Patching the holes
Today Dad and I spent some time patching the holes in the passenger side rear sills. Dad had already cut most of the cancerous metal off before I arrived and this side of the car was going to be a lot more tricky than the driver side.
The driver side didn’t need to be cut back as much as what the passenger side required. The passenger side needed to have more or less the complete rear sill removed, as well as some of the wheel arch connecting to the sill. This meant that we would have to manufacture to pieces with very little metal left to guide the shape.
We first manufactured the sill as best we could. Then, we used the driver side as a template to get the general shape of the piece of the wheel arch that was removed. Once we had both pieces sort of looking right, we screwed them to the car and to each other. With a little more work, they fit together well and we decided that they were ready for welding.
Rather than trying to do all the welding in an awkward position, making sure that the two pieces were secured together, we removed them from the car and took them to the work bench. Once up there, the welding would be a lot easier. Once the two pieces were welded together, we reattached them to the car and welded it to the car. In the end, we think that the patch has come together very nicely.
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- So much easier welding on the bench
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- Close up of the patch on the bench
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- The patch welded to the car
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- Close up of the patch welded to the car
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- View of inside the wheel arch