[roger1]

Originally Posted by John Kelly

Hi Roger,
That was me in the youtube video : )
First, make sure that you are reading the panel correctly. You must get the contours right to see where the metal needs to be before addressing the oilcan. This means using a template of the contour up and down as well one side to side, or front to back. Otherwise you may be working on smoothing before you have the metal where it is supposed to be
John

Thanks a lot John. That is a big help. Some of those things I am doing already just by studying and using a trial and error approach. I do have the Wray Schelin shrinking disks that he sells on Ebay. I got the big and small disks and it came with a video.

Is the only way to get a template from a known straight car? There is only one other hardtop that I've seen around town but haven't had the chance to meet the guy yet. I've done mostly fiberglass on several Vettes in the past. But, I'm not very experienced with metal. The Vette work I've done has given me a pretty good eye in getting a smooth panel however. I seem to be doing alright so far without a template. Also, my panels were never hit that hard. I'm dealing with small dents and welding shrinkage from patch panels. There are 2 patch panels in the passenger quarter and 1 in the driver. I've also had to put in 2 small patches for rust (passenger side only) where the wheelhouse seal sits on the inside of the quarter. No issues with that on the driver side. So, I'm tackling the hardest first with the passenger quarter.
I did gain a lot of experience with the shrinking disk however, when I stripped the top of the car, there was a bunch of bondo there I didn't know about. There were about a dozen dents in it. With the slapper/dolly and shrinking disk, I got them all out and won't need any filler. I'm damned determined to not use any filler in the these quarters too.