The door from hell...

[Wisconsin_Snake]

Ok, I posted this long ago regarding that my driver’s side door was malformed as I could not get it to fit properly at the top. DV explaned to me that who ever put the door together basically squished top down to hard.





Per as instructed by DV, the way forward was to cut the door apart. In the meantime I went forward and worked on other areas of the car.
It took me a long time to work the guts to go ahead and do it. Basically it meant that I had to cut the inside side molding off and then more scarier part, skinning the outside door skin from the inside body





So I researched on the internet as to the best way skin the top part of the door. While doing that I came across a youtube video stating that using a cut off wheel was a great way to cut through fiberglass.
Much more exact than using a sawzall or body saw (for straight cuts)
Let the cutting begin…





Here you can see how flat the top of the door was pushed down too much (towards the front it’s supposed to flair up) but this is flat across.



Here you can see last area I was able to cut into the door before I had to abandon the cut off wheel and switch the unwieldy sawzall where I would have to try to have the blade hug the inside of the door skin but not go through… As you can see second pic going up, there was a allot resin gooped on both ends of the door making the task that much more tricky.

Here is a pic of the area that I had to travel along with the sawblade to get to a point where I can lift the skin to where it should be. (The orange line indicated what I had to cut. )

As you can see I was able to get up close and go right along the edge.



Result: Here is pic of the door with a piece of wood temporarily placed to lift the skin to where it should be.




Here is a side view of what it looks like now…
Note that I went back and redid the mounting plate so I was able raise the front of the door a little bit closing the gap on the front part of the door. Not shown here.
Boy is it nice to have the body of the car flow into the door without a ¼ inch drop.

[Wisconsin_Snake]

Door latches have been installed. (I had really open the holes on the door to the point where I had to cut beyond the internal metal frame)
I am contemplating placing/welding a washer to the inside metal frame on the door, though I am concerned with the effects of the heat on transferring to the other side of the frame where the fiberglass is against.


Question for those of you who built your cars, following DV door install process, it’s mentioned that when you lift the rear end of the car and install the rear brackets under the trunk, the rear gap for the door (shown here) will close.

[Alfa02]

Well done Wisconsin Snake. As far as piece's fitting on our CR, I had the dash board from HELL, near as we came up with. mine was a reject just thrown in the kit, to complete the kit. Mine was one of the last 3 cars in the series 1. We wrapped it once then found out it was no-where close to fitting, the car was not where the dash board was wrapped. Loooooong story short took 3-more try's to get it to fit!! Ended up bringing the car to my interior shop. 1-gauges weren't centered, 2-heater was in the way of the gauges. Switch housing to low, to clear heater housing, etc. etc. Good for you to keep pressing on, the door look's great. Cheers Tom.

[xb-60]

I agree too, well done with the repair, Mr Snake.
(Tom I find I'm agreeing with you often....is this healthy?)

I think a lot of us have at least one item that was just "thrown in" with the kit. My example also was the dash panel....just a flat plastic panel with curved ends, when I specified a dropped centre dash.

Snake - body prep is looking good with good reflections from the pictures posted. Good luck with the build.

Cheers,
Glen

[Ron61]

Good Job and it seems that every CR around here had some part that had to have anything from minor to extensive rework done to get it to work correctly. I don't know if this was just them throwing parts together to make the kit or if they had a problem with some of their molds back then.

Ron

[1795]

Nice job! That was not easy work. I helped a friend who is local do some work on the CR that he had. We had to re-work the motor mounts to get the engine and transmission straight.

[Alfa02]

Originally Posted by xb-60

I agree too, well done with the repair, Mr Snake.
(Tom I find I'm agreeing with you often....is this healthy?)

I think a lot of us have at least one item that was just "thrown in" with the kit. My example also was the dash panel....just a flat plastic panel with curved ends, when I specified a dropped centre dash.

Snake - body prep is looking good with good reflections from the pictures posted. Good luck with the build.

Cheers,
Glen

That's pretty scary isn't it Glen I'm going with "Great minds think alike"

[1795]

Originally Posted by Alfa02

That's pretty scary isn't it Glen I'm going with "Great minds think alike"

Well that's one way to look at it for you two, then again.....