Organization at Last!

 When the weather is too cold and windy to enjoy working in the workshop, my time is usually claimed by my wife for one of her projects. However, this time I decided to take on one of my projects that has been put off far too long. Even though the weather sucks, the sun has been shining enough to heat the upstairs storage area of my garage to a comfortable level 

The long-delayed project has been to build storage racks and to organize boxes of mixed car parts so I don't have to paw through boxes of parts to find what I need. I know there have been many times that I spent far more time looking for something than actually working on the car.

The racks I completed will accommodate about 75% of the large and medium-sized boxes I currently have, and I have three metal storage racks for small boxes. The gabled end will have some wide shelving installed, and several larger parts now sitting on the floor will hang from hooks on the studs.

Island Rack

North Side Rack

About half the sorting has been accomplished and nearly all boxes have been labeled or relabeled after sorting. 

The weather forecast for tomorrow is windy and warm, so I might get something done on the car. I'm getting impatient for the new door latches to arrive so I can install the door glass!

An ABBA Favorite

Whenever I hear this group, I wonder why we have so much horrible music today. Surely there must be other singers and songwriters in this big world with similar talent! 

Window Frame Rivets & Window Cranks

 I received the rivets needed to reassemble the door glass. Though I only needed four for each door, the minimum order from Hanson Rivets was $15.00 and they were sold in bags of 100, so they are pretty pricey. To add insult to injury, they charged $21.52 for shipping and handling. Since they were shipped via USPS in a padded paper envelope for $1.00 postage, that seems to be gouging a little more than necessary.

If anyone is in desperate need of these rivets, I’ll give you a few if you send me a stamped, self-addressed envelope.

Another part arrived yesterday. It was a repro button for a Mopar floor shifter. My original worked perfectly fine, but the plastic chrome plating was badly worn. I checked all over online, but the prices were too high to convince me to order. Because of their high prices, I seldom ever check Classic, but this time they were on sale for a little over $40 including S&H. Since others wanted as high as $88 plus S&H, I decided it was time to order. As best I can tell, the quality appears comparable to the original, and I know I couldn’t get the old one re-plated for less than the price of the reproduction part.

Since it was too cold to work on the car in the unheated part of my garage, I did a few small jobs in the heated area.

 I had decided to have the rear pot metal window cranks re-plated so I had to remove the swivel grips and that meant removing the riveted pin. I have always been curious how they were secured inside the handle but was surprised to find that the end of the pin is splined. I might have found a way to pry them out and save the pins but couldn’t think of an easy way to keep from damaging the pot metal parts. I’ll probably make new grips from the same steel tubing I used on the front door handles.