Metal Working tips and tricks.

Outlaw;n79511 said:
Its nice to be around guys who have their heart in this. I only hope I can get close to the work I see in this thread.
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​There is no such thing as perfect & every great person at their trade has to try extra hard to achieve a result less than truly perfect. Even though that result may not look less than perfect to others, such is the thought & effort level needed to get to such a level.
As long as the main important aspects of metal work come out good enough, proper enough bodywork & paint skills on top of that can result in a finished project far greater than all the average finished projects out there.
 
Excellent thread Chad thank you, I did the same deal on the crew cab i'm doing, the gaps were horrible. All four doors needed it somewhere It is all original g.m. It's funny as I read this I did exactly what you did & the owner of the shop that the truck was at thought I was nuts, Hence why I'm on here & the truck is now in my garage.
 
Chad, in your post #90.1 you say you dont like the ideal of condealing the seam. I get what your saying in regards to trying to fill the seam with weld but are you also against cutting the flanges off the roof and the patch panel and butt welding the together same as the seam on the bottom of the patch panel? That method would be the same as the butt weld at the bottom of the patch panel and there is no options on that seam other than butt weld vs overlap.
 
[quote name=''68 Coronet R/T' timestamp='1451223513']Chad,
Got the shirt a while back and meant to post earlier. Very nice. Thank you.[/quote]
Lol.. No problem.. Hope you enjoy it.
 
Outlaw said:
Chad, in your post #90.1 you say you dont like the ideal of condealing the seam. I get what your saying in regards to trying to fill the seam with weld but are you also against cutting the flanges off the roof and the patch panel and butt welding the together same as the seam on the bottom of the patch panel? That method would be the same as the butt weld at the bottom of the patch panel and there is no options on that seam other than butt weld vs overlap.
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I would really have to look over the seam. if it's just to connect the two panels with a flange. Yes I guess you could remove the lips and make a filler piece from one end to the other but weld the patch on both sides and plannish all of the welds from one end to the other, but I'm guessing that lip is hard to access from the inside. You really need to have good access to both sides so you can put a dolly behind it to plannish the weld and be able to grind on both sides. If you don't have good access I wouldn't want to do it.. If you do have good access expect this to be a really big project. but what does that pinch weld attach to on the inside? is there a 3rd panel that attaches to it at some point?

Overall to this type of project right I see it being a really big job.. The idea of just welding that seam shut seems really bad to me. I wouldn't want to do that, it makes for a stress zone that is going to be likely to crack.. However removing the lips from both panels will also take some of the strength out of it.

Also if you plan to just cut the two flanges out and weld the two panels together. It may not even be that simple. the front edges of those two panels will be radiused where it transitions into the flange. those two panels need to be flattened to a perfect fit so that way you don't have to fight additional warpage, These two pieces really need to be perfectly flush with each other from one end to the end. Meaning that you should be able to put a straight edge against the two panels and there shouldn't be any discrepancies in height from one to the next so that way you have a smooth transistion and also a easier weld seam to plannish after its welded together.

Let's also not forget about the pull you will have from the weld itself, this will need to be relieved which is where the plannishing comes into play, f you don't do this fairly evenly from one end to the other you will also have more warpage to fight..

Is it feasible. Sure.. But is it worth all of the work to do it right?? Well that's up to you.. To me I wouldn't want to do it unless you were building a $300,000.00 show truck, with a fully custom built frame from scratch etc etc.. Otherwise I think this is just one effect that will be out of place.
 
Also keep in mind as I write this I can't stand the weld seams on the 57' chevy we are doing, the panel in front of the trunk, where it seams to the quarter panel. It welds to a inner support and the quarter panel at the same place. This isn't much different than what you are looking at doing on your truck and that is also factory.. I just don't like it. Any seam like that is bound to have a failure eventually. All we can do is try to do our best to make it so it doesn't happen.. But the idea of adding another stress point like that just doesn't make much sense to me. This is why I prefer a seam such as what a 69 Camaro would have, (similar to what your roof seam is) it has two panels with a flange and a spot to seam seal which gives a point for stress relief of the panel vs trying to layer them all together.
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Basically You are just adding another point of vulnerability where I would try to remove them.

Hope that all makes sense to you. I am a little tired and it's late.. lol.
 
It all makes sense. Thanks for the time you took to go into more detail. I can get to the flanges on the inside of the cab but I cant get a mig in there to make those spot welds. I might be able to get a tig gun in there with a short stick, but not sure how tig and spot welds would work out.
 
Awesome,,totally Awesome. Got to love them jack stands, most stable stands I ever seen. Would be nice to have a set with dollies too.
 
Outlaw said:
Awesome,,totally Awesome. Got to love them jack stands, most stable stands I ever seen. Would be nice to have a set with dollies too.
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Should have made these stands years ago.. It makes life much easier, especially when you don't have a hoist!
 
Lookin great Chad, you're way ahead of me.

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Yea, it looks like I'm a few steps ahead.. You may have time to catch up though, I think I am going to switch projects shortly.. Probably by the weekend.
 
Chad.S said:
If you look up at both panels, you can see how much of a difference a good fitting patch vs. a mediocre patch makes in the whole project, I can't emphasize fitment enough here.


Also you will notice that I use a lot of clamps when working with metal. I need a good variety and a place to put them, I got tired of digging through drawers looking for one specific clamp. So I made this rack and it's been a major time saver. Organization is just as important as fitment in my mind, however you don't need the organization to get the fitment, it just helps. lol.
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nice! I want one
 
Chad, when you talk about hammer welding, how much difference does it make if the weld is hot or cold?
 
I always hammer them cold, when they are still hot they are still shrinking, plus it's not consistent because it will cool as you work it.
 
Doing it hot is faster, but no control. Cold working is much nicer so see the process. People invariably go too far anyhow, even cold, that is why I do not recommend doing it hot. Besides, you have to grind off any build up before you planish or you introduce even more inconsistencies into your panel, and in that amount of time, the panel is cool enough. Lets say you didnt add any filler, well just wait a few seconds and don't be in such a hurry. Take your time, and you will have a better result every time.
 
Marty Comstock said:
Doing it hot is faster, but no control. Cold working is much nicer so see the process. People invariably go too far anyhow, even cold, that is why I do not recommend doing it hot. Besides, you have to grind off any build up before you planish or you introduce even more inconsistencies into your panel, and in that amount of time, the panel is cool enough. Lets say you didnt add any filler, well just wait a few seconds and don't be in such a hurry. Take your time, and you will have a better result every time.
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The funny thing is that since I am still fairly new to this, I learn a little bit more every time. There's a lot of fine tuning of your methods in doing this.

It took me a while to figure out when to grind vs just going straight to planishing..

Typically I also always add a little filler, even when it's a perfect fit, I add a little filler here and there, I just seem to get a better finish when I do it this way.

I've also played around with using the E-Wheel instead of plannishing with a hammer when the panel allows. That works really well also.
 
Well I'm on my way to eliminating the lapped seam on the aftermarket quarter panels.for the '57. Not sure how I want to weld up the patch pieces though. I can do the tack, grind, planish, repeat MIG method or the speed fusion weld TIG method. I've only practiced the TIG weld recently and am pretty sure I could do it, but the fitment must be perfect or else I get blow through.

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