Shape The Metal

What I love about this business! Just got off the phone with a customer who is 80 years old, has been running his hot rod bodyshop for 65 years, his children are now in the business. He has been doing everything by hand all that time, and rather than decide to hang up the tools at 80, he decided to get some machines to help with the work so he can keep going! I genuinly love speaking with customers like this and hearing avout what they have been doing and working on!

The new Gen 2 OX Planishing Hammer from.Allen Buresh is now shipping. The Gen 2 replaces the Original OX and carries a number of design improvements from the HD OX with improved piston / air motor design and slightly more power than the Original - still made here in the USA! The Gen 2's will be up on the site later today.

Preparing to make a buck so I can then make some new rear fenders for the 1958 W100 Dodge Pickup. The original right side fender is in pretty bad shape and the left side has a cut out for a spare wheel that I want to remove / restore back to original shape so decided to make some new ones. The lines on the original right side are out a bit so transferred the mounting fl**ge to paper first then cleaned the lines up with tape in preperation for transferring over to plywood for the main spine of the buck and will then build out for there.

The Woodward-Fab WFSSHD2 Shrinker Stretchers are back in stock! If you have been waiting for one of these, now is the time to grab one (or 2).

https://shapethemetal.com/products/wfsshd2-heavy-duty-foot-operated-shrinker-stretcher

Finally got the 58 W100 into the workshop - the first time in over 20 years this pickup has moved!
Got the pulling off the drivers side front fender and inner gaurds which was pretty dirty work, a combination of almost 50 years of forrest work and rust meant there was plenty of crud!
One part of the inner guard is still in pretty good condition whilst the other part that was under the batter tray needs extensive work / replacement. Along with a bit of work on the fender itself. Plan is to remake patch panels / complete panels inhouse but first need to figure out how close to original - the inner guards appear to be 14ga and the fender is atleast 16 and most likely 14 as well (need to confirm) whcih means a fiar bit of elbow grease is going to habe to go into any panels that are re-made at the same gauge. May look to remake the entire panels in lighter 18ga but let me think on it!

A few OX Planishing Hammers ready to go out to lucky customers - one in Cedar Rapids IA, one in Canada and one in Sweden. We ship these great products from to great metal shapers all around the world!

Friday work lunch at .bbq . Think this will need to become a regular thing, anyone else in the area keen?