Re-skinning a door.

[6Stang7]

How hard is it? Anyone have a how-to link somewere? It looks fairly straight foward to me, and I feel I can do it with the year of autobody I took in high school. One part that I'm wondering about is getting the skin in the right place on the door before I hammer and dolly the edges over. Are they easy to line up? I aslo planed on getting the old skin off by grinding the edges down. Once I do that, how do I get the old part of the skin that was folded over the shell off? Grind it too, or will it just come off? I would assume that a sealent of some type should be used, but what type? Any tips, ideas, ect would be nice.

 

[Ozsum2]

There used to be a write up about it complete with pics, but that was a couple years ago. Don't know if it is still in search or not.

 

[oboebrian]

Here's my pictorial write-up on my 72 door skin replacement:

http://www.desertmustangs.com/1972coupe/Door_skin_repair/72-Door-skin.htm

It's not too hard but you can screw it up really badly really fast if you're not patient and check your body lines. Follow along basically with what i did, only some things such as spot weld locations etc are slightly different. But the concept is the same.

BTW don't spend the extra money for the Eastwood Door Skin tool, a set of channel locks, body hammer, and dolly are just as adequate and a lot cheaper.

 

[dmoody]

Oboebrian, I looked at your write-up and the trouble I'm having is folding the door skin over the lip of the door. The factory door skin looks like it was pressed flat with a machine. The eutside edges of the door are thin whereas mine are thick and you can tell the door skin has been replaced. Is there any way to make it such that the lip will fold over easier? I thought about grinding the inside of the crease a little to weaken it. What do you think? Am I taking my restoration too far or has anyone solved this problem?

Thanks,
David

 

[NasaGT]

Nice write up oboebrian!!!

 

[danny clemens]

Oboebrian, I looked at your write-up and the trouble I'm having is folding the door skin over the lip of the door. The factory door skin looks like it was pressed flat with a machine. The eutside edges of the door are thin whereas mine are thick and you can tell the door skin has been replaced. Is there any way to make it such that the lip will fold over easier? I thought about grinding the inside of the crease a little to weaken it. What do you think? Am I taking my restoration too far or has anyone solved this problem?

Thanks,
David

The factory did press it together with a machine called a hemming press or hemmer. One stroke and it's done.

 

[BB1966]

The easy way to get it off is to take a grinder to the edge and grind it away till they seperate. I did indeed screw up the bottom of mine with a hammer/dolly but not to bad. Got the edege fairly sharp but not perfect. The good thing is that if you fork it up to bad it was only a $50 skin!!!!!!

 

[65stanger]

Nice write up oboebrian!!!

Ditto...........I'm gonna re-skin my passenger door in the next month or so........

 

[oboebrian]

I used the Eastwood Door Skin tool followed by careful work with a hammer and dolly, I would just recommend careful work with a body hammer and dolly. It won't be quite as thin as the original, but it will be close enough.

 

[shotsy]

I did the drivers side on my 70 and it turned out pretty well, I'll need a little bondo around the bottom of the door but other than that I was happy with the results

 

[65stanger]

The door skin I got from MU already has the flanges started, they're bent to a 90* angle.
There was one thing missing tho', which I'll have to transplant from the old skin, that's the upper mounting plate for the window assy........
Looks like the toughest and most time consuming part of this project is going to be cleaning up and prepping the door shell.

 

[mfp4073]

I got a beat up one from the NPD scratch and dent room for $20. I figure I will give it a go on one of my crap doors and see how it turns out.......am not looking forward to it....