Introduction

[alfadog]

Hi

My name is John and I live in Miami, Florida. I am a retired civil engineer and am repurposing my life along aviation lines, something I dropped many years ago. I am intending to gain a flight instructor rating and hope to have it by next summer, I was moving in that direction but broke my airplane and decided to go to school for an A&P license. About 2/3 done with that and then I will go back to the pilot ratings.

I have been repairing and restoring cars and motorcycles for 45 years but never learned to weld or do any serious metal fab. I am an excellent mechanic and have prepped and painted cars but again, no metal work beyond bang and bondo.

I also used to do high-end composite work as a profession before moving into the civil engineering area.

I just bought my son a 1972 GMC Sprint for his first car and a father/son project. He is 15 but an "old soul" and wanted one of these (actually an El Camino was what he specifically wanted but the Sprint is close enough); I had no input into his decision (I am more a sports car guy). He is very excited about the car but it needs some serious rust repair and came with one quarter panel for the worst bit but not yet installed. We drove it from NC to Miami so it is mechanically sound.

I took short welding and sheet metal classes in my A&P school but it was way too short a class to become proficient. I just ordered a MIG welder and an oxyacetylene setup from Eastwood to work on my welding and hope to be able to buy some sheet metal forming tools soon.

I hope to learn a lot here and look forward to "meeting" y'all.