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I've been working on my Vista Cruiser for over two years now in my driveway and I wanted to find out if there's anything else that holds the roof rack on top except for the four corners. Do the lengthwise rails just sit loosely on top of the roof? There's some plastic underlay, but nothing that keeps it down on the roof. Was this just the way Oldsmobile did it on a car they considered to be a utility vehicle that would get it's roof bashed anyway with whatever people throw on top?
Also, I never really started a thread on my repairs turned restoration and so many people have helped me here that I thought I'd better get started while I am still working on it or it will never happen. I'm doing a partial restoration on this car and I'm doing it in a slightly unusual way. I work in my driveway that has a big balcony that covers it, so I'm basically outdoors and I've been looking at the weather report a lot lately to see if I can still get any 24 hour period where the temperature stays above 65 at night which is what my SPI Epoxy primer calls for.
Here's how it all started. Three winters ago (correction Four. Times flies when you're having fun :-( ) I built myself a 2004R transmission and converted from a 2 to a 4 barrel intake. I barely had time to enjoy that a bit before I somehow started getting annoyed at the blisters that were showing through the paint on a few spots on the roof. It's been over a year since I started on the roof repair. Even though there wasn't much rust showing before I started, once I got in there, I quickly arrived at the might-as-well phase and it couldn't leave well enough alone. Once I started pulling off the stainless trim around the glass and the glass itself the project slowly kept getting bigger and bigger. I never really was disappointed that it was too much rust. I did envy some of the other Vista Cruiser restoration projects when I saw how clean their bodies were, but I also knew that most Vista Cruisers I'd seen were much worse than mine... Before I knew it I had to rebuilt the complete opening around the top Vista glass, as well as a section of the C and D-pillars and a little on top of the rear roof section and quarter panels. Rust repair definitely isn't my favorite thing to do. My Mig welder gave me trouble for a while, I learned how to do leading from an old timer, plus it's just quite bit of work anyway...Not to mention that I also am doing all new interior...
Thanks guys. I dread putting it back on my freshly painted (and color sanded and buffed) paint, but to me the roof rack is one of the cool looking features that makes the Vista Cruiser. I think I may use some double sided tape to help them lay down better, but check to see if they're bent first.
To continue where I left off here are some more before pictures. As you can see there were very little rust-throughs visible when it was all still together and more after I remove the trim and even more once I started to cut into the sheet metal. Basically, a lot of it was so severely pitted on the bottom side where dirt gets sandwiched between the second roof layer and the outer skin or where it has tar paper insulation stuck to bare sheet metal. In the end, I replaced almost all of the sheet metal channel that the Vista glass sits on plus most of the actual roof sheet metal on both sides and a few inches forward from the leading edge of the glass.
Here are some pictures of one of the long, rear Vista glass openings close to where the rear roof rack mounts. It seems like rust showed up at a lot of corners around the roof glass even when there was nothing visible before I took it apart. The reason I have some very good shaped patches is because I wanted to make sure I remove any sheet metal that was more than lightly pitted, but I also wanted to retain the original shape as much as possible, so I tried not to take out more than I needed to. Being able to cut, grind, bite, nibble, file out the bad metal and fit and weld the patches and then have access to grind the welds was also a consideration and leaving an access hole so I cut rust proof my already repaired sections with Por 15 and Wax-oyl before I welded it up. Oh yeah, also I tried to keep the original pins for the retaining clips, if possible...
Last edited by tcolt; November 5th, 2018 at 10:26 PM.
Here's the damage to the top of the left quarter panel. The moisture gets trapped behind the glass trim in part because the horizontal flange actually slopes down into the pinch weld instead of allowing water the drain out from the window area. Also, the typical rust in the rear where the d-pillar meets the quarter panel. A few sections were rusted through here and the key was to try not to get any warping into the quarter panel after welding.
It's hard to grind in the corner so a sharp bend made more sense. For that it's harder to make in one piece. I found out what welders flu is when I welded zinc-plated sheet metal. The fumes smell like sulphur and leave yellow deposits. Lead where I thought it would be good to have for corrosion protection.
Last edited by tcolt; November 6th, 2018 at 12:56 AM.
After I was mostly finished with welding up the roof rust I stripped the original paint off the non-rusted section of outer skin to the left side of the Vista glass. I barely noticed a small pinhole (dark spot) and poked around with a sharp awl. This is how it went from there.
Looks pretty solid once all the dirt and rust scale is removed. The Vista Cruiser can probably afford to shed a few pounds and it will survive for as long as I'm around. Back side of the piece that looked great on the front. Thoroughly cleaned, vacuumed, blown clear, ground, wire brushed, Por 15...
After I had almost finished and body-fillered and shaped the front roof section, I test fitted the glass and noticed that all the welding had severely sucked in the whole roof section so that I had to carefully push it back out with a 4-ton ram. That buckled the roof skin again, so I had to cut out a section and made another patch.
WOW! I'm sure mine was even worse as you can see alot more rot from the outside that you could your car. I ended up selling my Vista and I'm sure I will miss it but after looking at what you had to do maybe I'm glad I let it go... You have done a great job, especially in a driveway! Hats off to you, well done.
Thanks guys. I guess it's time to get to the reason for the title of this thread. I had already posted pictures of the tailgate and drivers side doors a few months ago, but here they are again.
These are from this past Sunday. It was a big day. I only painted the roof section and the jambs of all the roof glass. That way I can start driving the car and moving it on the street (sob) so my other cars can have a roof over their heads when the rainy season starts. I'm glad I didn't do the lower half of the car. For one, the body work is still lagging behind the rest of the job. But also there just isn't enough room all around the car and I ended up brushing against the sides a few times as I was painting the roof. Also, the annoying gnats seem to wait until you shoot the clear coat and then dive bomb straight into it. I had one area on the main roof section where 4 of them committed suicide within a 5 by 5 inch area. The good thing is you can usually surgically extract their bodies with a razor blade once the clear has cured. It's amazing how much can land on the paint and clear and you never see it once you color sand and buff it. I have to say I'm extremely happy with all the SPI products and the Matrix base coat too. I'm going to go out and rent a booth for the rest of the car though.
November 5th, 2018, 03:16 PM
