64 Two-Door Wagon L79/4 speed build

After the car was fully polished, it was time to turn my attention to the trim. This car has 30 pieces combined of aluminum & stainless to restore. Luckily most of it was in excellent shape, but those 6 side moldings alone are about 30 feet in total just by themselves. Ugh.

I did need to buy 3 NOS pieces, the drivers side fender eyebrow, the hood lip molding & the grille. But even they needed to be stripped and polished to match the rest of the pieces.

So this is where it begins, finding little dings & removing them all. Armed with pry tools, punches, screwdrivers, you name it...along with tiny sanding blocks & tons of elbow grease, I used a marker to outline the defects & away I went.




Here's a side by side of a fully polished molding on the right & its companion on the left after ding removal & sanding to 800.




Only 28 pieces left to go. 27 I should say. When I bought the car one of the door moldings was worn out in the front from constantly rubbing the fender molding. I found a replacement but it had a nasty ding that I didn't trust myself to remove without destroying the piece. It has all those character lines & concaves, so sent it off to Dennis Barnett to work his magic. Sent me this pic before he polished it. Great guy to deal with if you need trim restored.






Here's the box for the NOS grille I found...Dated 7/63 Older than the car which was built in 10/63. I hated to toss that box, but when I was moving it had to go.










Grille before stripping the anodizing...

Once the trim was all polished, I was ready to work on the tailgate & rear lights.

As soon as I found the car, I had gathered rare NOS parts including this NOS crank base. Might be one of the last to exist on the planet. I've looked for others to have as a spare & can't find anything.




Original side bumpers. Not reproduced. Luckily the car came with an extra tailgate so I had 6 total to choose from. These were the best 4.




Replated tailgate latch...




The tailgate window channels need to be reflocked & have the rubber ends replaced, so I ordered the parts from Einstyn & reassembled them.

The channels were really clean, but I had to scrape out the remnants of the old linings.




Once cleaned out, I pop riveted the new rubber ends. If you need them, these pieces aren't an exact fit, but they are not available anywhere else, so I'm extremely grateful for Pete at Einstyn for making them.




Then I glued the new liners in place...here they are before I trimmed them with a razor.





Here's the original tail light bezels installed. I was extremely fortunate they were in almost pristine condition without any pitting. All the original lenses were cracked, so I found all new NOS replacements. One inside diffuser lens for the brake lights was still intact, but I wasn't able to locate another one. I came across a '65 version which I then trimmed to fit. Could've sworn I snapped a pic of that, but it's vanished, along with my sanity.

The moisture wick was still in place on the passenger side, but not the drivers side. God only knows what I used to create a new one, but it will do the job for the next 60 years.









Also restored the original 300 emblems for the quarters. First I polished them, but there was no way to mask the thin inside line or the numbers without losing my mind, so I taped the edges, sprayed the black lightly & then gently scraped the paint of the lines & numbers with my finger nail after each coat. I was amazed they turned out this nice & I'm very lucky the chrome was so clean.

Before installing the rear bumper, I had to spray the brackets. When I got the car, the rear bumper was gone, so I found two of the brackets NOS, the other two in my travels, while the center one was still bolted to the frame. Here they are after blasting & paint.





The original license lamp housings were toast, but the lenses & bezels were in reusable condition after I took them to the buffing wheel. I bought some repop assemblies and used the new housings with my original Guide lenses & bezels. The original lenses are actually glass which shocked me.







If you recall, I found the car in Flagstaff, AZ & the owner was an older gentleman in his early 80s who purchased it in 1969, but said he stopped driving it regularly in 1973. While the rear bumper was MIA, the front bumper came with the original 73 AZ plate still attached. I was determined to keep it with the car, but its present condition was unacceptable.




I'm sure most of you can figure out where this is heading. Being the psycho that I am, I had my paint guy match the colors before I stripped it in my sand blaster. Or at least tried to...my media wasn't aggressive enough to remove it all. So I sanded it more by hand to feather edge & epoxy primed over what was left to seal it.




After contemplating how I was going to paint the smaller letters, constantly changing my mind between hand lettering them or masking them & spraying them, I decided on a plan. First I shot the green.





Then I decided to give the fine line tape a chance. 1/4" for the larger numbers, 1/8" for the smaller ones. I spent a few hours each night taping for 3 nights.





Sprayed the gold...




Then after it sat overnight, I carefully started unmasking.



Just a few areas needed some brush touch up...



After touching it up, here it is installed & you can finally see the finished tailgate as well as the installed bumper...




Installing those letters should be a simple task one would think, but even though Trim Parts manufactures them in the USA, they don't make the speed nuts that come with them. They started stripping the shafts & spinning while my hands & forearms were contorted in the inner structure of the tailgate. The amount of cursing that ensued would make Sam Kinnison roll over in his grave. It's tiny things like these which should take 30 minutes that wind up taking all afternoon. Takes the enjoyment out of building these cars. I digress...which is why I'm not even going to bother discussing the rear emblem restoration process as I don't want my blood pressure to spike.

Here's where the project gets frantic as the cross country move was less than 8 weeks away...

A bunch of parts were blasted ready for paint. Since it was a crazy rush, forgive me If I don't have all the finished photos. Everything will be shown assembled & in place toward the finish

Radiator shroud...original GM that my parts buddy had in his stash






Voltage regulator cover






Harrison HD radiator back from the radiator shop, pressure tested for leaks and repaired where needed.









Steering column disassembled & blasted





Restored pedal assembly

Really nice Pete. I just love the wagon. Not sure how I could swing it just yet (still big expenditures going on the motorhome), but I'm in awe of that wagon. It speaks to me, and it's just beautiful.

kmakar said:

Really nice Pete. I just love the wagon. Not sure how I could swing it just yet (still big expenditures going on the motorhome), but I'm in awe of that wagon. It speaks to me, and it's just beautiful.

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Thanks for the kind words, Kevin.

Found 2 15x6 vintage steel wheels & then bought 2 new 15x7s from Summit & needed to prep them for paint.

15x6s freshly blasted, then sanded by hand with 320.




Epoxy primed...






15 x 7s came powder coated so all I needed to do was scuff them down with a grey scotchbrite.

After I dropped them off to the painter, I worked on the dog dish caps. 64-65 shared the same cap, but they are not reproduced & usually mistaken or substituted with '67 caps. That would not work for me so I scouted for the correct caps. Found 2 NOS ones & 2 in restorable condition. Found a chrome plate shop in Austin TX that had a good reputation & reasonable pricing. Some shops quoted me $250 per cap...ouch. Centex plating did them for $65 a cap.

The problem is they don't do the detail painting....or at least I didn't inquire...so time to break out the fine line tape.





First one done...



All done & ready to spray





First one unmasked...







Painted wheels & installed on the car...

Time to turn my attention to interior. That leads us to the one last project I was completely dreading....repairing the cracks in the steering wheel. I was going to try to find a nicer wheel, but 300 models came with a wheel without the 4 pieces of stainless trim in them. Which meant I might as well fix what I have than trying to find a needle in a haystack and paying through the nose for a clean wheel.

After it was stripped, I began to apply the epoxy to the cracks. Once sanded I had to keep repeating the process until I was satisfied with my results. Here she sits masked & ready for primer.



I think it was easier fixing the cracks than it was trying to spray the wheel without leaving dry spots. After about 4 attempts at a perfect semi gloss finish out of the gun, I gave up & broke out the sandpaper. I had to color sand & buff the wheel to mimic the factory sheen My girlfriend, god bless her, was a hero for holding the wheel while I worked the buffer & a 3" pad. The final results speak for themself.



Just as I received my seat covers & door panels from SMS in Oregon, I was busy transforming all the original parts like kick panels, rear seat mounts, slider window covers, windlace & windlace retainers, etc to red.
Sprayed a test piece to confirm the color. My local paint guy was extremely patient helping me match the sheen & color just right.

Here they are awaiting install

Here's two of the side window plastic headliner moldings from Trim Parts after they were sprayed red. Wish they also made the piece that wraps around the tailgate window opening, but a generic piece of windlace worked as a substitute.



I was also able to reuse the original windlace that wraps the entire front door openings & sprayed them red, but alas those pics elude me at the moment.

Man, that is an impressive build. You do first class work and should be proud of that car.

JohnC said:

Man, that is an impressive build. You do first class work and should be proud of that car.

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Thank you for reading along, John. Appreciate the kind words.

Beautiful job Pete! That car is pristine looking.

You Sir do amazing work. If you run into difficult speed nuts again I have had good results using these push ons using an appropriate sized socket.

Absolutely Beautiful Pete

Yessir, absolutely gorgeous!

Before I could start assembling the interior, I had a few projects that needed to be accomplished. I found a factory gauge cluster in Prescott, AZ along with an El Camino bumper with the brackets still attached. The kid selling them wanted $80 total for everything so my girlfriend & I hopped in the car on St Patty's Day in 2018 while I was still in the parts collecting stage of the project, about a year before I began work on it.

With factory gauges, that meant the dash harness needed to be retrofitted. That harness along with the front-rear ribbon cable were the only reusable wiring in the car. The rest of the wiring was completely trashed. I kept the harnesses for reference & to strip for extra connectors, but they were in sad shape.

Luckily the dash harness was in very nice shape. I had converted my first '67 to factory gauges as well, so the process was a simple one. I also was able to source the two factory connectors I needed along with a replacement connector for the ignition switch to replace the original which had two broken tangs.

Harness wrapped & ready for install. New bulbs were added for all the dash lights.





Next up was the heater controls. The original unit had a broken lever & all the sliders were broken. Plus the housing needed to be painted flat red to match the rest of the dash.





After...Sprayed red, repaired lever, new sliders, new heater switch & polished buttons.






Now it was time to start installing the interior components, First the kick panel vents, where you can see the painted heater box, new firewall pad which were installed before the body was painted...& the painted & bonded shift hump.








This side shows the pedals, dimmer switch, fuse box ribbon cable, and the original lower column plastic plate...







At this point we're in full mad dash mode, so pics are sporadic, but here we can see the interior starting to come together after the dash cluster steering column along with the carpet, kick panel, shifter, bezel & the drivers door panel were installed. The dash was painted the correct factory flat red, PPG code 71360 that was perfectly matched by TCP Global.





Here's the passenger side door with the vent window, door glass, polished trim all installed, along with the water shield correctly tucked into the slot, awaiting door panel install. You can also see the new Trim Parts sill plate with the blue wrapper protecting the finish. Note the red color coded lock knob & the clear ferrule. NPD is the only company that I know of which supplies to correct size ferrules. The lock knobs were found in the Ecklers Impala catalog.





Before I could install the rear seat, I had to repair the broken seat mount hinges that enable the seat to fold forward. When I bought the car, the rivets were sheared off & stuck in the mounts.

After bead blasting, I had to drive the old rivets out but document the orientation of the rivet direction. Luckily I came across a wagon for sale on Ebay that had clear pics of the arms riveted to the mount. If it was assembled incorrectly, the seat wouldn't be able to fold forward. I found the proper rivets from AMK, & hammered them in.





You can see the painted & assembled mounts in the upper half of this photo next to the door panel.

I wish I could say I took pics of the slider window install, and all the corresponding interior trim....but I didn't. Time was precious & the slider windows were REALLY uncooperative. After paying to have my original slider window channels restored with new felt liners & the rubber resprayed on the outside, unfortunately the rubber & the felts were way too thick & the windows would not fit in the opening. I had to completely scrape off the newly sprayed rubber coating & remove the new felts for a thinner versions. That did the trick, but the $350 I spent to have them rebuilt was literally money flushed down the drain. I could've spent $40 & done them myself with the felts I found through Summit which I used to reline my door channels. Once again, I digress...

Without further ado, let's cut to the chase & show off the completed interior.

Here you can see the added factory gauges & the reproduction tach.







SMS did an unbelievable job on the seat covers & door panels. Worth the wait, but give yourself plenty of lead time if you need a set. I got mine delivered 22 months after placing the order with them.















The parking brake & accelerator pedals are the originals from the factory, as is the plastic column cover on the firewall. Kick panels, also original, were sprayed to match the door panels.














64 two door wagons are unique from '65 as they feature rear ashtrays & arm rests. SMS precut the hole locations for everything, for both front & rear panels.

More interior shots...

If you notice the seat back bumpers & the mounts that sit on the wheel humps, a gentleman name Steve Mcilearny created a mold from a set of originals & reproduces them in fiberglass. Luckily I found his info in the facebook wagon group. Another one off part that I'm extremely grateful for. Good orginals are rarer than hens teeth. These fit really nicely & should be more durable than the originals.















In '64 & I believe '65, cars with red interiors were supposed to come with white headliners. I didn't think that would look good with a silver car, so I went with a red headliner.

Looks like it came off the showroom floor. Absolutely beautiful.

Agreed.... Just immaculate!

My God is that interior beautiful.