[baddbob]

Sandblasting and repairing the original frame then priming and installing a new skin would definately be the best way to go IMO. With today's primers, adhesives, and sealers a skin can be installed and last 10 times what the factory did years ago. Some of the doorskins I've installed I've been able to monitor for 15+ years and they hold up way longer than a factory door---and this is in the roadsalt capital of the world! Keeping those seams protected is key to corrosion resistance.

[rrmccabe]

Its frustrating spending hard earned money for new stuff and not having it fit. I did not have the issues you are having, but I bought a NOS GM skin for this Camaro I am working on and installed it. Looked perfect. But when I mounted the door it was easy to see the back of the door was out of square.

With the door mounted I taped a line that would give me a straight seam and ended up grinding the back of the door off starting with about 1/4" at the bottom and tapering up. I just TIG'd the edge, quick file job and painted.

Not near your grief but I just dont expect stuff like that when buying a NOS piece. Heard horror stories (whore) about the aftermarket stuff.

I am to the point now that if I cant hand straighten it, I will.


Rich

[Ripped]

It's good to be able to hear and realte some of your problems with doors, it makes me feel a little better that I am not alone.

I wish that the previous owner did not butcher two massive speaker holes on the inside of the factory doors. If this was the case, then I would only need door skins or small patches.

Anyway, I'm going to have a look at the car today, and take some more pics.

I am going to discuss body work. If I should let him do the major fills, and take the car home and block it myself, or do all the body work myself.

We haven't got a great garage to work from, so I don't know if I can consider doing any painting or primering at all myself

[oldred]

Bob, I am sure you are aware of the warping problem from sandblasting and know how to avoid it but for someone not too familiar with sandblasting I would like to say be careful! I didn't admit this earlier but I ruined the original door frame by improperly blasting it. By the time I finished the bottom was bowed WAY out and down and the inside was wavy and could not be repaired since it is not covered by a door panel and has a textured surface, basically it was destroyed. I was lucky in that I was able to locate a door with a decent frame for free since the guy had replaced his with a new one and just wanted rid of it.

BTW, I also ruined the deck lid which I was blasting at the same time, but that is a different story, slow learner I guess After ruining those two parts it finally hit me that one has to be extremely careful what and how to blast.

[kenseth17]

Yep I remember the textured surface inside the mustang doors. I was lucky on the one I did, they were not in bad shape and only had a few rust pits on the inside. Still a pain using paint stripper and a scotchbrite to strip. If would have machine sanded with course grit, then the texture would most likely be ruined. I did blast some, but I have a siphon feed blaster and it doesn't shoot a lot of pressure. But a big flat panel, probably would be easy to warp if not carefull. There was a discussion on restoring the texture on one of the mustang sites but I can't remember which one it was offhand. There were a few different ways people were doing it. Spraying a texture coating like chip guard is a cheesy way in my opinion, but think they had other ways to go about it also. He put an aftermarket trunk lid from mustangs unlimited on because the original was in such bad shape, and to my surprise it fit well. Only thing is it didn't have holes for the trunk bumpers, and since he needed new ones I let him handle that. Glad I didn't have to mess around a lot with the doors, by the sounds of the experience others are having with them.

[shoddy_f-body]

I bought a repro decklid that going back too.

[oldred]

I had to replace the deck lid That I ruined with the blaster but again I was lucky and found a good used one. I have mentioned ruining the deck lid before when discussing sandblasting but this is the first time I admitted that I got the door frame at the same time Live and learn I guess but I sure as heck will not let it happen again. That door frame probably would have blasted ok if I had not gotten careless with it so that is why I wanted to warn anyone new to blasting to be very careful.