well, I think somewhere im my first post I made the statement "this things is actually pretty good on rust for a florida truck"
Remind me never to say stuff like that without knowing the answer....
Got the majority of the interior striped yesterday eveving. It wasnt "hard" work but man was it annoying. The seats were all rusted into the floor... the dash wiring is a nightmare, and the rust, oh the rust... NOT as bad as others Ive seen on here but im going to be a sheetmetal worker for the next month or so...
so seats and dash are out
Carpets out and ran the shop vac through it. Also, took the time to make lables on all the dash wires/connections so I can "possibly" get them in the right place later...
Floor boards are at about 70% heathly metal. So untill they get sanded completly down I wont be toatlly positive that patches will be sufficient.
Passenger floor baord and some contamination on the side wall..
Passenger center under seat mounts (pretty much anywhere that had a bolt through the floor had rusted out around it and will need replaced)
Rear passenger floor panel
Probably gonna be completly redoing the passenger side at this point. Driver side is suprisingly clean. makes me wonder if it had been done with the rest of the previous body work.
With the dash out I was able to get a full look at the windowframe and A-pillar... Lets just say the easy repair of the current pillar isnt going to be an option.
Brace Yourself!!! this is for mature audiences only
outer underside:
inner underside:
top: (please be sure and note the rust hole that has been filled with bondoglass, I am guilty of having done this when i restored my VW BUS in high school, I didnt know any better but this is obviously the Karmic forces repaying me for my sinful repair style of the past
)
So I am calling in a couple favors at this point for assistance with the A-pillar. A good friend who is a professional welder/fabricator is coming to help decide where to make the cuts so that he can get the best access when attaching the Donor.
Im going Friday to look at the same Cherokee that the Tailgate replacement from earlier in the thread came from. I remember it having a couple little sections of issue but its worth a look and a fully charged Sawsall.
The reasonto not attempt the welding alone is that the A-pillar isnt a soild structure. Its actually 3 layers and the dip rail.
Heres a cross section of it
If you simply butt weld it in place you cant weld the inner layer... This makes it tricky and is why we are looking for a complete A-pillar/cowl/roof line donor instead of using the half section I currently have and finding the bottom seperatly. There will still be some complicated welding in the roof line section and the cowl area but they are necessary no matter which method is choosen. The complet donor does however remove the hardest weld from the equation
Heres the roof, upper door weld difficulty
In talking with a master sheet metal worker it is possible to use the brakepress, stretcher/shrinker, wheel, and dollys to create the entire A-pillar from scratch. Welding in each layer as you form it. Im not a master metal worker so this is so far out of my comfort zone Im choosing to push for the donor option; even if it takes a while to find the right (clean) donor section. His estimate was between 50and 60 hours of time involved in forming the entire A-pillar, roof line, and upper cowl replacement to the specific needs of the windshield, gasket lip, and body angels. While you may wonder is that even possible..you would be amazed at the stuff this guys creates from scratch.
I will be documenting this process very thoroughly. My search returns little to no availble or helpfull information on this type and level of repair in this area.
Now wheres my gorilla glue???
Kinda had a moment when removing this fuel sender cap. Its the first thing I made for this jeep and at the time I had no idea this was going to be the path it was going to take. It was gonna be a fix it up, clean it up, and have fun in it truck but its just to special to let it waste away any further!
So im gonna work a bit this weekend and try to finish getting the side windows out, roof rack off, steering out, and rear door removed. It needs to be ready to have the Body taken off by the time the next Florida Shop day happens so there are some able bodys to help lift it onto the dolly...
Well, I guess thats it for now. Hopefully Fridays donor attempt proves sucessfull!
Thanks everyone for support, and feedback. I NEED IT!
JP