Harbor Freight stud welder for dent pulling

[kenz240z]

I've been doing the body work on my 240Z V8 project car. I started on the hood last weekend and after stripping off 9 layers of paint & primer, was pleased to discover the hood was free of any major damage. However, there were two dents on the top of the hood at the nose that were filled with copious amounts of body filler. There was also a crack on the drivers side front of the hood that required a quick repair with the MIG welder. I dimpled the crack with a body hammer then welded & filled it with the MIG. A little work with the grinder dressed the weld down and a small amount of filler will finish it up.

Because there is a brace on the back side of the nose of the hood, I couldn't use a hammer & dolly to remove the dents. So I decided I'd put the stud welder I bought at Harbor Freight to work to pull the dents out. While I wasn't able to get the metal perfectly smooth, it will only require a skim coat of filler to smooth things out. Better than a thick wad of filler!

There was a small dent to the left of center and a larger dent to the right of center on the front of the hood. The small dent took 3 studs to pull out. I started with a stud on the left edge of the dent, a little less than 1/4" inside the dent, and a 2nd stud on the right edge. The stud welder comes with a slide hammer for pulling on the studs. After a few blows on each stud, the dent was almost gone. A 3rd stud in the center finished it off.

The big dent took quite a few studs, but was mostly gone after the first 4 studs were pulled. Eastwood sells several varieties of stud welders, but the HF one is cheaper. It comes with 3 different sized tips and 3 different size studs. I found the smallest studs to be the easiest to use. I used a pair of dykes to cut the studs off and then dressed them down with a grinder.

[kenz240z]

If you refer to the 1st photo of my initial post, you will notice that the paint on the hood was severely cracked. After I removed all 9 layers of paint & primer, I noticed that the metal was slightly rust pitted in the cracks, under the hood emblem and also in a couple of other spots.

To neutralize the rust, I wiped the hood down with Rust Mort. Rust Mort is a SEM product with phosporic acid that converts the rust to a black "oxide" that can be painted over. The Rust Mort must be wiped off with water before it is painted. I used a damp cloth quickly followed by a dry towel.

To help insure the rust won't come back, I applied a thin layer of PPG 176 etch primer. Once the etch primer was dry I sprayed the hood with PPG 182 high build urethane primer. I like to use this as the first primer coat because it goes on thick and will fill in small imperfections in the surface.

Next step will be to sand most of the high build primer off with 80 grit paper on a long board, skim coat the low spots, sand the filler, then spray the hood with high build primer again and repeat the process. After a few iterations, the hood should be as smooth as I can get it. Then it will get sprayed with PPG epoxy primer, the base coat (cobalt blue for this car) and finally the clear coat.

[Reverend]

Nice work mate! Keep it up! Btw. is there any way to install hood emblem (for good) without those holes? mine has none.

[cbudvet]

You did a great job! That looks amazing. I love Harbor Freight. They always have to little gems of tools that do great jobs without breaking the bank. Also, if you get mad and throw a tool across the garage and break it, replacing it isn't that big of a deal.

Good job with the car.

carl

[kenz240z]

Thanks, guys! I'm planning to start on the doors today. The ones on the car are rusted through and would take a lot of metal work to fix. Fortunately I bought a pair of seemingly solid doors through an ad on Craigslist.

Koalia, one option would be to use trim adhesive to "glue" the hood emblem on. Another option would be to use double-sided trim adhesive tape.