It's only been almost a year so why not toss up an update.
The winter stalled major progress on the car but my Dad is back on it just about every day. The body work is pretty close to complete but still requires some final fitment/sanding/etc. It's pretty crazy but my Dad, who is 60 years old mind you, has been putting in 10-14 hr days almost every day for weeks. The attention to detail is pretty crazy so I'm hoping the results come out after all this diligent prep. A couple images below are my dad "working the body line".
My sister took this pic of my Dad on father's day. Dad didn't know it was being taken as he would have brought his gut in a bit. I still like it.
Upon the previous assembly effort, we didn't see it at the time but 4 mid/rearward body mounts were not in good shape. There wasn't much point to continuing with body fitment until we know the body and frame are in happy harmony. Luckily I had purchased solid aluminum body bushings to remedy the issue. Sadly, replacement of them was not as easy as I had hoped. The "mid" mount on the drivers side has a pad off the frame for the bushing to sit. Well the center of it had rotted away so that wasn't going to work. On the other side, the bolt was rusted to the nut in the body so the head decided to snap off. I did get the rear and front bushings replaced but that wasn't going to be good enough.
After some deliberation, we hooked up with a local certified welder to give a hand. Off came the front fenders and wheel wells for access. Luckily, no cutting of the body was needed and they were able to get the old nut/bolt free from the car. I purchased a repair kit from UMI for the frame work which worked beautifully. They burned that in so not the bushing on the drivers side has a place to sit. The other side was easier for them so all was well. Of course it wouldn't be that easy though.... When the fuel line was moved out of the way for welding, it decided to spring a leak. While my Pops wasn't pleased, I saw it as a good thing to happen now vs later.
The fuel line was removed with plans to run a fresh one from front to back. In the mean time, we took the opportunity to have our welder friends install the subframe connectors. These could have been bolted in but its nice they got welded. The chassis should be in good shape now.
This is hopefully the last week it is at my house before it goes to the paint shop for some color. Right now there is a lot of fix/prep work being done under the hood because once all the body is back on, it will be a pain to get to those areas. Most notably this includes refurbishing/replacement of the HVAC assembly, run the new fuel line, and replacing spark plugs. From there, the body will go on for final fitment/prep before it's time to get it to paint.
There is a ton of work left to do but the paint will be a huge step. I have a ton of pics saved to a Google Drive acct so all the progress will be made available for those who care to see it later on.