Skye Poier wrote:
> I am looking for 'how-to' information on repairing accident damage to the
> body. I have ordered the Haynes body repair manual, seemed like a good
> place to start.
Decent book. It's very down to earth which is nice. A
lot of car restoration books about body repair are a
little on the snobby side, factory panels only, and
factory-style reconstruction only, and so on. While we
all want that in the ideal, every dent can't be
a frame off 24 month ordeal.
> The body just below the bottom of the rear tail lens has been 'pushed in'
> from behind (PO accident). I'm thinking maybe a slide hammer will pull
> it out enough to be functional (my main concern).
Slide hammers work, but the problem you will probably
have is that the metal is stretched and deformed so you
won't be able to get it back to the right shape without
a lot of filler.
You can make some gains with careful shrinking with
a torch, and so on. But that is a lot of work....
What has worked for me in the past is to cut seams
into the metal at spots that are "difficult", like
bending or obviously oil canning.
Then with having the area in sections and such, it's
a lot easier to accurately replace the sections and
weld the seams back up, make patch panels, and so on.
So on a straight dent, rather then trying to pull
it back straight as a unit, I'll cut along the dent,
align the sections independently, and weld the
seam back up.
In the big picture, I suppose it isn't as glamourous
as delicately panelbeating it all back to shape, but
as one of those without 20 years of hammering experience,
I can get better results with much less filler this way.
--
Trevor Boicey, P. Eng.
Ottawa, Canada, tboicey@brit.ca
ICQ #17432933 http://www.brit.ca/~tboicey/
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