CeeP

Thanks for the advice, guys. I'll go see if I can't locate the spot welds this weekend. Starting this whole project has been a mix of excitement and dread. Jerry - I'm in the SF bay area, in the south bay. From the forums, it seems like there's quite a few 2002 owners around these parts though I haven't seen too many 2002s around. Thanks again!

Heh, I was expecting that, but here's the rub - I want to learn to do this stuff, I'm just not sure where to start. I don't mind sinking a bit of money into this as it's more for the experience than anything else. I could change my mind not too far in the future .

Hi folks, New 1973 '02 owner here and I bought a basket case. I'm hoping someone who's done a restoration can help me out and answer a few questions I've got after a more thorough inspection of the rust on this car. The problem areas - the front floor pans are rusted through near the pedal box on the driver's side and near the firewall on the passenger side. The driver's side frame rail, where it starts to angle up towards the engine bay, is also rusty. The back end of the passenger side frame rail has pushed through the floor, probably from when I jacked the car up. I've already ordered some floor pans from W&N, but the more I look at this, the more I'm not sure how I'm going to fix this. Questions: 1) Driver's side floor pan - If I cut out the floor pan, I'd like to not cut out the section of frame rail that's attached to the floor pan, but how can I separate them? I don't see a big bead holding the two together - is it just spot welded? Or am I doomed to just cut everything out that's attached to the floor pan? Similarly, the rail is attached to the wheel well - can this be separated? 2) Driver's side frame rail - Any advice on fixing this? I thought I'd farm this out, but seeing how much it's coupled to the floor pan, I'm not sure if I can do one without doing the other. It'd be nice if I could just weld in a new rail, but short of that, I was thinking maybe just cutting out the rusty part and welding in a new section. Again, this depends on if I can separate the pan from the rail. As far as the passenger side, I figure whatever applies to the driver's side should apply over there too. As far as the rail poking up, maybe just hammer it down and weld that chunk of the floor back together. Go easy on me - I overpaid for this car, but I was looking for something to learn on. I think the first lesson I've learned is wait for a nicer car.

The car: 1973 2002. Mechanically seems pretty sound, everything else needs work. The Goal: A nice driver, learn a few things along the way. Me: Limited mechanical skills but willing to learn! Why blog: I'm hoping some of you who might read this have been down this path before and can help me with technical info and/or advice on what I should or shouldn't be doing. What I (and a couple friends) have done in the last couple weeks: Oil, coolant, and transmission fluid changes (now seems a bit of a waste, given what was discovered has made the car undrivable) Removed the interior (save the dash) and stripped away most of the soul sucking sound deadening tar goo. Removed the pedal box. Stood around looking at all the rust on the floor pans, cursed loudly, spent many minutes wondering wtf I've gotten myself into. Next steps - strip rest of the goo residue, cut out floor pans, weld replacement W&N parts in. Then worry about replacing the rusty sections of frame rail, which actually might get farmed out since its structural and shaping metal and welding is still new to me.