Hello, Wondering what the guy who know what they are doing... would do to this. This is the driver side front fender, inner structure. It is very rusty, and has some deep pitting.... but seems to be fairly strong. (Poked with pick, scrapped.... and stuff) My first thought was to cut the worst parts out, and patch in new metal. After a little wire brush and sanding, and determining that it still had some structural integrity (2wo pin holes, and a thin edge)... I decided to see how it welded. The pin holes welded up easy, and I was able to build the edge up. I still need to grind a bit... but wanted to get some input whether this was a decent approach.
A little history; I dont know what I am doing, but I am going to get it done! I am going to paint it myself. I am looking to make it a nice driver. I was successful in putting a trunk pan and lower qtr patches in last winter... this winter I am attacking the rust in the front of the car.
I was just searching last night for lower fender patch panels. I'm starting at the front and moving back.
James your work looks good you should be able to bend up a piece without buying a patch panel,if you can weld like that you should be good to go. The only thing i would do if it were my fender is paint the bottem of the fender inside and out, under your patch and the back of your patch with 3 coats of por15, por15 doesnt burn back alot along the welded area, after your done welding try a get more por15 on your welded areas,its like Franks red hot sauce i put that $hit on every thing, good luck Greg
Well from what i see in your picks so far so good......first thing you have to do is treat the rust so its dead with products like SEM Rust Mort, POR has a product, i personally like a product by Permatex called Extend......They are all acid based and will neutralize the rust.....some of them need to be washed off some turn into a primer.....On the pitted area i would skim the area with a metal based filler such as Metal to Metal,Alumafil,or similar....these are waterproof and will strengthen the the pits with metal [stay away from the weld zone].....Next i would apply a weld through primer on this panel and the outer skin....Once all the pieced are welded in and completed i would get a can of 3M internal panel coating and soak the inside of the panel area, You will need to move the fender around to get it covered......The internal panel coating works similar to spray lithium grease [but is a wax] it sprays on like a penetrating oil but dries a waxy surface.....Lastly in your outer skin once you a done smoothing your weld the first coat of filler over your weld should be the metal based filler as described above.....too many times you may think you have a solid weld only to find in a short period of time that you left a pinhole and a bubble appears......this will prevent that from happening....when we fabricate and instal panels in our shop nothing leaves without this step being applied.....this is the method i use in my shop and was used on my 72 suncoupe front fender [which is in a still in progress state]
here is a couple of pics from the fender on our suncoupe .....1) with the rusted area cut out and 1)with the coat of metal to metal
The advice in this site continues to impress me and very useful to what I'm doing as well (nearly same deal on a 69 Wildcat). Only thing I can add is.... watchout not grinding too much as you'll remove too much 'good' metal. I use a $20 spot blaster that works great (outside) for this type stuff and only on thicker structural metal. That has exposed some really interesting areas on mine that I would not have seen otherwise. Eastwood has a great rust disolver and a encapsulator - although, I always hear about POR15, eastwood's is easier to use and holds up well and can be topcoated. I like the all metal idea and have used that in the same manner suggested prior to final filling. Looks like you're doing great work.
Thanks guys! I just wanted to make sure I was on the right path. I did the POR15 prep, and POR15 went on well. I made sure to not POR15 the weld areas, and used weld through primer instead. Here it is close to complete
Here is the passenger side.... someone else has been in here! Looks like some yucky welds, and a pile on bondo. Hope the inner structure is in decent shape. I plan to use 20GA the last one was out of 18GA, a bit tougher to form.
And thank Metal Shaper for all the input. I need to look into the internal panel coating, sound like a plan! I do plan to use All metal on the outside of the patch. I used it on the truck pan, and you cant tell it was ever replaced. One thing, that stuff was a pain to sand smooth! Not sure if it was my application, the weird curved area it was on or what... but I didn't really have any fun with it. Since I dont know what I am doing... I plan to break it down in stages. That way my pee brain can try and learn each stage... and I dont get overwhelmed. After I get all the rust out... I need to learn body work.
what you have done so far looks very nice, better than some body shops i have seen.......my direct cell # is 603-361-3180 if you get lost or need advice on the project call me i can help you through it......i am a slow lousy typer
Re: Front fender patch, (New! Psngr patch help needed) ok, A little issue with the passenger side. It has a low spot... I was concentrating on keeping the edges flush, I forgot to check the middle! It dips a little over an 1/8, only in the circled area... the top and bottom are good. I don't have any access to the back side.... what is the best approach to fix it? (And I noticed it after i finished the all the welding and grinding) HELP! James
James; low spots are much easer than High spots so just use a bit of filler. 1/8 inch should be fine. Not what you wanted to I am sure. I have had a couple low spots on my restoration also and it s%$ks.ou:
Yea, I thought about that.... I was just hoping to use minimal filler. I may try again to wiggle something in the hole from the back side to see if it can pop out. I like the high spots better, 'cause you can wack 'em with a hammer!
what you have is too much metal the low spot need to be shrunk out/or the high spot needs tobe shrunk and this will pull up the low spot.......first off before you do any metal finishing weld in your panel completely.....the heat from the weld will cause a certain amount of shrinkage......then attack the distortion.......one way to smooth the panel is to use a shrinking disc as the one sold by wolfe metal fab.........like i said first weld the panel in and see what deformation you have and i can walk you through the smoothing process
Unfortunately it is welded in now, and the welds dressed. (I will get an update picture) The low spot is still there, and it was a little high toward the edges. The patch I shaped was actually a super tight fit... even a bit of a interference fit on a couple of places. I think this messed me up! Anyhow, I don't have a metal shrink'er disk, but I have seen/heard of them. I know a torch is out of the question for someone of my skill level.... but would a heat gun have any affect? Thanks!
no you didnt mess up this is a common problem with the heat generate by the weld.......what is happening is the panel is getting tugged in 4 directions from the weld and is causing the distortion.....if you have access to the sept edition of street rodder magazine i wrote an article in the professor hammer column on this very subject with a visual demo this may or manot be helpful to you.......i know there is an inner structure in the way but i think there is a space between the structure and the panel...there are spoons out there which can slide in there to work as a dolly but they are not cheap....one trick i have done is to take 3/8" flat stock and contour it so it can slide between the 2 panels.......if you can do that then start to hammer direct on the weld to stretch out the heat shrink from the weld [go slow or you will cause distortion from over stretching the metal]....this should aid in straightening the panel....if there is still some high spots that need shrinking take your body hammer and on the face apply 2 layers of duct tape and start working the high spots down.....youwill get the same results as if you were to hammer off dolly
