Golden Lion Grrrages
1962 Chrysler 300 H Convertible
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The passenger side A pillar molding has two dents. I found a very nice spare in storage
and brought it over. I might as well try to remove the dents in the
original piece. Doggone, they worked out so nice I reinstalled the original piece. I used
hammer handles -- the oval sections, and tapped on those pieces of wood with the
outer section of the molding supported on softwood.
We removed the front tires and brake drums. Ball joints test good, good idler arm and center link and tie rods.
Both wheels show worn wheel bearings but the brakes shoes, cylinders and drums have lots of life.
We removed inner and outer races front wheels. Some were hard to pound out -- a matter of the
right size hammer and the right angle on the punch. We installed new races by using the old wheel bearings for install.
Put the old bearings in the new races and it gives you a lot of surface to pound on.
New front wheel seals, grease, reassemble with the Chrysler recommended bearing procedure (90 in-lbs, back
off nut one slot).
The front door panels came off so we can rebuild the power window motors. Both doors had vapor barriers.
The passenger door will need to be replaced due to rust, the driver side is fine. The driver door has been
cut by a previous owner to access the window motor. You can see the motor had broken the transmission
mount and had been repaired. We will put anchors on both motors so the impact from door closing does not
result in the motors stressing the transmissions.
The driver side panel was torn and damaged along the lower edge. The cardboard backer was weak
in this area as well. New door panels are not available. I got the idea to make this panel presentable by
adding a third chrome strip. I had a spare piece. The strip is held by a series of sharp pointed teeth which
easily penetrate the board. By using a strip identical to one already on the panel, it almost looks like it
was factory. In any case, it does a great job of covering the torn area and protecting the bottom edge.
The fuel line from the tank had been patched. A new one came from InLine Tube. It was about $135, a large
part of that was the shipping cost -- it doesn't weight much but it comes in an over-size box. It has a large
radius bend that is easily straightened. Installation was quick and easy. I had to replace several of the
clips which hold the line to the body. There are three sizes. I needed several medium and one large to
get the fit I needed. These were from Gary Goers. Probably Quirey has them now.
The neutral safety switch had been bypassed. For the longest time
I have been
unable to successfully test a neutral safety switch. Every switch I tested acted the same:
I always had continuity from the wire post to the spring loaded pin, no matter what position
the pin was in. And I always had no continuity from the wire post to the body. I never could
get the switch to be off in one position and off in another, which is what I expect a switch to do.
Aha! The answer from John Grady. It is not a switch. It is a spring loaded grounding pin. See
more here.
The driver front fender has significant Bondo repair. The passenger side fender is fine. I have a replacement in much better shape for the driver so set about in the removal. The grille has to come out. I had forgotten how
difficult the H grille is. The mounting nuts are not visible, and the grille mesh is full of sharp edges. This car
has AC, so the condensor is there with its thousands of sharp edges. Plus, there is little room, even for
my small boney hands. It is like working on a cheese grater.
The fender is not held on by too many bolts, and most are accessible. I left the inner fender intact, which
makes the job easier. It took about 3 hours working alone and the fender was off. I was pleased to see little
rust on the inner fender, chassis, and firewall areas.
One of the things I like is properly shaped tail pipes. When you get new pipes, the ends of the tail
pipes are just square cuts. It isn't all that much work to take a cut off wheel and get the
proper shape. The idea is to cut the underside pretty much horizontal. Take a yard stick, approximate
horizontal, make a mark on the pipe with a Sharpie and see where the cut ends up. There is a lot of "artistic leeway"
allowed here. In this picture you can see the far pipe, not modified and the nearer pipe has the cut.
A 40 grit flap wheel on your grinder will let you quickly compensate for unintended designs.
The carpet in these F G H cars -- The F and G
use black carpet, the H uses gold. The club (George Riehl, Ken Mack, Michael Burke) researched this subject
in 1995. While the G carpet has a pile height of
.375" and was available anywhere, the black F carpet has a different pile (.500")
and could not be found. The H carpet is a .375" pile but the color was
unique and could not be found. So the club took on
a project to have F and H carpet custom made. We had a batch made and sold
kits through the club store. 34 F kits were sold with the last one being
sold in 2002. 16 H kits were made, the last sold in 1999.
Each F kit consisted
of 5 yards of 72" wide material. The H kit was 5.5 yards; slightly more because the front seat
backs also needed material.
A layout was provided to show how the kit
could be cut into parts. A while after the last kits were sold, we approached
the manufacturer for another production run. They would not make another and no
other sources were found.
I bought several carpet kits back then and still had one I could use on
this car.
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