Welcome once again to Thursday. It’s that time of the week when we open the Chevy Hardcore vault, take a step back in time, and locate an article that you guys might have either forgotten about, or might not even know exists. Whichever the case, we are certain that you will enjoy this editorial flashback.
I decided that this week, we should take a look back to 2016, and visit at an article that makes 1967 new once again – Rebuilding The Deuce. Everyone like to remember days gone by, and automotive enthusiasts do this by restoring vintage cars that excite them. But, doing so usually means dealing with rust. Sometimes though, rust can be a non-issue, and we learned that first-hand when we visited Real Deal Steel in Sanford, Florida, to check out the company’s all-new ’66 and ’67 Chevy Nova bodies.
Real Deal Steel has been building and shipping Tri-Five and ’67-’69 Camaro bodies for quite a few years, and the Nova is a great addition. Assembling a new Nova body sound great, but unfortunately, there is no possible way that these new panels and pieces could simply be welded together by the home enthusiast. Let’s face it, there are critical body measurements, and it would be impossible to correctly assemble the panels. So, the use of fixtures and jigs that hold each panel to a close structural tolerance had to be designed and built.
This was no easy task, as Joe Wittaker attests, “We have had our hands full developing the fixtures, production, and sales of our Tri-Five Chevy and 1967 through 1969 Camaro bodies, and have just within the last year been able to devote time to developing the fixtures needed to assemble the Chevy II.”
One year! It took nearly one year to design, develop, and ultimately build the fixtures needed for assembling the new body – nobody said it would be easy. We had heard that Real Deal was working on the Nova body back in 2015, and it wasn’t until September 2016, when we were finally able to go to the shop and see one be assembled.
If you check out the original article, you can follow along and see just how involved it gets when putting one of these bodies together. First, the floor section is mounted to the base fixture. This is what positions every piece and panel of the body. From there, the firewall section, cowl section, inner skeleton, and then outer body panels are welded in place. True to the original body, these new units are spot-welded using a water-cooled, production-style, resistance spot welder, much like you would see on a modern automotive assembly line – except the Real Deal guys fill in for the robots.
There is a lot more information in the article, including what’s involved to get one of these or other new -manufactured bodies titles. But you’ll have to check it out to get the whole story, so, take a look back at Rebuilding The Deuce, and find out how you can own an all-new ’66-’67 Nova body – rust not included.