacement :)
if it all goes well they will be on the shelf ready to supply...................
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by HealeyBN7 »

yeah - still on the buck and still sanding.
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by Larry Kluss »

Slacker! :devil:
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by nigel c »

I'm with Larry on this one, slacker! while your not in the workshop being constructive, drop me a PM, we need to talk.

happy new year all :)
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by HealeyBN7 »

So, after grafting a new front end on the Peerless and looking it over critically, it appears to sag off on the driver's side. Technically the opening on the right is 1/4- 3/8" smaller then the opening on the left.

It helps to see the issue with the string in place.
IMG-20140105-00061.jpg
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Given this was a copy of the Warwick front end, one can compare the oddness with the other car in the garage. Indeed it is also not symmetrical. In fact, when looking at photos online, it appears there are several examples with an asymmetrical nose. Not all, but more then one.

I debated living with it, or correcting it. Since I don't know if my Peerless was originally symmetrical or asymmetrical, I decided to give it a yet another nose job.

I first had to relieve enough of the structure to allow it to flex. Then I inserted a template from aluminum tubing that I bent to match the passenger side. Once I was satisfied that the new side was correct it was given a coat of glass mat.
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A test fit of the grill confirms that I should have enough wiggle room to square it up when the time comes.
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This last photo shows the repair to the opening and new glass to straighten the license plate box.
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The joys of body work,

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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by Steve Simmons »

Ha! I knew you couldn't live with that!
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by nigel c »

Whoa there tiger.
don't start all that Malarkey you'll never stop. I'm the worst for looking at things that aren't square, its part of my job but you do need to know when to walk away.

The Peerless or Warwick were not, and have never been straight/square/symmetrical.
just step back and look at the car Dean. Look at the bonnet aperture. Put your hands palm down either side of the aperture at the front, just where the wings (sorry, Fenders) start to rise up towards the headlamps. I bet one hand will be nearly flat and the other will be curling up the wing?

If you measure the door apparatuses (just on the length) you will find a difference of 1"
if you measure just the length of the rear section of the front....Fenders you find they are different lengths
And don't get me started on the heights of the front wings against the front wheels.
WHY? Because the original was made by hand and not by CNC/Robot/Rapid Prototyping/3D printers.
they are, for want of a better word, Organic!

You will find a lot more of these problems when you sit it on the chassis with wheels on.
I measured two cars that have never been restored. Their bodies had never been removed and the chassis was original.

As a rule of thumb (on these two cars) when you try to set it up level you can get two fingers (one above the other) on top of the RH front wheel to arch and four fingers (yes four!) on the LH front wheel.
Also the headlamps do not (as standard) site level and I could go on and on!

I did a compromise on my car. My main concern (and it will be yours too) is that because I was sitting the body back down on a new chassis I had no original datum, no fixing holes to line up etc. My worries were that it could "crab" down the road. Don't know if this is a phrase/issue you guys are familiar with. Its when the car travels down the road and if you look down the side of the rear wheel you can see the front wheel sticking out and the car "looks" as if its travelling slightly (if you lucky!) sideways.
Anyways, I think I got it right and it looks straight on the road.....and yes, I have driven behind to check! :roll:

So don't get to bogged down with the little imperfections of the car, it is what it is, an old car with character. :drive
BUT do keep the progress up, its coming on!
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by Fifty Six MGA »

Ha!

That makes me chuckle. Our house was built in 1922, and when I was renovating it, I discovered that pretty much no part of it is square, flat or level. I eventually learned to measure the top, bottom, middle and some points in between to try and figure out what the real shape of things is. Something as simple as mounting a picture rail gets tricky when the wall bows outward significantly...bigger things get to just be a real pain in the ***.
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by Larry Kluss »

Dean, there's nothing wrong with wanting it right and I can't blame you for putting in the extra work if the flaw bothers you. At the same time, I'm with the group that a crudely built fiberglass body is far from perfect, much like the first Corvettes. No one will ever notice those things when the car is finished.

Here's a video for you showing the process of hand laying the fiberglass cloth panels and assembling the bodies for the first 1953 Corvettes. It was a crude process at best.
http://theoldmotor.com/?p=109175
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by HealeyBN7 »

Larry Kluss wrote:Here's a video for you showing the process of hand laying the fiberglass cloth panels and assembling the bodies for the first 1953 Corvettes. It was a crude process at best.
http://theoldmotor.com/?p=109175
That's a great video. Wow that is labor intensive. No wonder they invented the chop gun. Hope they discovered masks and gloves after the first few 'vettes were glued together.

When they put the assemblies together in the big chassis jig at least they knew to sand the bonding edges of the previously cured sub panels. That detail seemed to escape the James Whitson Peerless coach builders as they attempted to bond directly to the glossy finish, which failed. Considering the video was 6 years earlier, it is too bad that knowledge wasn't well known.

Nigel is right. There are many asymetrical features in the body. I won't tell you where the rest are as most won't be "fixed", but the crooked mouth made it look like it had a small stroke.

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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by nigel c »

nice one Dean, Funny.

I can see why they nearly axed the project. They must have thought it a wonder material until they saw the labour bill!

Your right about the bonding attributes of the Body suppliers but I did talk to one of the guys who fitted all the glass in the Phase 1 +2's and he said he remembered watching them fitting the body to the chassis and it was like each one was a revelation!

Back to the subject of the Peerless Body shell. I will have a look through my photos (remember them?) and see if I have any of the areas we have discussed and scan them in. Should really get round to that anyway. I do remember trying to get the car to sit somewhere level!

here's one I did earlier..............
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Re: 1959 Peerless Restoration

Post by HealeyBN7 »

This weekend offered some unexpected progress on the Peerless.... Any guesses?
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