Chapter 57 Swedish Steel Was Formidable
“Jason, I’m here! Huh? What’s this car? A Volkswagen Beetle?”
The moment Noah arrived for work, his eyes lit up at the sight of the car raised on the lift.
“Hey, Noah. This is a Swedish Volvo from the 1960s.”
“What…? This is a Volvo? Something this round? Wow… Old cars really did all have unusual designs.”
“They definitely had far more individuality between manufacturers and models than modern cars do.”
Back in the 1950s and 1960s, manufacturers did not share platforms the way they did now, and there were no collision regulations, so designers were free to display their creativity to the fullest.
“Anyway, we need to drain every oil and fluid from this car. Bring over the drain tank first.”
“Yes! Ah, but Jason, can I suggest something?”
Noah stopped on his way to get his work clothes, holding his backpack against his chest.
“A suggestion? Of course. What is it?”
“I’ve been thinking about it for a while. What if we started uploading work videos or photos to social media?”
“Huh? Social media?”
“Yes! When I’m bored at home, I watch a lot of car-restoration content. Partly to study. And there are more people who enjoy that kind of thing than I expected. The posts get tons of comments too…”
Noah began explaining excitedly.
The truth was, I barely used social media.
There were probably very few people in the modern world who looked at their smartphones less than I did.
Of course, I occasionally watched videos to pass the time while eating alone.
But I had never once thought about becoming the person featured in those videos or photographs.
“Don’t you have to talk a lot in front of the camera and show your face for that sort of thing? No matter how I think about it, I don’t think I could do it.”
“Ah… True…”
Noah glanced at my face and scratched his head.
Apparently, even he could not imagine me smiling brightly and speaking fluently in front of a camera.
Considering how awkward I was even in real-life social situations, competing against professional extroverts would probably be difficult…
“Hmm… Then how about just taking photos and uploading them? We could use it to save a portfolio. You work on so many unusual cars that it would be a shame for all the records to disappear. If you give me permission, I can take the pictures and manage the account too!”
“Really? As a way of keeping a portfolio…”
That was fairly tempting.
I already kept analog records of the cars I had restored, but they were difficult to search and required a great deal of effort.
“All right. That sounds like a very good idea. But the work itself and learning the trade come first. Don’t let the priorities get reversed.”
“Yes! Don’t worry! Uploading a few photos is nothing for me. And writing about the restoration work will probably help me review what I learned too. Hehe.”
I did not understand why he was so pleased about increasing his own workload.
Still, if he enjoyed it, there was no harm in it.
“All right, enough of that. Shall we start the actual work now?”
Gush—
“Ugh, is this really gasoline?”
As a sour-smelling brown liquid poured from the fuel hose, Noah covered his nose and took a step backward.
“Yeah. This is what happens when it gets old. That’s why when restoring a classic car, you always have to drain not only the oil, but all the fuel before you begin.”
Gasoline had a much shorter shelf life than most people imagined.
Even when stored in a sealed container with stabilizer, it lasted only about twelve months.
If left inside a vehicle’s fuel tank like this, its quality began deteriorating rapidly after six months.
When abandoned for decades, all the volatile components evaporated, and oxidation turned the remaining fuel into something sticky like varnish.
After removing all the fuel, we also had to detach the fuel tank completely and clean the inside.
“Noah, bring me some unusable spare nuts. And prepare about three liters of hot water.”
Clatter—
I poured the metal nuts Noah brought into the fuel tank.
Then I added hot water mixed with degreaser and firmly sealed the tank opening with a rubber plug.
“Now shake it up and down as hard as you can so the debris inside comes loose. Do it four times for about five minutes each.”
“Oh, understood!”
Clatter, clatter, clatter—
Noah hugged the fuel tank, which was as thick as a tree stump, and bounced while shaking it up and down.
Meanwhile, I searched for and purchased the parts required for maintenance and restoration one by one.
Then I heard Noah groaning in the distance.
“Gaaah… Ugh… Hah, hah!”
His face had turned bright red as he staggered awkwardly, looking as though he were dancing with the fuel tank.
“Hahaha, Noah. You look pretty impressive right now. Want me to take a picture for the portfolio? How about calling it ‘Ballroom Dancing with a Fuel Tank’?”
I teased Noah and pointed the smartphone in my hand toward him.
“Ah! No! I’m going to show our account to my friends later!”
Still hugging the fuel tank, he turned his back and tried to escape from me.
“Woof! Woof!”
Dusty, not understanding what was happening, excitedly circled Noah.
“I’m joking. And that should be enough by now. Open the plug and check inside, then bring the POR-15 rust remover. The dilution ratio is written on the back, so mix it with water and fill the tank.”
(Translator’s Note: POR-15 — An American brand of rust-preventive coatings and metal-treatment products frequently used in vehicle restoration. The name is derived from “Paint Over Rust.”)
“Ugh, I’m saved…”
Meanwhile, I climbed a low work ladder with about four steps and looked down at the Volvo’s roof.
Hmm. This will probably be the most difficult part of this restoration.
There was a crater-like depression in the front of the Volvo’s rounded roof, as though it had been struck by a meteorite.
Panel repair over such a large area was never easy, but—
Actually, this works out well. I can show Noah some bodywork too.
There was no hesitation in my hands.
Without even consciously thinking about which tools to use or how to move them, a complete sequence unfolded inside my mind like a panorama.
“Whoa. Did this thing get flicked on the head by the Hulk or something?”
(Translator’s Note: Hulk — A Marvel Comics superhero created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby. The character first appeared in The Incredible Hulk No. 1, published in May 1962, and is characterized by extraordinary physical strength.)
Noah had approached without my noticing and poked his head over.
“Seriously. It’s deeper than it looks, so we’ll have to push it out from the inside first and inspect it again.”
Together, Noah and I removed the entire interior headliner until the bare metal was exposed.
Next, I brought over a body jack, a pump fitted with a metal post, and slowly began pushing the dent outward from inside.
Pop, creak, pop!
As I pumped slowly and carefully, the metal post on the body jack gradually forced the dented roof outward.
“Jason! The dent popped back out! But… it’s still really uneven…”
“Yeah. That’s because the metal stretched beyond its original shape. Let’s restore the curvature first.”
I placed a curved dolly against the inside and gently tapped the raised area with a small body hammer.
Bang, bang, bang, bang—
“Wow, how can metal that’s several decades old be like this?”
Noah could not hide his amazement as the metal’s shape changed only slightly despite the repeated hammering.
“Whew… This is Swedish steel. There’s a reason the PV544 was nicknamed the Blue Tank. Light blue, symbolizing the Swedish flag, was one of its most popular colors.”
At the time, Swedish steel was primarily produced from ore mined in Kiruna in the north, and it contained extremely low levels of sulfur and phosphorus, impurities that reduced iron quality.
Furthermore, Volvo followed the philosophy that thickness meant safety.
Whereas the sheet metal on ordinary modern cars was generally 0.6 to 0.8 millimeters thick, many sections of this PV544 were one millimeter or even more than 1.2 millimeters thick.
Bang, bang, bang, bang—
It took nearly three times as long as it would have on an American car of the same era before I finally finished hammering.
“The basic line is mostly restored now, so next we need to perform heat shrinking.”
“Heat shrinking?”
“Yeah. It compresses the molecular structure of the slightly stretched metal again. It’s essential if we want the panel to retain its strength afterward.”
“Ah, I get it. Like how plastic suddenly tightens when you apply heat…”
Noah carefully took notes on his phone while also photographing what I was doing.
“The important thing with this work is not to heat a large area all at once. Find the correct points and concentrate the heat there. The heated area should not be any larger than roughly a dime.”
Whoosh—
I adjusted the oxygen torch tip until the flame narrowed, then heated one point on the metal until it glowed red in a small circle.
Bang, bang—
Then I removed the torch and struck the spot several times with the hammer.
Sizzle!
I placed a wet towel over it and rapidly cooled the metal.
A wave of hot steam rose into my face.
“You saw that, right? You repeat the process little by little while maintaining balance across the entire panel.”
“Heating, hammering, rapid cooling… I thought bodywork was just hammering metal until it became flat, but there are more steps than I expected. Still, it’s actually kind of interesting…”
Noah continued taking notes, moving his lips as he concentrated.
Whoosh, bang, bang! Sizzle—
After completing the heat treatment, I finished the fine panel work using a process called body filing.
I ran my hand across the surface.
“All right. What do you think? Feel the surface.”
“Oh! Almost all the unevenness is gone.”
“Right? We’ll still have to apply body filler to make the surface completely smooth, but the better the preparation work is, the less filler we need. Filler isn’t very durable, so it cracks if you use too much.”
“I thought everything was basically the same once it was painted because you couldn’t see any difference.”
“That’s the one thing an automotive restorer should never think—that only the parts visible from the outside matter. If a car is built that way, the customer will eventually feel the difference while driving it.”
“Hmm… I think I’m starting to understand why people like the cars you build.”
Noah looked around the repaired section of the Volvo’s roof with fascination.
“Yeah. Even if it takes longer, the people who know what they’re looking at will recognize it. Ultimately, trust and reputation are what allow someone to survive in this industry for a long time. And that doesn’t apply only to me. One day, you’ll have to take responsibility for the name Noah Reed too.”
“Take responsibility for the name Noah Reed…”
All the playfulness disappeared from Noah’s expression as he listened seriously.
“Ahem. Anyway, enough talking. Let’s move on to the next job. We need to finish all the general maintenance before the additional parts arrive. If we get most of it done by Friday, I’ll take you to the upholstery shop over the weekend.”
“Yes! Really? You mean the upholstery shop run by that Mateo person?”
Noah had been deeply impressed by the interior work Mateo completed on the Metropolitan.
Unfortunately, I had gone alone to commission the job that time, so Noah had not been able to meet him.
“Yeah. He’s also a craftsman who puts his own name on his work. The Metropolitan was excellent, but the Studebaker looked like a genuine work of art. You would have loved it if you’d seen it.”
“But didn’t you say his workshop was far from here? It isn’t in Arizona, right? Was it New Mexico?”
“Yeah, that’s right. We do have to cross into another state, but it’s right near the border, so it’s only about a hundred and ten miles, roughly a hundred and seventy-seven kilometers. The route is straightforward, so it should take about an hour and a half.”
Even as I said it, the statement was slightly misleading, but living in America changed one’s sense of distance.
There were plenty of people who considered that distance perfectly reasonable for a commute.
“Oh, then it’s practically right next door! After we drop off the car, let’s get Mexican food for lunch in that town.”
Ever since the birthday party in Mexico, Noah had become completely obsessed with Mexican food.
“Sure. Unless Mateo’s mother brings us packed lunches.”
“Packed lunches?”
“…It’s a long story.”
[Kiruna Iron Mine, Sweden]