How to remove a dent (Part 1)
My friend Gary bought this 1957 Porsche Speedster 30 years ago. He had good intentions of restoring it for himself but since he is in the collector car restoration business he has had time only for his customer’s cars… He managed to make some progress over the years but a lot of work is still needs to be completed. The series of pictures I am posting are of the rear body shroud showing an impressive dent on the left rear quarter that was inflicted about 35 years ago. I offered to help Gary make some progress on the Porsche and he is letting me copy the surface information of the whole body in return. I intend to capture all of the Speedster’s surface and reproduce panels in aluminum and steel.
Building a complete set of 1957 Porsche Speedster body panels will be the featured project of my monthly 4 day metal fabrication class later this year. First I have to get the panels in shape in order to copy them. The first two pictures are of the Porsche 30 years ago, when Gary first purchased it. The second two pictures are of the sandblasted rear body shroud showing the dent from the outside and the inside. The third two pictures are of the dent roughed out showing the area from both the inside and outside. I roughed it out using one of my delrin head shaping mallets on my new super beater bag ( 150 lbs of sand in that beast, it’s now my favorite and I’ll be offering them for sale at my website soon)
Chris a former student of my August metal fabrication class stopped by today and I roped him into helping me hold the rear body shroud while I roughed out the dent in five minutes.
In the next few weeks I will spend an hour here and there smoothing up this large dented area. I will show all of the steps required to bring these surfaces back to a super smooth condition ( no fillers required) using a slapper,dolly, and one of my smooth and safe 9″ shrinking discs. Eventually the whole rear body shroud will be made better than new, taking out all dents, filling unwanted holes, and repairing a few small areas where rust is present.
HOW TO REMOVE A DENT (PART 2)
HOW TO REMOVE A DENT (PART 3)
HOW TO REMOVE A DENT (PART 4)
HOW TO REMOVE A DENT (PART 5)
