Project 3 from ogorir: floorpan/firewall rust repair

[ogorir]

patch panel in:

you can see the burn-through spots where I welded the supports on the underside (I thought I had a pic of this, but I don't). basically, I folded up some short sections that match the ribs stamped in the floor pan and welded them on after it was in the car. I did this for 2 reasons: A) our brake sucks. B) it's arguably stronger than the original floor pan.

I had to make one section bolt in, as the brake lines are supposed to run inside the car in the bottom of one of the ribs. I welded nuts to the support channel so once you get it up there, you can tighten it all from one side.


this is the setup I used to make that radiused hole. it's 2 big 1" drive sockets, one just fits inside the other. I drilled a whole with a step bit, then used a carbide burr to enlarge it to the diameter of the small end of the small socket. this gave the socket a bit of a pilot to work with. I beat the little socket through and it left a nicely radiused corner. because my hole wasn't round, the edge was a little screwy, so I took a flap wheel and ground it flat.

the beads were put in with a bead roller, the hole I beat around a dolly clamped in the vise. this bit took some work to make the hole the right size for the brake lines to go through the floor.

this last one is (almost) everything welded in, caulked and sprayed black. I was hoping the flange I made to support the corner of the flat panel was going to cover the hole that's till left, but I ended up having to make a piece and weld it in. in hindsight, I'dve made it part of the big flat panel. I think I was trying to use a drop from another panel to make that flat bit, which is probably why I cut it there in the first place.


this is also a bit of an experiment. I used standard outdoor latex house caulk as seam sealer. we'll see how it performs over the next few years.

This is all covered in foil lined dynamat now.

I think this took 4 days start to finish to put in the patch. it took 2 weeks to rub/wax/throw some rattle lacquer on some thin spots, fix this rust, paint some POR-15 on a bunch of other minor rust, put in the dynamat, and run brake lines.