500 Giardiniera Restoration

[damon500]

Hi, as I seem to be discussing this in the wrong areas I decided to start a thread in the correct place!
Project is a 1961 500 Giardiniera that has been dismantled and stored in a leaky carport for 20 years- much worse than I first thought- have attached some pics.
The car has had a big front end accident at some stage and has a badly bent front crossmember, left hand inner wheelarch and floor.
I'm sure the car has had previous celebrity ownership- looking at the floor I believe that it has been previously owned by Fred and Wilma Flintstone which is handy as the engine is dismantled and missing a lot of parts- including the cylinder head!
The plan is: cut out the bent front crossmember and replace with a Niki front floor and steering rack. Replace the floors and other (numerous) rusty areas. Then reassemble with a Niki transmission, Bis Bellhousing, clutch and flywheel and 650cc 126 barrels.
Thanks for all the advice so far- this could be a long thread!
 

[Bambino]

Damon,
Are you going to upgrade the brakes at all?
The car doesn't look too bad - were there many animals (mice, spiders etc.) calling it home?
I don't have any spare mechanical parts, but I do have a pair of recovered front seats (black vinyl with red piping) that are surplus to need.
Chris

[damon500]

Hi Chris,
Mice and spiders are the least of my problems with this project! I also thought it 'didn't look too bad' until I looked closely.
Later I will take some more shots once the fibreglass floor has been removed but the current problem is the poorly repaired accident damage- I have decided to cut out the entire front bulkhead and replace it as the floor, inner guard and bulkhead are badly buckled and all the suspension mounting points were bent into completely the wrong places- I'm fitting a Niki Bulkhead etc which will also least allow me fit the Niki steering rack.
Haven't decided about the brakes yet- I have a Niki set I can fit but Giardinieras ran the Fiat 600 brakes which don't have the annoying self adjust system of the 500/126 and the drums are much more round than the Polish interpretations 
Here are some pictures of progress...

[Amateb8]

Hello! How is the restoration coming along?

[damon500]

Latest update - now it is winter I have gone back into the Garage and started delving deeper into the Giardiniera... plenty to do!
I got one Wagon floorpan and one sedan pan- plan was to use the wagon pan on the drivers side and stretch the sedan one for the Passenger side.
It ended up that the wagon pan was such a poor quality reproduction that I decided to get another sedan pan and stretch it to match- enjoy!
See if you can spot the 126 parts...

[1973/126]

 126 steering rack...

 By the way it`s looking great. That is what you call a project.