Rear Deck Lid Removal?

Author Topic: Rear Deck Lid Removal?  (Read 3792 times)

Offline Grancoupe

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Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« on: September 11, 2004 - 10:25:52 PM »
This car has been a body shop nightmare. To make a long story short, what should have taken about a month took a little more than 2 years. I gave the car to a friend of a friend to get it stripped and painted. The body was in good shape and needed very little work. His wife gets severly sick and goes into liver failure. So my car sits. What can I say, its not a daily driver so I wait for this guy to get his life together. 2 years and a liver transplant later she lives and I get my car back. Painted. But the body popped all over the place! He has moved out of the state and I'm about to lob a grenade in it and walk away. So much for the long story being short, I've decided agianst the hand grenade and am going to redo the car myself. If you want it done right you just have to do it yourself... The rear deck has little spots of rust around the tail light holes (its a 70'). There is tiny litlle spots of rust in the seams where the deck lid and the quarter meet. Along with a few small spots in the bottom corners. I was thinking about removing the deck lid completely and reworking it off the car. This would give me the oportunity to use lead fill instead of bondo. Has anyone ever tried removing the deck lid without destroying it? Are new ones available and how good are they? Thanks for the input.




Offline 360 'CUDA

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #1 on: September 11, 2004 - 11:04:44 PM »
Taking out the rear tail panel, fixing it and putting it back is not an option
The work it takes to get it out means you either cut the panel or cut the quarters :P
A better idea is to either replace it or cut out the rust and patch it with little pieces
depends on the condition of the panel and how much rust it really has

Like we were talking about on the other bondo thread, a little bondo here and there never
hurt anyone and I would leave the lead to the experts

Offline HemiDog

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #2 on: September 11, 2004 - 11:11:09 PM »
Are you really talking about removing the tail panel?
If it is truly the lid, taking it off is easy.  Just four bolts on the hinges.  However I think if you are going to use fillers to repair the lid, you may want to keep it on the car so that you can match it to the quarter panels.  I would masks off the quarter panels where the deck lid meets if you don't want to damage them or do any body work to them when sanding.  Just my opinion though.

Offline torredcuda

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #3 on: September 12, 2004 - 06:27:10 AM »
I`m confused as to what you are calling the deck lid?The deck lid is the trunk lid,the panel housing the taillights is the tailpanel and the one you may be refering to??,the part between the back window and trunk lid and between the quarters is usaully called the rear window filler panel.it can be removed by cutting out the spot welds and Year One or any repro body supply sells them but if it`s not real bad I would just fix it on the car.I agree with 360,done corectly plastic filler will hold up as good as anything but I usually use a fiberglassed reinforced or All-metal type filler(aluminum particles added to the plastic) for a first coat just in case there are any pinholes.
Jeff
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Offline Steve

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #4 on: September 12, 2004 - 08:06:48 PM »
I think that this is what you mean? (see pics)

I was going to swap tail panels, but changed my mind. By the time you work one over then do the swap, we'll all be dead. I had some pinholes in my original tail panel near the lights. I simply mig'd the pinholes, deliberatly burning out the thin metal. See the third pic and spot where the pinholes were filled.  Larger spots required small patches. The license plate area, because it is a second piece spot welded to the tail panel (and surrounded by body seam caulk) will also likely have rust. Pics one and two show what you might be facing...and no, you won't necessarily see all of the rot without taking the pieces apart. The second pic shows a new piece that I fabbed up and welded in to replace the original metal. 

As far as where the quarters meet the tail panel and the trunk gutters, you can drill the spot welds, cut out the bad metal, and fill. I've also attached a pic of some of the trunk gutter work I've done. Fortunately, I didn't have to get into the top area on the tail panel.

Just work the panel as best you can. Weld in new metal to replace rotted sections. I would personally avoid lead. There's a reason that went out years ago. There are many quality filler products available today that are non-porous and can be applied to bare metal. Whatever route you go, make sure to grind, cut, burn, file, or otherwise remove every bit of rust that you can, remebering that the whole car is put together with spot welds, meaning that there are a lot of panels laying on top of panels with only 33 year old body seem filler (which is now brittle and cracked) to keep moisture from getting in between the panels and totally raising hell.

Just my $.02, which is probably worth less than that.



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Offline Grancoupe

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #5 on: September 13, 2004 - 11:47:39 PM »
I have to say thank you to all you guys. I was in fact talking about the tail panel. I saw it removed from a old Nova and reworked, but I guess its a different animal all toghether. So I guess its going the get done on the car. No Prob. Thanks espescially for the pics. It looks like i'm going to have to do some similar surgery. Will be posting some pics as soon as something gets done. Thanks again.

Offline RUSTY Cuda

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #6 on: October 01, 2004 - 08:03:51 PM »
I had to swap tail panels, mine were so bad i worked 3 days on 2 light holes & decided to find another, took a while & had to work the new one a day or two, but gettin the old one out was nasty, ended up cutting it up to get to all the spot welds, so if it's not too bad just weld on the car.
Puttin in the new panel was not too bad.
"new" tail panel with most a the excess cut away!

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Offline RUSTY Cuda

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #7 on: October 01, 2004 - 08:05:02 PM »
Old one, hacked to remove, all my light holes were very bad!

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Offline RUSTY Cuda

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #8 on: October 01, 2004 - 08:06:37 PM »
Good time to clean out the trunk! ;D

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Offline RUSTY Cuda

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #9 on: October 01, 2004 - 08:08:50 PM »
"new" one welded in!

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Plum6Pak

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #10 on: October 01, 2004 - 11:06:23 PM »
 :o You are certainly a talented welder RC! That's one nasty job I wouldn't want to try and do. Good work!  :D

Offline Grancoupe

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Re: Rear Deck Lid Removal?
« Reply #11 on: October 03, 2004 - 09:03:15 PM »
Looks like those panels were meant to stay. Thanks for the info and pics