I plan on doing a full restoration on my 1971 gs convertible. I want to get a rotissorie to be able to rotate the body and do a body off restoration. I have been told that I better weld in x bars in the door opening before taking the body off the frame or it will tend to fold up. This seems to make sense to me. Someone here has had to go through this and I was wondering where they ended up welding to?
Depends If you have a full "frame" on the turn table, then you don't need them. We usually build a tall cart so we can get at the body mounts. Many units use the body mounting points, but if you are going to replace the trunk floor or any other body mounting point you are pretty much screwed if that is where the tooling mounts too.
I am just going to have the body on the "turn table" - the rolling chassis is going to off to restore that also! That is the reason I am concerned with body flex.
When I did mine, I used an engine hoist for lifting... I unbolted the body form the frame and left the doors on while replacing the trunk floor and quarters. I would lift the body up and place 4x4 blocks where the body mounts go. I could then easily cut panels and tack them in place. It was easy to check that everything still lined up by dropping it back down to check alingment. Once that was done I removed the doors and used the same method to replace the floor pans. Once that was all done, I lifted the front and placed 2 sawhorses with a 4x4 across them, resting the front of the body on the 4x4. Did the same with the back. I then rolled the frame out. I had to lift it several times with blocks to keep it level. I had no problems with the body bending or twisting. Once the frame was out I covered the body with heavy plastic sheeting. Using a portable sandblaster, I blasted the bottom of the car (that part sucked). Once it was clean removed the sheet and primed/painted the bottom of the car. With all the new metal there wasn't much to the sand blasting. Came out great. No rotissorie needed. If your only doing 1 car and space is tight doing it the way I did may work out for you.
Clearification What I was trying to say is that if you build a frame on the rotissorie to simulate the car frame then the body should not flex. However, if you are going to replace any metal that includes a body mounting hole then I recommend building a cart.
What works better? the braces in the door (from hinges to striker) or the bars going from the top of the windshield back to the top of the rear seat frame?
Rob, I'm not sure. I have hear of someone using the braces in the doors! I would think this would be an easier way to go.
