Door Repairs

Over the past few weeks I have been working on various sections of the chassis, tidying up areas that I had either not completely finished or had missed. Most of these are small little jobs that needed welding and making good. I also completed the outer sill end on the rear wheel arch. Certainly not worth another post, but they can be awkward to finish off neatly!

Having finished the rear wing and wheel arch I wanted to check the gaps again around the door and the front wing. After fitting I remembered that there was some filler present on the bottom of the door. 

After removing all the filler this is what I discovered!

I thought it best to cut out the worst parts back to good metal.

The rust had worked its way into the main door structure, but much of it was surface with some pitted metal.

But once it was all cleaned and the holes welded up, with a few coats of rust converter it started to look good again.

Then with the primer to seal it up.

Just needed to make a new panel

And start to weld it in.

And finish up.

Now for the bottom left

Template ready

Think it will fit in there

Trying to keep the amount of heat to a minimum to reduce warping of metal

Although the photo looks ok across the bottom half where I have welded, there was significant warping. Many people warned me of this. I had read up on metal shrinking techniques that help pull the metal together to reducing the warping by tightening the metal. I tried it here with a blow torch and a very damp rag. Heating up the area you want to shrink, but only a little. You don't want the metal to blacken if you can. Then you apply the damp rag to cool the area and this shrinks the metal and helps correct the warping.

I think I will need more filler here than I planned but as long as everything looks straight I'll be happy. Which it is.