Onto fitting the patch panel. I dont know how there are some folks who just get these panels and use them without a good amount of modification. The lower body panel segment is 3/8-1/2 too wide. if I line up the flange the body line is way off, of course I aligned the body line and cut the flange off. The flange will get welded into position to fit the valance and get the right gap, then I will fit the patch to it. I wasn't expecting it to just drop on and overall I am quite happy with the panel, It has the overall shape and sweep of the factory quarter and had enough material to trim to fit. But it does rack up the hours planning cutting and fitting. the valance went on and off a dozen times.

Here are a few of the cuts made for fitting the patch, the factory panel weld had broken and was integral to the rest of the flange alignment so I had to rework it as a unit. I did not get many pics of the area as I was pretty focused on what I was building as opposed to showing what and why I was doing. You can see the copper weld through and some of the cuts and welds may be visible in the flange itself.

Gap fabbed.

Finished, fitted panel spotted in. Stitching it up and prep for prime will be next weekend. NOTE That is not a dent or panel warp-age under the side marker in the first pic it is a reflection

Finished welding in the quarter patch, Needed to do a little hammer & dolly work, I put a heavy guide coat to protect the metal for a few weeks prior to massaging the panel before epoxy prime and skimming with filler. In the one pic, you can see a small deviation at the rear most weld by the body line, it will need about .060 filler in that area. Going to move to the driver side repeat the process.

Holding a flexible edge to show the profile over the weld. the transition is 95% there and happy with it since the factory quarter was hammered on and wavy AS F.

Cut out driver side inner, installed the new AMD inner panel and established the panel gap to the rear valance. I had to add a piece to the flange for the attaching hardware hole. The Goodmark outerpatches are good in several ways but lacking in others as you will see in a couple weeks. I started fitting and trimming it and .....

Quarter to Valance panel gap welded in place, cut out the end of the mangled marker opening. reference pic of the stupid amount of unnecessary filler that was used to blend the ratty patch it had.

I chose to repair the mangled marker opening as opposed to finding someone who will cut one out of a parts car. Since I have to replace a good portion of the quarter I fixed this one and will scab it back into place. the fist two pics are how it started the next two are working the panel back into shape.

This is the patch after working its shape, welding the split and trimming it down. Its not virgin anymore that's for sure but will need nothing more than epoxy and high build to finish it ready for paint.

Ok, a lot went on with this panel prior to the point these pics were taken. Like the other side the patch has a overall great shape but needed quite a bit of "adjustment" It is not stamped with the small flange that goes behind the bumper so I decided to use the original which was very thin and had rust through, plus the angle of the bumper notch was off by 1/4" so I cut it down and flattened the fold in it. The original quarter was beat and hammered and shaped with filler, lots of filler. Just sad that this was common practice back then. I spent a couple days getting the panel close to where it needs to be, I wont get it back to original but I will only need a skim coat of filler to finish it.

This side also needed the valance flange cut off and fit, I mounted the valance to get the gap right.

Welded in, It is a respectable proper repair albeit not a master metal worker with every tool available. I am satisfied with it knowing I still have more to massage.

Still need to install the reworked marker lamp flange patch but you can see the overall shape is about 95% there.

Coming along!

Do you have a metal shrinking disc? They are great for leveling out imperfections on body panels during bodywork - high spots, and oil can dents that appear when doing metal work, ect

Neil, I do have one and have used it on these quarter patches. I will still be doing more hammer,dolly and moving the metal around when I finish the panel replacement and start dialing in the finish prior to filler.

That is great. I still run across people who do metal work on older vehicles that have never tried out a shrinking disc. They are pretty handy to have for certain tasks.

Look forward to more of what you are doing on this project.

Finished the side marker area, metal worked the panel quite a bit, Very pleased with its shape. It will only need small amount of filler to finish it off and return the quarter panel to a proper repair for the rest of its existence.

This quarter panel has had plenty of abuse over time, the whole car has been filled and overfilled throughout multiple paint jobs. I block sanded down through all the layers to get to the high build that was sprayed over the original paint, From here I will apply black epoxy prime and then do filler. When I am satisfied it is very close, I will seal with epoxy again then proceed to 2k high build. I expect to get it about 90% with the initial high build and only have to spot in any areas that need a little more attention. There is SO SO much touch time throughout this process, few people understand it.

The Owner brought me some parts for fitment, the driver side bumper bracket needs some tweaking to set the gap. But it is nice to see the parts go onto the car and know that progress is being made.

Ended cutting about 1/4 inch from the outer arm of the bumper bracket and tweaking the angle to get the bumper in the same orientation as the other side. You can see the RePop bumper has a poor profile on its trailing edge. It has a concave curve which doesn't match the shape of the car and also has a point in the top rear corner that needs to be softened. But that will add cost to the rechroming and maybe a stock replacement may be better. I also had to weld new studs to the bumper-ettes as as soon as i touched them with a wrench to remove the nuts the Chinese hardware broke. Figures