The Rusty Roller Coaster. Unusual Good News!

[zKars]

Something this rare and un-exected needs to be shared.

Going up the hill to happiness:  Working on stripping down a friends 72 to send it to the paint shop. Car is really nice everywhere, no reason to expect much rust. Engine bay, frame rails from the outside, battery tray, dog legs, all clean. 

Going down the hill to hell.  Finally get to tearing out the interior, floor mats, padding, then some kind of PO applied black tar like sheeting, seems like half sound deadening, half dampener, and when I pull that up, what do I find?  Fibreglass!  GD Fibreglass applied edge to edge, front to back, covering the entire floor. Both sides/. Oh wonderful, I know EXACTLY what this covering..... And how the hell do you remove 4 square feet of fibreglass? Grind, dust, huge mess, that's how.

Going back up the hill of happiness again. First I dig around the fibreglass edges that curl up the sides, seeing if I can lift some of it and get a look at the mess underneath. Hummm, edges lift pretty easy, little pounding, little prying. 

Well long story short, I got the entire passenger floor cover off in about 6 pieces in 15 minutes. Thank god they didn't clean the floor properly before laying that 'glass.

And loe and behold, what catastophe were they hiding under all that fibreglass?

Damn near nothing but clean metal!!!!! Except for one hole at the end of the frame rail and a couple of holes up at the firewall seam. Nothing a little newspaper and duct tape can't hide! I mean, fix, yeah, fix....

I cannot believe my eyes, or my luck. Here's hoping the driver side is not much worse. 

Now that I'm pushing my luck, I hope the sun roof hole plugging goes as well.

Edited October 19, 2017 by zKars

[Captain Obvious]

New product!! The marketing dept. sees Lightweight Fiberglass Replacement Floor Pans!!   

You've got the mold, right??

Edited October 19, 2017 by Captain Obvious

[siteunseen]

1 hour ago, Captain Obvious said:

New product!! The marketing dept. sees Lightweight Fiberglass Replacement Floor Pans!!   

You've got the mold, right??

I swear I was thinking of doing this under my passenger's seat. The heater valve leaking plus that doors foam being ripped has rotted a hole under there. That was my easiest solution I could do by myself,  lay down some fiberglass cloth to cover the hole. Wondered if I should lay it inside or underneath. I need to kill the rot asap with some SEM rust inhibitor.

 

[grannyknot]

The previous owner was thinking, 'preventive maintenance'.

[Mark Maras]

10 hours ago, siteunseen said:

I swear I was thinking of doing this under my passenger's seat. The heater valve leaking plus that doors foam being ripped has rotted a hole under there. That was my easiest solution I could do by myself,  lay down some fiberglass cloth to cover the hole. Wondered if I should lay it inside or underneath. I need to kill the rot asap with some SEM rust inhibitor.

 

 Home Depot has a water activated fiberglass wrap (PowerWrap) made for plumbing leaks. I've not used it on floorboards but it did work great on iron pipe.

[zKars]

Powerwrap. Interesting stuff. At Home Despot Canada a lousy 2"x 30" package is $16!  Would cost $300 to do your floors one layer thick.

Another product from a different industry applied to DIY and home Improvement. I think that's just Fiberglass medical cast material repackaged (and price jacked up).

Remember the TV ad for the miracle "new" water proofing spray? They huckster puts a screen door in the bottom of his boat and sprays this black gooey crap over it then rows the boat across some pond? Well we know that stuff as good old vehicle undercoating. Been around for years. Put a new label on it, double or triple the price, sell it to home owners.

Now what else do we use every day that could be used in another part of our lives to make it easier? Come on now, use your imaginations. Keep it clean.

[zKars]

While I'm thinking about it, back to that sun roof repair.

 

[zKars]

Well that went well. Love that body epoxy/urethane bonding stuff.

Cut the new roof patch panel (after very careful measuring to get the right section and section) 1" larger than the opening, clamp it in place, drill 24, 1/8" holes and put 3/4" sheet metal  screws in to secure. At this point the whole roof should feel nice and taut. 

Remove screws one at a time, and drill each top original roof hole to 11/64 so the screw won't bite in the roof hole, then put the screws back just biting 1-2 threads in the patch panel so the new patch panel leaves a lovely 1/4 or 3/8 gap all around. Squeeze in a nice bead of the adhesive into that gap (about a 1/4 bead or so, too much is fine), and tighten the screws in sequence to pull the two together. Not too tight.

Squish goes the glue, look for squeeze out all the way around (inside too!) . Clean up the excess. Wait 8 hours. Add a very thin coat of bondo to fill the low spot where the roof patch is located, exactly the thickness of the roof. Sand and prime. Enjoy a nice tight and proper shaped roof. 

Don't forget proper prep, coating bare metal with primer or zinc phosphate treatment. Don't leave  

Have done this with welding, but between the hours and trouble of slowing welding that patch in to prevent heat distortion, I can tell you this method is very strong and much simpler. Not as good as replacing the entire roof, but as long as the tension and shape is retained, then my method is a reasonable alternative. 

Here is a few pics of the process.

Screws in, just catching the patch, nice gap to fill with goo

Side view of the gap being closed at the left, still open at the right

All screws snug, nice even bead of squeeze out.

Full view. You can poke the patch all over with your finger and the roof and it all feels tight. Low angle viewing from all angles shows me the overall shape of roof is totally right. Nothing funky. Just have to be really meticulous when laying out the patch to get the exact same piece from the doner and positioned perfectly.  The car is a 72, the roof patch is from a 78.

Edited October 20, 2017 by zKars

[240260280]

"Mr. Chips" of the car world!

[zKars]

Now I feel really old. Where did you dig up "Mr Chips" from? That's so old it has a beard!

[zKars]

Ok, time to crowd source an opinion. Just what should I do with those screws when the glue hardens?

Remove them and fill with more goo, grind off the heads and tails and leave them in place, or weld up the holes after removal? Or?

Each option has advantages and problems. Ideas?

[siteunseen]

11 minutes ago, 240260280 said:

"Mr. Chips" of the car world!

Goodbye sunroof, Goodbye Mr Chips.