When West Coast Street Rods owner Roy Fjastad, Jr. told us he was going to chop a '49 Chevy pickup, we wasted no time getting over to his shop in Huntington Beach, California. Before he got started, though, he had some extra work with sanding down the powdercoating, that the owner had done earlier (someone told him he should have the cab coated first-not good advice for anybody!). That coating is really tough to get rid of, so it took Roy some long hours to get back down to the bare metal. The Chevy cab has an inner roof section, which also had to later be cleaned and chopped. In this case, Roy got a hold of an extra top for the Chevy, which came to be a big help. But before he even started to mark the cut lines with his Sharpie, Roy built a cage inside the cab to make sure that nothing would move when the cutting was commenced.
Slicing & Dicing
The owner wanted a 6-inch chop, which is pretty radical, but still possible. When you drop the top that much, it has to be cut into sections, then have metal strips added, before all the welds can be performed. Roy uses a TIG welder, and likes a perfect fit of the panels before anything gets welded. He took his time to mark all the cut lines on the cab before anything was cut at all. Another thing was to keep the rear window a little bigger than if it was chopped the full 6 inches. Two more inches of rear window made sense, so the rear window was cut out and chopped 4 inches before getting reworked into the rest of the chop. Roy made his plan by drawing all the lines on the top. First cuts where made at the lower beltline around the back, plus at the front pillars. Roy made the cuts with a thin cutoff wheel, to keep the gaps to a minimum. Next step was to make the 6-inch cut around the bottom of the top before the top part was cut up in sections. Roy has a rule with his top chops, too: "start from the rear and line up the panels, even if that means you have to cut and move any B-pillar to fit." In this case, the Chevy does not have a B-pillar, so to speak, which made it easier. With the cuts done, Roy could start with the rear panels and hold the pieces in place with Vise-Grips and clamps. He filed the edges and checked the fit until he was happy with it before any tack-welding was done.
Tack-welding & Hammering
With the fit of the rear panels perfect, Roy could start tack-welding. After each weld, he used a hammer and dolly to flatten the small warping that the heat from the TIG creates. After he had the two rear corner pieces in place, it was time to do the same with the A-pillars. But to keep them in line, both along the roof edge and windshield, all of the pieces were set up and clamped. There was now an open cross section in the middle of the roof when the pieces were 6 inches lower than the original. With most other top chops, Roy has to make the missing pieces for the driprail, but for this chop, he had the extra top to cut the needed pieces from. The rear window piece was now held in place with Clecos (temporary aircraft industry rivets) and sheetmetal strips to fill the big gaps. More tack-welding and hammering occurred until the roof was all tack-welded together.
Next step was to do the final welding on the roof. After hours of welding and hammering, the grinder was used to clean everything up. The chop of the body was done, but now the doors had to be chopped and fit, too. Same thing goes for the doors as with the top; when all cuts were made, there was about a 3-inch gap in the upper doorframe. With the extra top came a door, which was a good donor for the missing pieces. The last part of the chop was to cut down the inner roof panel and make it fit the new roofline within the lowered lid. Thanks to Roy for making sure that the fit of all the pieces was as close to perfect as possible before any welding was done. The finished result was as good as they come. Lid lowering is by no means for the faint of heart-rarely do you get a second chance on a botched chop. If you're looking to chop a top for the first time, it's in your best interest to gather all the vital info you can, whether it be from talking with professional fabricators or reading up on the subject, knowledge is cheap. Paying someone to fix your mistakes, however, is not!
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 The best way to start a top...  The best way to start a top chop is to make sure the body is all bolted down square on the chassis (or even better, onto a squared body jig), and also get it off the floor on jackstands. |
 Step two for Roy was to get...  Step two for Roy was to get the doors off, then brace the inside of the cab to make sure that nothing was going to get out of place when the top was cut free. |
 The powdercoated cab gave...  The powdercoated cab gave Roy about 10 extra hours of grinding, since the coating is worse than epoxy primer to grind down. Careful time was taken to make sure all the cut lines were going to be absolutely right on target. |
 For cutting the roof, Roy...  For cutting the roof, Roy uses a thin cutoff disc to get the cuts as straight and with thinnest gap as possible. |
 The rear panels were cut all...  The rear panels were cut all the way, except for the last 1/2-inch at the rear window and doorpost. When he had the front pillars cut, the last of the small cuts were done. |
 The last of the cutting for...  The last of the cutting for the rear section was done at the rear doorposts. |
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 With the last cut made at...  With the last cut made at the front on the lower portion of the A-pillar, the top could finally be lifted off. |