2548's Restoration

I prefer to call it the inspiration of desperation. Improvise, use the tools and materials on hand, don't be afraid to goof up sometimes, and refuse to give up.

Next I'll get on with cleaning up the engine bay. The gas tank has to come out. Mine was easy, as it was not being held in (!!!!):



There has been an odd creaking noise coming from behind me, ever since I've had the car. Whenever going over sharp bumps such as a railroad track. Now I think I see why:



I'm not going to be a real stickler for originality, so I want the clean bay look. I used an air chisel to remove the metal straps for the A/C lines and electrical bundle. This proved to not be so wise. It tore away the base metal, and left me with holes to fix:



Here the hole has been rounded and I am preparing to weld in a small plug. Using magnets to hold it in place. Magnets really mess with the welder's arc, so use another method if possible. That super sticky aluminum tape used on A/C ducts works pretty well.



I've used an air powered scraper tool, and in some places ordinary paint scrapers, to get most of the "tar" off. Heating it helps to soften it, using a heat gun or propane torch. Use care; the stuff will burn if you get it hot enough.





Following that with rags or paper towels soaked with mineral spirits yields a clean (?) metal surface.





If you have high humidity like I do, wipe the bare metal down with ospho (a phosphoric acid solution) to slow down surface rust.

Here I am going to remove this grounding stud, which I don't use. Shortly after I bought the car, I moved the battery to just in front of the right rear tire, and ground directly to the engine block. Of course, if you are staying all original, you would not do this.



This tear is on the left side, at the emergency brake cable opening. Possibly damage from a stub axle failure, as the axle opening was a little beat up too. Pics that follow show the repair process, which was pretty easy in this case:











Here is a little tip I learned; if you can reach both sides of a repair, and one is more visible than the other, weld on the less visible side. It will save you time on post weld grinding and finishing.

OK, another departure from originality. I have stabbed myself for the last &%^*$*! time on these things:



I actually cut off a couple of chunks of rubber hose and shoved them on to these brackets to keep from really hurting myself. If you intend to keep them, I suggest you do the same while you work in the engine bay.

Going for the clean bay look, I decided to make new brackets not only for my safety, but because they were ugly. The factory welder had blown a hole through the sheet metal at one of the welds; never fixed it. Been there 44 years as far as I can tell.





Here is my design for the new bracket, with the cardboard template I used to shape it:



Removing the original brackets left patches of rusty metal and some holes, which had to be fixed:











Before removing the old brackets, I measured their positions, and made a simple wood brace to reach from left to right. Here I am using it to hold the new brackets in place with clamps. This way, the new brackets support the engine cover panels in the same positions as before.



A test fit of the covers:



Next I'll scuff up the metal, and grind off any burrs and other obvious defects.





Give it a good cleaning, and apply the first coat of epoxy primer with a brush. It doesn't look so great, but most of it gets sanded off anyway.





Here was a factory boo - boo. The inner and outer panels did not completely overlay, and there was a funny looking gap here. Cosmetic mostly, but easy to fix with a small piece of metal welded in:



Finally about to wrap this part up. The inside of the engine bay is really wavy; it will take a lot of work to smooth it out. Right now I am just going to address the gross issues. This is not the end of my work here, just reached a point where I can leave it and move on.





This coat was sprayed:

I'm loving this thread. Incredibly inspiring - I think I'll have to go take a welding course so I can have some play on mine when I get to take it down to bare metal.

Lot's of great tips to help us rank amateurs as well.

quote:

OK, another departure from originality. I have stabbed myself for the last &%^*$*! time on these things:

Oh man! I feel you bro! Can't tell you how many times I stabbed myself or nearly lost an eye on those damn things while refinishing my engine compartment. I came really close to cutting/grinding off the point, but ended up zip tying a bundle of rags on each one.

UFO, with some 95 changes from stock in our Pantera, I never criticize anothers' work, but I do sometimes suggest more.... like cutting the under-engine crossmember & e-brake bellcrank support loose and making them removable. The first time you need to pull the oil pan and run into that welded-in-place crossmember, you'll wonder why Ford never did this. DeTomaso did make those parts removable, once he regained control of his project. Each car has slightly different dimensions between the rails, so either a custom piece or shim to size. I made my bolt-in crossmember from a 2-1/2" OD thickwall aluminum pipe. Others have modded the stock part or made a billet aluminum structure.

OK Boss, it's on the list! I've already done the e-brake mod. I'm waiting with the cross member till near the end, so I get all the rest of the suspension mounts repaired and assure their proper location. Rodney.

Looks great. Keep up the good work.

Next I’ll show the repairs needed around the windshield. This is all rust repair, and it involves pieces of several panels. Here is what I found after taking the windshield out:







This brazing and lead work appears to be original, where the very tops of the A pillars meet the roof; I’ll leave it alone if I can:





These rust holes are along the roof line, and I have put marker dots on each spot weld I have to drill out:













Now I have cut the welds and cut out the rusty strip of metal. About 2/3 of this upper channel at the roof line needs to be replaced. It is easier to smooth a weld at a sharp bend, so I cut right along the front most edge:



It is good to see the rust had formed from the outside in. Once I scuffed off the surface rust on the inside, the remaining metal is in pretty good shape.



There were a few places where the rust had pitted the roof panel badly enough I did not think I should leave it. Here I’ve cut out a segment, and am preparing to weld in a patch.







Here is something I learned about welding in small pieces. The small patch piece will heat up a lot faster than the big panel being repaired, and it is very easy to blow holes in it. So leave extra metal on the patch, and cut it off after the welding is done. Some times, it is not possible to do this, but it helps when you have room to do it.

Here I am fitting the repair piece in the windshield channel up by the roof:















Here is another rust pitted area over on the driver’s side. I’ll weld in a strip of new metal:









After repairing the edge of the roof panel, I’ll fit in the repair piece of the windshield channel, and tack weld it in place.







Now normally I would plug weld in a repair piece like this, but in the windshield channel, I decided to tack weld the edge of the repair to the inner frame. I did it this way to not have a bunch of plug welds in the windshield channel, which I would have to finish smooth and flush. I want a smooth surface for the windshield gasket to seal against.

Where the repair meets the roof panel, I stitch weld them together so there are no pin holes to leak. Here I had a bit of trouble, and had to cut out a small section and do it over:



Now to work on the lower part of the windshield channel. This is formed by the rear most edge of the front fender panels, and by the vent cowl. I suppose I could do this repair all in one piece, but that would be cheating. Seriously, if anyone needs to work in this area in the future, it would be a pain to have this all in one piece. I’ll make the repairs to match the factory panels, and leave a small gap in the channel for water to drain away.





Much like along the roof, the rust has damaged the channel and the edge of the panel. Here the channel and fender are cut apart:



The spot welds are located and cut out:





Here the damaged edge of the fender panel is cut away:



I have adhesive tapes of various widths, they help guide me to make a uniform cut. It is much easier to make repair pieces of uniform size.





A small segment of the cowl is rust pitted, and needs to be replaced:





After welding and smoothing, I have solid metal to work with:



Next I’ll weld in the repair piece on the fender:











Ok, almost done with this area. Notice how the repairs of the fender and cowl sections are separate, as original. If this area ever needs work again, it will be much easier to do. I will leave the small gap as a water drain.







Only the very bottom of the A pillar part of the windshield channel was rusty. Thanks for small favors. This patch segment was welded in here:



The repairs on the right (passenger) side will have to wait. My right front has both rust and accident damage. It will be one of the last areas I repair, and I will complete the windshield channel on that side as part of the over all work on that area.

Wow! Great work - very impressive.

You are making me feel bad. I need to get out to the garage RIGHT NOW, and get back on my project!

Rocky

It will still be there tomorrow. Rod

The right front fender is the only panel that has to come completely off. There are plenty of clues that this car has been hit here at least once:







I can see there is a LOT of bondo here. Normally one would sand or grind through it, but I chose not to do that. I figured that would take a lot of work, time, and create huge amounts of dust. Also, I could have just cut off the whole panel bondo and all, but I could see that major portions of the panel could possibly be saved. I wanted to get most of the bondo off so I could see where the serious damage was.

It is fortunate that I can get to both sides of the panel in most areas. I used a propane torch to heat the inside of the panel. This causes the bondo to soften and release it’s bond to the metal. Of course, I can’t heat the whole thing up at once, so I used cabinet shims to wedge the bondo off a little bit at a time.









Maybe there should be a prize for the biggest slab of bondo ever removed from a deTomaso:



This is what was underneath:



Be careful when using a torch to heat things; some will burn:



This filler panel between the A pillar and the fender panel I call a contour filler. I can see this was damaged and brazed back on in the past, but I have to be cautious here. The fit of the fender with the door was reasonably good, so I can say that this past repair, although ugly, was fairly well done. I may end up leaving it if I do not find any structural damage.



Next I’ll remove the rest of the bondo and see if the fender can be saved:









This part, I don’t think I can save:



This clue makes me believe this car has been hit at least twice here. Not only is the replaced fender damaged, but the original metal that it is brazed to is badly damaged also:



Here I am separating the fender from the contour filler:



I tried to melt off the brazing that holds the fender on (this is not original, of course). You can see I got it very hot in front of the head light opening, and near the hinge, but I was not successful. I decided to cut the panel off. I used a plasma cutter to cut in the bottom of the drain channel between the fender and the front hood seal flange. That way, I can hide the repair when (if) I put this panel back on.



If I have to use a new panel after all, I will have to cut away the remaining material also.

Here I cut off the area near the windshield channel and cowl:





And finish separating at the contour filler:



After cutting the panel away from the obvious areas of previous repairs (no pics), the panel finally comes off:



More damage is uncovered:





This piece near the windshield channel and cowl must come off:



This reveals even more work that awaits me:



This is going to be fun …. not.

oh my

I can't imagine, it has taken me this long to reply still getting over the shock of what YOU found.

Holy cow UFO... you're rockin!! Very commendable... !! And...yes...I do believe you get the award for the biggest slab of bondo. You can call it your "lightening" project, as you likely will take 30lbs out of the car by the time you are done...

Great work man...! Keep it going. Now I have to get out in the shop and try and be as productive..

You, sir are a real craftsman! (And stubborn, too!) My hat is off to you.

This series shows why ANYONE contemplating buying a Pantera desperately needs a 'Paint thickness gauge' (aka Bondo-meter).

Think though Boss - the more people pulling mass bondo / bog out of these cars like this only makes the marque better in the long run again...

I'm seriously contemplating doing some courses to learn how to work panels so I can do this sort of work myself on cars. My biggest source of frustration with my project so far because its my first ever car project is just not knowing stuff...

Next I’ll show some of the work needed on the floor pans and under chassis stiffeners. This was damage from rust and some improper jacking. I also repaired holes left by the installation of some non-stock seats.

Here is inside left floor, after removal of carpet and pad (well, what was left of them; what a nasty job that was):



Outside, same area:



Most of the rust through was in these two areas:



Fortunately, most of the damage was out in the open, areas where there is only the one layer of metal. Not here, however. This rusty patch extended across one of the stiffeners, so I had to locate the spot welds and cut them out:



Here you can see the one area repair tacked in, and the other yet to do. Also see the jacking damage to the outer stiffener:



The right side does not look quite so bad from outside, but it has a lot of pin holes.



Here is a series of pics of the jacking damage on the chassis stiffeners, and the work needed to repair them:





















I used the plasma cutter for most of the work removing the rusted patches and the bent stiffeners. Since I wanted to reuse the stiffener pieces after straightening them, I had to find a way to cut the damaged bits out more or less cleanly. Here is how I guided the cutter along the corners and bends. A small piece of wood, a hole drilled through for the cutter tip, and a groove ground along lengthwise guides the cutter tip. Obviously they don’t last very long, but so easy to make, just throw away the burnt up one and make another. Works surprisingly well:



Here is a little patch to cover some holes from a prior seat installation:





I could have fixed this on the inside of course, since it will be covered with pad and carpet no one would see it. Just decided to do it here while I had access.

Here is more of the stiffeners repairs in process:







I’ve cut out the rusty patches on the right side; funny how the rust damage is almost a mirror image of the left side. Must be low areas where water collects:



Some of the smaller patches I made, and welding them in:









A few more pieces to go:





Looks like Dr. Frankenstein has been here:



But hey, my quality control inspector approves:



My spider died and my toad moved out. Tough to find good help these days.
Rodney

I am happy when I did my car, it had very little rust.

When I repaired mine I made the replacements from 14g. I also put some inner supports with slots in case moister gets in.

I have no intention of jacking up the car here but in case someone does down the road it should be a little more stiff.

Alright UFO...now I'm just getting plain jealous..!! You're making impressive headway. Keep it up...!!

Thanks, guys. I have been following your work also with keen interest. Comp; why did you weld nuts to the back side of that sill stiffener panel?

quote:

Originally posted by UFO-LOW:
Comp; why did you weld nuts to the back side of that sill stiffener panel?

I figured when the car was on the rotisserie it was the best time to set up a belly pan. I mounted nuts all over the belly and built a belly pan.

While you are doing this kind of work, there is one mod I really like. Look toward the bottom of the page where I mounted large eyelets through the frame:

http://www.rc-tech.net/pantera1/valance/valance.htm

I have already had a chance to use them easing the car off the trailer at the interior shop. The ramps were not that great and this was a great point to attach the cables to. BTW the airbags were very helpfull for ramp clearance:

Wow, I see!

Really, I have both yours and Rob's threads in my favorites; I refer to them often.

I hope other owners will benefit from my work as I have from yours. I'm just way behind on my posts. I'm making a point to get caught up; I have lots more to share. Rod

On to the door frame surround on the left. Bad rust under the trim:







Just a little note about the weld in that last pic, between the rusty patch and the rivet hole. It looks like a butt weld, but it is not; it's a lap weld. More on this in a bit.

The rust on the edge where spot welds are is so bad, I can't see where the welds are. So, I went to the inside and scuffed the paint off so I could see them:



I still cut them on the outside however. Here I cut a small part out to see how the inside structure was made. The inner sill is kind of folded back around and spot welded to the inside of this rusty piece, but up closer to the roof panel. If you look closely, you can see the spot weld divots. If I cut any closer to the roof panel here, I will be cutting into it. This gives me an idea; I can use that inner panel as a guide for my panel nibbler's jaws. It will guide me to cut away just the right amount of this rusty metal:



Here you can see this worked pretty well:







I had to finish up at the fore and aft ends with a dremel. Finally the rusty strip comes off:



Again I am fortunate that the rust formed from the outside in. The inner structure is solid:



Pay attention when you make the repair pieces; this is 16 gauge steel:



Now to fix this bit. Cutting in tight corners can be difficult. I actually save my cutting discs when I have worn them down to 1 or 2 cm. in diameter. I use them in tight spots like this. I only get a few seconds of use before they're gone, but they do the trick.









See what I mean about this being a lap weld. Again, I’m lucky that the rust has only affected the outside; the inside is solid. I can clean this up and weld in a small patch:





Making the patch and test fitting:





Finally the pieces are clamped in place, tacked, welded, and smoothed:













Needless to say, I will NOT be using pop rivets to hold the trim on. I’ll use low profile stainless button head screws.

Here is something I did not expect: the smallest pieces are the hardest to make. Without the special tooling the factory had, it is really difficult to copy some of the complex shapes, bends, curves, and folds of the factory pieces.

Here is one of the most complex areas of the whole car; what I call the upper B pillar junction. This is where the heavy structure of the lower B pillar ends, but a smaller section extends up to the roof line. It forms the frame of the cockpit back glass, the rear quarter window glass, and the upper back part of the door frame. The top fore-most part of the rear quarter panel, the top of the cosmetic door striker panel, the inner panel facing the engine bay (the one just above the gas tank), the rear wheel house longitudinal stringer, and the firewall cross member (with the upper seat belt fasteners), ALL come together in this area. It is very prone to rust. I have over 100 pictures of the work on just this area.

First to get the lead off:















Starting to see the metal, and rust, under the lead:







Now to cut out the rusty parts, bit by bit:











About 3 inches of this inner panel, below the quarter window, has to come out too.



I try to cut panels between spot welds, it is easier to put them back together that way:



I have to cut through these panels in my way, to fix the structure underneath. I spend quite a lot of time looking at this, to minimize collateral damage. If possible, I want to put these cosmetic pieces back on.



This corner where the cockpit back glass fits is trashed too:



Finalizing the cuts:













And it is off:





This piece I will clean up and reuse:





Next episode; cutting out the rusted structural parts. Stay tuned!

Damn impressive work there UFO! Sure wish I had your skills. Loving this thread!

Rock and roll UFO...!

If you are getting that deep into your doors it is wrth putting the door on to get proper fit. Look at how I refit the door jambs:

http://www.rc-tech.net/pantera1/door/door.htm

Thanks again guys! I will be re-fitting the doors, since mine were so rusted out I got a different pair from King. I read your posts a while back, and will read up again when the time comes.

If you have never had to repair this part, these pics should give you an idea of what you are in for. It will give you one of those “what were they thinking!?” moments. Here are four strips of light metal, two of which extend down to the top of the B pillar. Open to the rear where the tire can throw rain water, salt, and road trash at them. Just behind is a stamped in welding access hole that looks like it was designed to catch said trash, and trap it inside the structure where it can do maximum damage. Ye Gads!

Here I have already scuffed off the worst of the rust, and I have to ink mark the spot welds just to see them:















Now I have that junk out of the way, I can start cleaning up this area:



And get an idea of what this weldment looked like originally:







See where I have started to cut these pieces out:





Once you get the rusty junk out of there, and clean up the rest, it starts to look more manageable.





Here is a cross section cut of the vertical B pillar extension:



Another tip; keep all pieces of the damaged parts you cut out, no matter how bad, until the repair is completely done. They give valuable clues to guide you in reconstructing the parts. Even if you do not copy them exactly, in many cases I haven’t, they show the intent of the designer. Some times you can simplify, or even correct a weakness in the design, and keep a problem from occurring again.

Next episode: making the repair pieces and welding them in. Stay tuned!
Rod.

Now for the fun part - putting it back together again. As I mentioned, there are 4 pieces to this weldment. I cut them off at different lengths, partly because that was where the damage was, and partly because it makes for easier repair. I labeled them and used a piece of tape to copy them. The tape is cut at the edge of each piece, and marked with a sharpie pen at the major bend(s):









Here are the repair pieces in rough form. Yes, it took a few tries to get them right. Notice on #4 for example, I left extra width so I could get a grip on it with my stretcher jaws. Cut the extra material off after I got the bend right:



This piece I will be saving, but I have to cut off this bit of rusty flange so I can make a new one:





The first piece to repair is the top of the cockpit cross member. I decided to do away with the pinch weld flange, as it really does nothing useful. The back glass gasket has plenty of flange to hold on to, and in this tight corner the flange kind of does more harm than good. If I find later that I need it, I can easily weld on a piece to replicate it:







Next to make a new piece for the inside of this flange; at the bottom of the rear quarter window opening:









While I’m in here, I am going to make a shield for this big hole. I brushed and vacuumed out the crud, and thankfully found no serious rust inside. I trimmed a bit off the flange, then fitted a simple metal shield:





I just want it to keep most of the crud out, but allow air in for evaporation. It is held with a single self tapping metal screw from below. I’ll spray some undercoating in the area later.

Here I have trimmed this inner panel flange piece and adjusting the fit:



This area is not easily seen, so I do not worry too much about making it pretty:



Now to weld it in:







Next to start repairs on this weldment. Starting with piece #2, it is the first one to attach back on to the upper B pillar. That little hole is original, from one the rivets that holds the trim piece on. It is a pain in the butt; I either have to leave it or recreate it. I chose to leave it, and I have to be careful about welding near it.











Here I pause to test fit the quarter panel piece I cut out of the way earlier. It hits the edge of piece #2 just a bit, so I’ll trim #2 off a tad.







Back to welding:



I had to use a small screw to align the rivet hole in this new piece with the original. There was so little room that a nut would have been in my way, so I used a split pin instead. The screw and pin were removed after the welding was done; they were only there for alignment:



Finally I have enough of the welding and smoothing done so I can spray some zinc primer in there:



Now to prepare the quarter panel piece to go back on. I welded some backer strips on it:



















After some smoothing, it looks much better. There were also some dent puller holes just below this area which I welded up also:



Finally I have to weld in a strip of metal where the striker’s cosmetic panel meets the door frame; this was badly rusted out:







After touching up a few pin holes and smoothing, I pronounce this job done:





Time for a beer!

Beautiful work! Cheers to you!

Next I will detail my repairs to the A pillar area on the left (driver’s) side.

Here is kind of a “before” picture. To the right is the left (driver’s) door, which is toast. To the left and below are the front fender and outer rocker, respectively, which don’t seem too awful bad, right? Just a few rust bubbles, right?



Wrong! Here is what lurks underneath:



I’ve already started cutting out the rusty metal, see how bad it gets as I progress:





Here is one of those “what were they thinking?” bits.







These small assemblies I guess are meant to be splash shields, and I think there was some foam or rubber like material in the little groove. They may have done some good when new, but not long before the elements take their toll. Why not put it on the front of the A pillar where it would have done more good, and possibly have been serviceable? We’ll never know.

Next I have cut a piece out of the front fender; not only was it rusty, but the A pillar and contour panel behind it are rusty too.



With this out of the way, and the bottom of the A pillar cut off, even more damage is visible:







Notice the lap spot weld, where the mid-rocker joins the inner front wheel well surround. I had no idea the wheel well surround metal extended this far back; it is a good 3 inches rearward of the door opening.



This piece of the outer rocker / door sill has to come off because it is in the way; I will end up reusing this piece:



With that out of the way, I can cut out the rusty inner wheel well surround metal:



This pic shows the difficulty of repairing a damaged unibody. The floor pan metal above and below the stiffener is the same piece of metal!



The “floor pan” extends in one piece all the way out to join the mid and outer rockers at the flange weld. The stiffeners are spot welded to it, inside and out. If I needed to replace the floor pan, entirely, I would have to cut out all the spot welds to remove those stiffeners. I didn’t count them, but there must be hundreds. No thanks.

Back to cutting out rust and cleaning up the area:







Next episode; making and installing repair parts. Stay tuned!
Rodney.

Rock and roll Rodney....Rock and roll...

Here is my solution for the rusty floor pan between the stiffener and the flange weld. I’ve cut out the rusty piece, and made a replacement that will be welded to the stiffener. It will give me a new surface make a new flange weld on. I tried to make this in one piece, but could not get that curve at the front right, so I made it in two pieces.



This is test fitting and trimming:



Next to make repair pieces for the mid rocker and wheel well surround:



This is 16 gauge steel, so harder to work with. There are some tough compound curves here too:



This is the only easy piece:



Even a small portion of the inner rocker was rusted through, so I cut out a rectangular piece:



and made a small patch:





This access hole on the interior had an ugly rusty patch on the edge. This is only cosmetic, but I fixed it anyway:



I made the patch for the mid rocker overlap to the rear, just to add strength and be sure I had solid metal to weld to. I cut the rectangular piece out of the outer rocker because it was damaged, but it made a convenient access opening to weld through.





Next up; a slight departure from originality. Stay tuned!

...... what..? Departure from originality... I don't do well with this... the suspense is killing me......

Looking good man.

Rodney -

Really interesting stuff. I don't think that many (i.e. hardly any) of us have seen what is inside our cars where you are working - I certainly haven't.

You are a real craftsman.

Thanks -

Rocky

quote:

Originally posted by Rocky

You are a real craftsman.

I second that! Wow. Really impressive.

Craftsman? Really I'm just an 'ol farm kid. You should see what I can do with baling wire and old fence posts.

I have to side track my own thread a little. I had reached the point when I had to install my roll cage support stiffener, and this is not going to make sense unless I back up a bit to explain.
Some time ago, I decided I would put a roll cage in my car. Mostly for occupant safety, but also thinking about possible track day adventures. The SCCA rules describe the requirements, and I also looked at the work of other Pantera owners. (Thank you all for documenting your work; you know who you are).
I started by locating the end points of the main hoop and side hoops. You can see I’ve temporarily installed some of the interior trim. The green marker in these photos is a milk jug cap, which just happens to be 1.5 inches in diameter, the size of the cage tubing:





I did not have an idea how to make the tubing pieces fit, and I imagined that trial and error would take a lot of time and effort, along with a lot of mock up material. After giving it some thought, I decided to try a 3-D CAD model. Essentially, I would make a 3-D model of the car’s interior, and then draw a roll cage to fit within it.

These next pics show the set up of the X-Y-Z coordinate reference. Nothing more than some wooden yard sticks clamped in place inside the cockpit, and another yard stick with a level taped to it, free to move about and measure things.







Except for the mounting points, I did not measure where I wanted the roll cage to be; I measured the constraints. In other words, I measured the things the roll cage would have to clear. One point at a time, I filled in a table of X-Y-Z data points, with notes about what it was I had measured. I suppose this took a few days of shop time, a “shop day” being usually only a few hours a day. When I entered this data into my CAD program, the result was a crude, but accurate, model.

Once in the CAD program, I could model the roll cage, and try different designs. I let the computer figure out the lengths of the tubes and angles of the bends. I bought some 1.5 inch electrical conduit to use for a mock up. The bends kinked kind of bad in the mock up, so I’ll have to take care to avoid that in the real thing. The mock up verified for me that I had a good model, as these photos show:









While doing this I was thinking about the mounting points. Attaching a tubular structure to a unibody is not easy. Most designs use a steel plate contoured to fit on the inner rocker and held with multiple small bolts. I decided to use a different approach; a structural stiffener made of channel steel, inside the rocker. The roll cage will be welded to short segments of the same material, and these will bolt to the stiffener. The inner rocker metal will be sandwiched in between. These pics show it better than I can explain it.

The channel steel stiffener cross section:



The edge of the seat belt retractor opening is rolled in. I had to trim maybe 2 mm off the inside edge to allow the stiffener to sit flat on the underside of the inner rocker sill.



The mounts are two 3/8 - 16 grade 5 bolts at each mount, with nuts welded on the back side for more threads:





Here they are complete, one for each side, before and after painting:





Now, back to where was I? These stiffeners can only be installed with the front of the inner rocker channel open, as mine was thanks to all the rust repairs. Once it is installed, the opening is welded up, and it does not come out again.

Here is the inside view (this pic is the right side, while I’m working on the left; did not get a pic of it):



And finally the installation:





Standard disclaimer of liability: I can offer no assurance that this design offers any benefit or meets any specifications, or is suitable for any specific purpose, yada, yada, yada. If anyone chooses to copy it, you do so at your own risk. Nuff said.

Next episode; closing up the rocker and finishing the metal work.

I'm in AWE!

how about showing some graphics from the model