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New wood pieces for the doors

Jerry

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The wood pieces that are inside the doors on my TR3A were so full of holes that I decided to make new ones. I was tired of welding anyway so out to the woodshop. I made them out of Oak like the original pieces. Do you think they bothered to put any sealer on them?

Jerry
 

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I made new ones also and sealed with two coats of boiled linseed oil (available at hardware stores). Let it dry overnight between coats.
 
Thanks for the push I needed, Jerry. I've been toying with that idea ever since I started my frame-up restore. I too dabble in woodworking. It'll be a good rainy/snowy day project. My '57 TR3 has three pieces in each door...one curved long and two small ones, one on each end of the long ones.

Cheers,
Charlie
 
I wonder why they stopped using the long one in the door. The panel has screws that go into metal in that area, so it would make sense.

anyway, I will seal them. I probably don't have linseed oil, but I do have tong oil. Which for a part that is never seen, should work well. If you need to make some pieces the tools are simple. table saw, bandsaw and belt sander. You could substitute a saber saw for the cut out.
I made news ones because there were so many holes in the old ones. I can't imagine how many times the panels were taken off to get that many holes. And still, when we got the car, there were no panels.

Jerry
 
Original wood used for the doors was cuban mahogany. It was fairly cheap in the 1950's, difficult to come by now days. The long piece of wood in the doors has a 5/8" curve to it. I ended up using phillipine mahogany which was also expensive, but water, mildew and insect resistant and doesn't shrink much.
Robert
 
Original wood used for the doors was cuban mahogany. It was fairly cheap in the 1950's, difficult to come by now days. The long piece of wood in the doors has a 5/8" curve to it. I ended up using phillipine mahogany which was also expensive, but water, mildew and insect resistant and doesn't shrink much.
Robert

Hey Robert, where were you when I was cutting my blocks last year? I couldn't tell what wood it was either, and defaulted to oak...

John
 
The grain is similar in both woods, I assumed the dark color was age and dirt, but Mahogany makes sense also. My dad used to use a lot of it in his cabinet shop in the 60-70s. But he said it started getting expensive and also had a lot of shrapnel in it from the war which destroyed his blades. Then the style people asked for changed to alder, oak, and ash. For what it is being used for in our cars, oak, ash, or mahogany would work well.

Jerry
 
I'm pretty sure the construction of the doors changed at TS 60k+, as many other body changes were made. That's when they eliminated the long wooden piece in the door. My original body was pre 60k and the wood in the doors was not any kind of mahogany. Neither are the pieces of wood in my post 60k body doors. My guess would be ash...doesn't look like oak.
 
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