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D Gilliham

@rktpwrd5

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Bittersweet day.
Gave Olds Cool her final bath for the year, getting ready to park her for her long winters sleep. She may come out once or twice more if the weather’s nice into October, but otherwise she’s going away until spring.

Shame I didn’t get her out more than a handful of times this summer what with the deck project and all, I do enjoy driving her she never ceases to make me smile when I mash that loud pedal.

#olds #cutlass #gbody #w30 #sleeper by @rktpwrd5

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18 days ago

Well, an entire summer of construction at the Skunkworks World Headquarters is finally coming to a close. From rebuilding a 40 ft length of rotten fence that blew down in a March wind storm, to immediately plunging headlong into a full blown composite deck project, it’s been nonstop building every weekend and spare moment.

The deck project is mostly finished and complete, with just a few sections of hand built railings left to do, along with skirting the rest of the underside. Due to the wallet now being awfully light and the good weather days getting fewer, those two things will have to wait for next year.

I did get stair riser lighting installed on all three sets of stairs though, super simple to do, easy on the eyes, and a bit of safety during the long dark winter days to come.

I’ve got some pretty trick ideas for relocating the hose tap, and hiding both it and a retractable reel underneath, so look for those incorporations next year too.

A massive thank you to my dad, I couldn’t have done it without the old guy’s help and woodworking tools, thanks dad!

#deck #deckproject #compositedecking #dıy #construction by @rktpwrd5

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20 days ago

Olds Cool has come home to roost.
After getting tired of paying exorbitant monthly storage fees and having them go up considerably every six months (up $200 in two years) I finally decided enough was enough. @storagemart , you can kiss my ass. You ain’t getting another red cent outta me.

Pretty cool to see not one, but two 1980 Olds Cutlass Calais’ side by side in the same garage again.
Hard to believe they both started out as the exact same year, make and model.

#kissmyass #stuffyourridiculousfees #oldsmobilecutlass #gbody #gbodyornobody by @rktpwrd5

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3 months ago

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3 months ago

First light of day for #oldscool in over six months. Yeah it was cool and cloudy, and she was very dirty after sitting in storage all this time, but damn it felt good to be back behind the wheel with the cam chopping, the exhaust growling, and pissing off Teslas everywhere.

Happy #mothersday to all the moms out there.

#gbody #cutlass #hotrod by @rktpwrd5

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5 months ago

Hehehehe

Added some tech to The Juggernaut. Remote door popper solenoids, no more opening the doors with the inside handles.

#shaveddoorhandles #shaveddoors #remotetech #tech #thejuggernaut @avsonthewebdotcom by @rktpwrd5

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6 months ago

Finally got the last of the bodywork done on @mikes57chevy and into high build primer today. Lots of bodyworking and block sanding complex curves and shapes across body lines and panels. This is the straightest this car has ever been with many issues corrected along the way, and it’s only going to get better with each successive step from here on out.

Milestone today for sure and suffice to say I think he’s pretty happy with it! Thanks for trusting me to work on your pride and joy and putting me behind the gun for the honour of shooting it today brother.

#bodywork #57chevy #blocksanding #primerqueen #milestone by @rktpwrd5

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6 months ago

Decided to see if the ‘ol four double nickel was still hiding under all the dust. And whatta ya know, it is!

#455rocket #olds455 #torque #torquemonster #bigblock by @rktpwrd5

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7 months ago

Tackled a pretty easy little job this afternoon, replacing the pathetic rubber trunk bumpstop/height adjusters on The Juggernaut.

The factory ones left much to be desired, lack of fine tuning adjustments, and unstable the further out they’re adjusted. So today I welded some mild steel 5/16” nuts to some nice thick washers, and after hitting the backsides with some weld-thru primer, positioned them squarely and welded them in the enlarged stock holes.

Dress the welds, shorten the aftermarket stainless studs, and assemble the whole works with the provided fancy stainless jam nut. Now I have clean, solid, and finely adjustable bumpstop adjusters that also match the hood bumpstops.

Nice relaxing way to spend a Saturday afternoon.

#payattentiontothedetails #saturdayafternoonproject #thejuggernaut #gbody #protouring by @rktpwrd5

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8 months ago

#thejuggernaut #praisethelowered #airedout #widebody #gbody by @rktpwrd5

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8 months ago

Putting in the difficult monotonous work today prepping all the seams for some fresh @3mcollision heavy bodied seam sealer. There are a ton of seams on the back end of this car, they literally extend from the top of the back window all the way to the taillights.

All the old seam sealer had to be painstakingly dug out, the surrounding metal sanded and prepped, and then 2 coats of epoxy primer went on. Now to let it cure overnight and scuff it before preparing for the new sealer to go on.

#thejuggernaut #automotiverefinishing #builtnotbought #gbody #hotrodlife by @rktpwrd5

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8 months ago

From concept to reality.

All the wiring is fully completed on the back half of The Juggernaut, so now I’m back onto sheetmetal, fabrication and bodywork again.

I’ve had this vision of having the filler panel below the back window as one piece welded to the body for years now. I know it’ll really clean up the whole area, but is a little more involved and complicated to execute than you’d think.

Starting with a steel filler panel from an ‘81-88 Cutlass, I extended the ends and @mikes57chevy built the brackets to support and locate it. This left a considerable sized gap to the trunk lid though, so I picked up some precision machined 3/8” keystock that can be easily shaped and fill in the gap nicely.

Any monkey can just weld in a filler panel, so to make it look like it actually belongs and take it to that next level I’m creating radiused inside corners and welding them to the filler panel to match the corners of the trunk lid. Very difficult to actually accomplish, but it’s getting there.

It’s a little rough around the edges right now, but after it’s welded in and a little body & filler work it’ll look like it originally came that way.
Stay tuned.

#sheetmetalfab #fabrication #custom #oneoff #oneofone by @rktpwrd5

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9 months ago