Quarter Panel Rust Repair

When I bought my Ford it came with a lot of rust. Thankfully it came with a few patch panels too. This entry shows how I put these panels to good use combating the rust on my '49 Ford.

The driver's quarter had already been repaired but the passenger side was badly rusted and in need of replacement.

I am not by any stretch a talented or experienced body man, but what I lack in know how I usually make up with in enthusiasm. 

Besides, what could possibly go wrong? It's not like I could make it much worse right? Right?

I started by trimming the quarter patch panel to fit over the damaged area making sure to go far enough into the good metal to cut out all the rust I could.

You can see the trimmed-down panel laying on the floor in front of the tire.

I lined it up where fit on the car and traced around it with a sharpie. 

I took a deep breath and one last look at the rust and went at it with a cut-off wheel. 

With the rusted quarter out of the way I was able to see what kind of shape the inner fender was in. 

Surprise! It's more rust!

Out came the cut-off wheel again and I made pretty quick work of cutting the worst of it out.

I made a simple panel with a ninety degree bend to replace it. I used some butt-weld clamps to hold it in place so I could tack the new steel in. 

My clamps come from Harbor Freight and they work fine. My only recommendation is to buy a few packs because about one in seven are deficient somehow. They're either not square or poorly cast.

Once clamped in I was able to tack it, pull out my clamps and finish weld it. 

Here it is welded in. It's not quite as shapely as the original but it's going to get the job done. 

After welding everything in I went over the whole surface with a wire brush cup mounted to my angle grinder.

Once all the old rust scale was knocked down I brushed on some rust reformer.

I like the brush-on stuff better than the aerosol because I like to see that the chemical reaction is happening. The aerosol stuff comes out like black paint and you don't get to see the change. 

This stuff goes on milky white and, as it dries, creates a black, uniform paintable surface. Once dry you can sand the brush streaks if you want it smooth.

I'm not set up to sandblast so I figure rust converter is the next best thing.

When using this stuff always pour it out into a separate container, I use the lid of a spray paint can. If you dip your rusty brush back into the bottle it will contaminate it.

After the rust reformer dried I shot it  with some black spray paint.

Then I covered that with some Dupli-color Professional Undercoat. 

I like this stuff a lot. It goes on smooth and you can really build it up without it sagging. 

Unlike other aerosol undercoats I've tried that never seem to dry, this stuff dries to the touch pretty quickly.

I went ahead and did the inner fender and wheel well while I was at it.

I let everything dry overnight and was hard at it again the next morning. 

Fitting the panel was a challenge. Getting the panel into a shape that agreed with the body was a trick. 

Once it was all clamped in my gap was too tight across the top. I ran the cutting wheel through it to widen it a bit ad re-tack weld it. 

Here it is all tacked in. I had to cut a really skinny patch for the lower left hand side where I cut the hole the quarter too big. Oops

The factory pinch welded the lip on the wheel opening. I don't have a way to do that so I went back with plug welds and I'll grind them down smooth. I clamped the patch panel in tight to the inner fender and welded through a hole I punched in the patch.

To punch the holes I used this Central Pneumatic Punch/Flange tool. I picked mine up in-store at Harbor Freight for about 40$ + tax. You can order one from their website or pay 15 bucks more at Amazon.com and pay no shipping charge.

When I was satisfied that the panel was in a shape I could work with I started bending up a small panel to fill the space not covered by the patch panel.

The shape was pretty tricky here with a couple bends going two different directions. A sheet metal shrinker/stretcher set would have com in handy here.

When I finally got the metal persuaded into a pleasing shape I got it placed I tacked it in too.

That just about wraps it up to this point. I still need to finish weld and, of course, do a little body-hammer work. After that comes filler, primer and paint. At this point though it makes my head hurt to think that far ahead. Stay tuned for my write up on rocker panel installation or go back and check out my Floors Saga. 

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