Kind of a door sill plate restoration/recondition tutorial. (With pictures)

[68fury3]

Hey all, did a little work to recondition my door sill plates today. Figured I’d share a few things I did in the hope that it might help some of you out. I have a 68 Fury convertible. The sills were in pretty rough shape. I’m going to post step by step pics as replies to this thread to hopefully make it more of a tutorial instead of a long rambling post. I’ve already started drinking tonight so I can’t promise I’ll finish it tonight. Lol.

 

[68fury3]

Here are a few pictures of the condition of them before I started. There are some pretty major dents and dings on the drivers side. I wasn’t worried at all about the ones on the flat areas. My biggest worry was for the ones that were in the ribbed area. I knew I would have to come up with some creative things to repair those areas.

 

[68fury3]

I used a piece of steel, probably 1”x2” by about 8 inches long in my bench vise as a dolly. I don’t have any special body working dollies or hammers. I’m definitely going to invest in some because I really think I would have had better results if I did. I took two different sized chisels and ground them to a sharp point. After that, I hit them on the sander again to slightly flatter the sharp edge I did this so that they wouldn’t punch through the metal. I used a hammer to knock out the dents while the sills were laying on the piece of steel in the vise.

 

[68fury3]

Once I had the big dings knocked out I concentrated on the ribbed areas. After banging out those areas, it definitely effected the lines in the ribs. I laid the panel upside down on the dolly and used the small chisel on the back side of the panel to try and knock out the ribs and give them a little more shape.

 

[68fury3]

Once I got everything knocked out I used 220 sand paper on a sanding block to smooth out any visible blemishes. Some of the spots were way too deep and I just couldn’t work them out so I did the best I could.

 

[68fury3]

As you can see, once I sanded the bad spots with 220 it actually made the ribs blend in and disappear, which I knew was a possibility. I used a bit of a crude method to correct it by simply taking my knife and running it back and forth to re-cut and connect the existing lines.

 

[68fury3]

After I was satisfied with the repairs I sanded the entire piece with 320. I then used a 3/4hp buffing wheel with a sisal wheel and brown compound to smooth out all of the scratches made by the 320 sand paper. After that I cleaned the pieces really good with acetone and followed up with white compound on a loose buffing wheel. They are by no means perfect because I’m not doing a restoration and wasn't concerned with them looking brand new. I definitely could have done a little better by having better tools and spending a couple more hours on them. I’m very satisfied with the results. I’m going to order some better body working tools and work on some of the other trim. Definitely a lot of effort by very rewarding. Hope this might help some of you out. Have a great day.

D.J.

 

[LocuMob]

Nice, certainly looks better than what you started with.

 

[MacLebaron]

Very nice!

 

[James Romano]

After I was satisfied with the repairs I sanded the entire piece with 320. I then used a 3/4hp buffing wheel with a sisal wheel and brown compound to smooth out all of the scratches made by the 320 sand paper. After that I cleaned the pieces really good with acetone and followed up with white compound on a loose buffing wheel. They are by no means perfect because I’m not doing a restoration and wasn't concerned with them looking brand new. I definitely could have done a little better by having better tools and spending a couple more hours on them. I’m very satisfied with the results. I’m going to order some better body working tools and work on some of the other trim. Definitely a lot of effort by very rewarding. Hope this might help some of you out. Have a great day.

D.J.

Thanks for posting this. You did a great job. I'd like to know what products for the polishing compound s you used. I'd like to do mine as well, they look about the same as yours did.

Thanks!

 

[68fury3]

Thanks for posting this. You did a great job. I'd like to know what products for the polishing compound s you used. I'd like to do mine as well, they look about the same as yours did.

Thanks!

Hey James, Caswell Plating and Eastwood both sell the brown and white compounds as well as the buffing wheels. Using a 1/4 to 1/2 HP buffing motor would probably be better. The 3/4 is a powerful motor for such light and flimsy trim. One wrong move and you could really destroy the piece. You could also use a small buffing wheel on a die grinder if you don’t have or don’t want to invest in a stand alone buffing motor.

 

[live4theking]

Looks great to me.

 

[James Romano]

Hey James, Caswell Plating and Eastwood both sell the brown and white compounds as well as the buffing wheels. Using a 1/4 to 1/2 HP buffing motor would probably be better. The 3/4 is a powerful motor for such light and flimsy trim. One wrong move and you could really destroy the piece. You could also use a small buffing wheel on a die grinder if you don’t have or don’t want to invest in a stand alone buffing motor.

Thanks, I'll look into that. Better than buying chepo repops

 

[Jon O.]

Very nice work! I've found that mother's magnesium and aluminum polish rubbed in and dried with paper towels will shine them up very easily if you don't have dents to fix. Mine were grey with no shine at all. Less than 5 minutes of work and I can see my face in them.

 

[WOT440]

 

[TXPinkSkurtz]

I finally found a pair on EBAY and just "bit the bullet"...I don't have the tools to do what you did, but sure like the results. My driver's side threshold was completely missing, and I never could find one, so when this set came up I jumped at the chance.

 

[bnz84]

Man that looks good. I really need a buffer/grinder! I used this technique as well except I used small buffing wheels mounted to an electric drill. Has its advantages but it goes slow. But I had less dents than you so that transformation is really nice. Anyway you can get a drill kit for $20 from horrible freight but you will still need a sisal wheel which are really useful. The anodizing comes off with the sanding and then it looks dull but it will come back. A little mothers aluminum polish 2x/year and they look great.

Oh this polishing compound on a soft weel and drill will do wonders for your hazy headlights.