April 28, 2003 - Floor Repair

This part will no doubt be a long process. I need to cut out rusted areas of the floor material and weld in new material. I need to either get replacement floor pan parts from a parts car or fabricate something that is appropriate. Here are the first pictures of the rust and the cutting process.

I welded up the lower layer of the floor first, then I tied it into the upper layer. Tomorrow I will cover that over with the top layer of floor material.

This weekend I continued with welding up the floor. I'd already welded in the lower layer of floor material so I began welding in the upper layer of material. This was a slow process as I had to tie in a number of different areas and also lay down a few small patches here and there where needed.

When that was done, I started on the left rear passenger area. I decided to use just stock material for the floor as good floor pans would probably be pretty hard to come by and expensive if I could find them at all. I also decided to not cut out the remaining material but rather to weld the new material to the original. I applied the floor pan patch in two parts so I could weld the edge of one part to the floor and then weld the edge of the second part to first part of the patch. This seemed to work great and I think it will help to stabilize the floor from vibrating and "oil-can"ing. These pictures show some welds missing. They were taken after I had the patches all tacked in and not fully welded in place.

I then tackled the driver's area. Same theory, same procedure.

I've nearly used up the remaining metal from the T&C hood. I am regretting not cutting the entire top out of that car before I scrapped it. The top of a T&C has got to have a 4'x 10' area of fairly flat body material on it!

I also thought I'd show you some of the handy tools I am using for this stage of the project. This is an air powered three jaw metal sheer. It cuts straight lines through sheet metal and boy does it go! It doesn't like anything that has bumps or bends in it but if you have a flat piece of sheet metal to snip off, this is the tool of choice!

This is the little unit that makes it all possible. I bought this MIG welder last fall when I was repairing my 1990 KImperial. It is a very nice unit for this type of welding. It has enough power to weld body panels etc. I usually keep it on 2 or 3 out of a possible 4 power settings and it can easily burn through material at that power level. I hope to get a bottle of gas for it some day but for welds that will be covered up, flux core is fine. They just aren't as pretty is all. My brother-in-law had the little wagon made up for me special for my Christmas gift last winter too. That makes it much easier to move around the shop.

May 28, 2003 - Finishing Floor Patches

Last night my neighbour brought home the top of a van. It would make excellent material to finish the floor repair in the NYB. Not much to say here except that I cut the metal to fit and welded it in. I'm DONE!

I covered my welds with seam sealer and after letting it dry overnight, I painted all the seams and the patches with black paint.