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Drive Side Frame Rail Repair


peterman

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We are snowed in here in VA so I thought it would be a good time to update the blog. I’ve been slacking, thankfully on the blogging front and not on the building front – well, maybe a little. In the time between these posts I have completed a few things that make the paint shop seem a little closer (in time, not so much in affordability).

I was able to weld up the lower A pillar on the passenger side. It went back on nice and easily. Then I welded up the lower C pillar internals and inner rear wheel well piece. This was difficult to do with a flux core welder. The heat for flux core is controlled by how much wire you let stick out of the gun. With the thin metal in the rear wheel well, the wire had to be quite far out so I didn’t blow holes through the metal. It became a little unwieldy so another trick is to use a piece of copper to back the area you are welding. This pulls the heat away quickly so you don’t blow through the metal. The copper helped a lot. I still have to order the passenger side rocker panel from BavAuto or somewhere else.

The other thing that helped was my new Hobart welding apron. It has saved me from so many burns under the car, next to the car, pretty much everywhere I weld. It’s a great thing to have.

With the driver floor pan in place, I began mocking up the replacement section of frame rail that I bent up in the last post. I welded on a portion of the top plate to the replacement frame rail because I knew there was no way to do that if the bent section was installed in the car. Looking back, I would have made the initial top section longer so the butt weld between the two flat sections was in an easier place to weld and grind flat – another little bit of learning. So I mocked it all up in place and thought it looked good. I tacked it in then started running a bead near the sub-frame end. Something didn’t feel right so I stopped and thought about what I was doing. It seemed wrong and I had no idea why, but then I looked at the pedal box hole and thought will the pedal box fit with the frame rail where it is? Nope! Good thing they were only tack welds. Thank God I caught that now and not when I was actually trying to install the pedal box. I ground off the tack welds repositioned and began again with the pedal box in place.

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Now it all fits up nicely and I should be able to install the pedal box when the time comes – learning bit #a lot. With the replacement rail in place I welded on the remaining flat portion of the rail then ground down the plug welds.

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Then I moved onto mocking up the floor pan portion of the frame rail with cardboard. The cardboard templates were transferred to the 1/8” steel as before and cut out. The steel verticals were tacked in; then a 16-gauge flange with holes for plug welds was tacked in flush with the floor pan next to the verticals. I still have to run the fillet weld and the 16-gauge bridge between the verticals. That’s about as far as I have gotten in the last month since I posted.

Not very productive, I know, but at least it’s something. The cold means I need to bundle up and not having a rotisserie means I need to cram under the car in said bundle. This lack of maneuverability leads to frustration, overheating, then inevitably, hyperventilation and the need for a beer. It’s easy to make big strides but that last 10% of work to complete the task usually takes the longest. Silly things, like finding a little pitting that you want to fill, or finding another bit of metal that needs to be replaced, these little things that push out the impending completion of the task; they all are exacerbated by the cold.

I am really looking forward to those perfect, cool, 70 degree evenings May can bring us.

Pete

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