Lifting body off frame suggestions

[Dave K.]

67' and getting ready to lift body off. Is it best to take the doors off first or leave them on; I think I would prefer to leave them on,although I have no hardware to hold them in place. I'm currently building the Dollie from Noland Adams workbook and it says support rear of car with wire rope......what does this exactly mean?
Dave

[Paul J.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Take the doors off and put some braces in between the hinge piller and the latch. I made some from angle iron from the home center, but others have used threaded rods and turnbuckles. Don't use the doors, as it puts stress on the hinge attachment points, the rivets, and the fiberglass door. Another reason not to leave the doors on is access to the interior. Also be sure to support the rear end if the body is off for a while.

Paul

[Scott M.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

I would also take off the doors to eliminate any stress to them. Makes the job lighter and easier to deal with. No idea what the wire rope thing is all about, maybe for a vert to support the back end. Sometimes the floor is cracked under the luggage stop and it will sag real bad. I just used a couple old walker bumper jacks when I lifted mine.

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[Dave K.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Scott....I like your picture. How did you get your deck lid springs out? I'm having a hell of a time getting to the outermost bolt. Extremely tight to get a wrench in there.
Dave

[Michael G.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Support of the rear portion of the car is a must on convertible. After removing the doors I made cabling (wire rope) that attach at the top hinge with a hook and the striker area with eyelet bolt. I used a turn buckel to adjust the tension. Have a look.

[Doug L.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

I used the same technique, steel cable with eye bolt on both ends and a turnbuckle to tighten the cable. However it occurred to me that I didn't want there to be bending stress in either direction, so I cut a section of 2 x 2 and placed it between jambs at the top of the openings, then used the steel cable to "lock" the 2 x 2 in place. The 2x2 keeps the door opening from flexing in one direction and the cable keeps it from flexing in the other direction. Once the doors are off the only things connecting the front and back clips are the door sills. You don't want to crack them! I lifted the body with an engine hoist. The key seemed to be having a long enough reach to place the hook over the center of the body. I used nylon rope and attached it to the front corners at the radiator support, at the center to the corners of the windshield frame (glass out), and at the rear around the spring towers for the deck lid. I let the rope slide in the hoist hook so that the tension at each point was equal. I built the dolly according to plans I found on this forum. The only problem was that I wished I had made the body mount higher to make it easier to get under the dolly. After getting the body off and fastened to the dolly I attached 2" aluminum "U" channel as outriggers at the front and back ends of the dolly. They extended out from the dolly by ~6 ft on one side and 2 ft on the opposite side. I then attached steel angle vertically to the 2 ft end and attached another piece of angle from the top of the vertical piece, across the body to the "U" channel. This created two triangles. I could then lift on the 6' extended end of the channel and rotate the body and dolly 90 degrees. That allowed me to have full access to the underside of the body so I could clean it without laying on my back with stripper and lacquer thinner dripping in my face.

[Mike E.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Once you get the body off and start working on the chassis, think about building a candle for the frame too. It makes moving it around your shop easy and safe. I used Noland’s basic body dolly design but changed the dimensions to match the body mounts on the frame when it upside down. IMO working of jack stands was a pain. The frame isn't heavy enough to be stable when its stripped down.







This way you can reinstall suspension components just like they did in the factory when the car was built. Flipping it might be a challenge if you don’t have a hoist or two in your garage or a bunch of friends and a case of beer so keep that in mind.

Mike

[John B.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Scott....I like your picture. How did you get your deck lid springs out? I'm having a hell of a time getting to the outermost bolt. Extremely tight to get a wrench in there.
Dave

Dave, I removed the deck lid hinges from my 68 a few months ago. Just reinstalled them this week. They are incredibly difficult. I had to remove the springs to have any chance of getting to the outermost bolt. I tried a lot of different things to shim the springs so I could release them. Nothing worked, so in the end a buddy of mine got himself wedged in there and just pried them off. Luckily he did not get hurt. Once the springs were out, getting to the bolt was easier, but still very difficult. Mine was not rusted in too much, so it was not impossible. Anyway, I knew that I would need some kind of tool to even have a chance of reinstalling the springs, so I made the tool in the picture. I used a short piece of square tubing that I cut to form the legs that slide between the spring coils near the top and bottom, a 1/2" bolt to use as a jack screw, and a short piece of pipe with about a 1/2" I.D. to provide some structural rigidity on the side that was allowed to move when using the jack screw. Anyway, this worked pretty well. You slide it between the two hinge supports with it set to about the fully open position. Lower the hinge to stretch the spring and engage the tool. When you lift the hinge, the tool holds the spring expanded and you can slip it off its mounts. There is not a lot of room in there, so getting the tool to expand to be long enough to easily remove and install the spring, but not so long that it won't fit into the space was a trial and error process. Fortunately my hinges were out of the car, so I could do the trial and error fitting on my bench. Anyway, with this tool I can remove and install deck my lid springs in a few minutes. Access to the outermost bolt remains poor at best. Wonder how GM did it?

Good luck,

John



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[Scott M.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Hi Dave, to remove the hinge bolts, both outer and inner I just used a 1/4" drive socket with small extension along a gearwrench ratcheting box end. Getting yourself into position is the worse part and I removed and installed them with the springs installed.

[Paul J.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Hi Dave, to remove the hinge bolts, both outer and inner I just used a 1/4" drive socket with small extension along a gearwrench ratcheting box end. Getting yourself into position is the worse part and I removed and installed them with the springs installed.

I used a socket and a combination wrench. Like a lot of other things on the car, it just takes patience.

[Dave K.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Thx....I appreciate the feedback. If i have to get up inside the car to get to the outermost bolt..will the fiberglass support my body weight (210lbs)?

[Scott M.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

No problem, I weigh 200 and laid there kicking and screaming a long time.

[Wayne P.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Not sure if you have a four post lift. I made up 4 body straps. Placed a ratchet clamp cable on the Rad support and another 2 cables from the back under the deck . Only removed hood .
I would take the exhaust off . Distributar out just in case of problems. Good luck take your
time lots of posts on this subject with check lists.

[Mike E.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Not sure if you have a four post lift. I made up 4 body straps. Placed a ratchet clamp cable on the Rad support and another 2 cables from the back under the deck . Only removed hood .
I would take the exhaust off . Distributar out just in case of problems. Good luck take your
time lots of posts on this subject with check lists.

Thanks...You have just made more justifcation for a 4 post lift. I like the idea of raising chassis into the body, rather than the other way around. You can check clearance from below.

Mike

[Robert K.]

Re: Lifting body off frame suggestions

Doug,
only one pic came through on the thumbnail...... Do you have any more. I really can't see some of the details you are talking about in the one pic.....

thanks and take care,

Bob