Stitch welding as seen on TV
Bridging sheetmetal
Stitch welding as seen on TV
Bridging sheetmetal
Most excellent videos.
In reply to fasted58 :
LMAO
"How to Fill Gaps with your Mig Welder."
I need to get my mind out of the gutter before I get banned.
thanks for those videos, that was helpful seeing the guy doing it. When he ways "take your time" with the 16 ga i assume i need to take even more time with this 22 ga. I filled a couple gaps similarly, but i had trouble not burning more and more holes next to the one i was filling, so i went for the backing plate. maybe i need to turn the settings down a bit when filling holes. seems like tight fitting butt joints weld easy, but the edges are likely to melt away, i'm guessing because there isn't enough mass to dissipate the heat? Maybe filling a hole is similar.
I haven't done any welding today, i've been grinding away rust on the inner rim of the fender. A lot of it turned out to just be surface rust that came right off, but some of it is pitted pretty bad. I think anything pitted deeply will just be replaced. Looks like i have quite a long, narrow patch to make and i don't have a 22ga piece long enough. Maybe i'll make 2 shorter ones. I need to buy some more steel, too. I have 20ga to spare, which is good because the floors and inner fender liners and stuff are 20ga, but the outer sheet is 22. I was expecting thicker for some reason, being an 80's truck carried over from the 70's. Fortunately the patch that needs to be replaced will be out of sight unless you stick your head in the wheel well.
Nothing on that van should be 22 gauge. That is tinfoil. Most old stuff is 19 which is hard to get and I buy sheets of 18 to do pretty much everything.
Pete
really? i used a thickness gauge on a part of the fender, it came up with 22 for the hood skin, fender skin (there is a fender frame), and 20 for the rest
In reply to Rufledt :
22 is getting really thin. The thinnest stuff I buy is 20 and I don't like it because it warps all over the place and you have no thickness to clean up wih the grinder. I use 18 for pretty much everything body related. Cant say I have ever measured the tin thickness of an old van!
Pete
I wouldn't bother with 22ga either. I mean, if you have it, and you're just patching the corner of the hood, sure, but don't go out of your way to get it.
is 20ga close enough to 22 to use 20 as a patch material? If so, that would save me some shopping since i have 20ga to spare right now
In reply to Rufledt :
Yup. Welding those two dissimilar thicknesses of metal is not terribly difficult, and 20ga is going to be thin enough to work easily.
I’ve successfully welded 16ga mounting tabs to 1/4” plate, but that’s TIG welding, and it’s a different animal entirely.
In reply to Rufledt :
For sure. There really isn't a rule for patch material. You could probably go to 16ga without issue.
You just have to focus slightly more on the thicker metal, steering your puddle over until it wicks onto the thinner steel, then back again. (AKA the capillary action NOHOME likes to refer to.)
Of course, you won't actually be welding long enough to go back and forth. You'll start on the 20ga and steer it onto the 22ga and stop.
I know more about electricity than i do about welding specifically but i think it's helpful to come at it from that direction at times. The thing that sucks about Mig as far as i can tell (i've only done mig and never had any real training) is that you are adding wire/metal/filler and heat simultaneously, and it's hard to separate them. If you're trying to weld on something too massive you will pile up un-adhered or not-welded filler just getting enough heat into the base material to start actually welding (which requires base metal to melt so that your filler and base metals intermix). That's mostly a problem of not having enough welder. I have preheated things with a torch in the past to do things that my E36 M3ty welder really shouldnt do. The problem i've seen with welding sheet metal is putting in heat faster than putting in wire. Moving the gun faster (welding faster) and welding in very short bursts as mentioned are some ways of dealing with this.
Another way that can help that comes from thinking of the whole thing as an electrical circuit is adding resistance to the ground. If you set your welder to its 'lowest' setting and are still burning holes too easily, you can add resistance to your ground and that will reduce the current in the circuit and take longer to overheat the base metal. The easiest way to do this is to move the ground clamp further from the weld area or onto a E36 M3tier surface. I've also experimented with using a set of jumper cables between the ground clamp and the work piece to add resistance when welding thin metal. You can hook up both of the cables in parallel, one cable, or hook both cables in series to add different amounts of resistance to the ground and lower the current below what the 'low' setting of the welder will do. A little experimentation may find a 'sweet spot' that doesn't make it hard to start an arc but slows the heat transfer enough to give you an easier time keeping up and reacting to it.
Always drooled over this van and glad to see it getting refreshed.
Its a shame that in the process its likely going to be losing pieces of its very retro paint scheme, So you'll just have to come up with something better.
I vote keep it retro styled with all the upgrades (wheels, paint, accessories, etc.)
In reply to Vigo :
that's interesting, never thought of adding resistance like that. So far i've just messed with the dials. I'm not sure my welder is behaving 100% as it should, but I suppose eastwood has a good warranty/replacement plan if it turns out not to be user error. Maybe i'll shoot them an email.
In reply to boaty mcfailface :
It's definitely losing the 5 shades of brown paint job, but i don't know totally what i'll do to replace it. I'm not going to try to "update" the style at all, as that's probably hopeless, so this will definitely end up still looking like an 80's van, possibly a 70's van. I haven't firmed up any plans with style/paint/interior yet as I plan to do rust repair first, followed by mechanicals, THEN paint and interior and stuff, but i'm definitely exploring options and open to suggestions. My plan is make it not rusty anymore, then make it run/drive/stop better, then worry about the way it looks.
The more I look at the wheels, i'm starting to think they are hopelessly pitted and corroded and will just need to be replaced, but i'm definitely putting a retro looking wheel back on. No 22"s with machined stupidity and fake hardware. I ran the math, and with the current loaded weight of 5400lbs (taken through scales some years ago), if it's evenly distributed, then I put the maximum 1,000lbs tongue weight on the rear wheels only , the heaviest still ends up below the weight limit of the wheels made by american racing, the company that made the current wheels. I plan to remove some of the thick, thick oak wood that fills the inside, and the load distributing hitch would not just load up the rear wheels even IF i loaded up to max tongue weight, so i think there is ample safety margin.
Their "Heritage" wheels look pretty retro, mostly available in 15" and/or 17". The current wheels are 15's, I would be willing to go up to 17" but no bigger. I only say 17 because some brake upgrades (parts bin or aftermarket) seem to require 17's for fitment, and I definitely want better braking. Back in the day my dad boiled the brake fluid in stop and go traffic towing our big camper and had to use the trailer brakes to avoid plowing straight into a Taco Bell when taking the off ramp. I'd rather not do that towing a car trailer in the future.
Maybe some old school turbofan wheels... 
No photographed progress as of yet, though I am working on a fender patch panel. I did, however, teach my wife a bit about MIG welding and she made a really nice coat rack.
I put the hooks on. That's why they're crooked :(
Rufledt said:
With my jeep sheet metal project pretty much done except for paint (i'll update that thread at some point I promise), it's time to start tearing into cars.
Lies!
Crackers said:Rufledt said:
With my jeep sheet metal project pretty much done except for paint (i'll update that thread at some point I promise), it's time to start tearing into cars.
Lies!
Been wondering what became of that little project. Is it "running" yet?
Pete
"at some point" can be a while 
Basically i got the metal work part done but not before fall hit and it got too cold to paint. It "runs", drives, and even steers VERY smoothly thanks to a sort-of-bushing thing I made. It's just too cold to paint and too cold for kids to be playing outside. I'll probably update the thread and make more videos when the weather heats up, for now it's just sitting in the garage on end with stuff stacked on it.
Been thinking about Arlen Ness since you started this project. What's a little more metal work?
Ok fender patch time. If you remember, the fender lip looks like this:
But under the lip looks like this (after some grinding)
Still gross. It was getting thinner and thinner, i'm just going to cut out the nasty and try a patch. I put some duct tape over the area i want to patch, drew some fancy lines on it, and cut out a piece of sheet:
The long ovals are where the mounting holes go, the line along most of it is where the metal wraps around the fender creating a soft bend. It's not perfectly straight, but straight enough that i could make the bend with the vice (not the brake). the bend fades as it goes to the right side of the piece.
Some stretcher/shrinker/hammer action and it's starting to bend around:
More fiddling and i got:
It's getting there:
Still more fiddling to make it fit better before i get to cutting and welding, but i ran out of time again. My wife was sick this weekend so i spent extra extra time inside helping out around the house. Small, consistent progress is better than nothing, though.
Any other pointers in shaping that piece?
Shrinker-stretcher?
One of the more oft used tools when doing bodywork.
If you have a channel like this:
Tiy can strech the edges to make it curl
Which is handy when you want to make a more flowing patch panel. This is for the back corner of the engine copartment where you have to cut out a gusset to make room for a V8. A flat piece of tin can do the job easy enough.
Or you can blend it in
Pete
Rufledt said:In reply to boaty mcfailface :
It's definitely losing the 5 shades of brown paint job, but i don't know totally what i'll do to replace it. I'm not going to try to "update" the style at all, as that's probably hopeless, so this will definitely end up still looking like an 80's van, possibly a 70's van. I haven't firmed up any plans with style/paint/interior yet as I plan to do rust repair first, followed by mechanicals, THEN paint and interior and stuff, but i'm definitely exploring options and open to suggestions. My plan is make it not rusty anymore, then make it run/drive/stop better, then worry about the way it looks.
That seems like a good excuse to learn to do some nice 70's panel painting.
That's pretty rad, for sure, but i don't plan on ever doing LSD and going to a rock concert in a field, so i'll probably pass
In reply to Rufledt :
Old vans such as yours should be required to have a paint job so outlandish it makes the town drunk want to vomit. It’s just the way things are supposed to be...
Wow, what an awesome project.
I totally agree with your dad on getting a 351. I had an almost identical van, similar color exterior and the exact same interior except without the full length light panel down the center. mine was an 85 with a carb 351. It pulled so so much better than my friends 94 302 which puzzled him as he bought it as a 351 and only found it was a 302 after the crank snapped. My carb 351 got 12 mpg in the city, on the highway, pulling, empty, no matter what, but back in the late 90's gas was in the $0.75 -0.95 a gal range.
The only digital pic I have of it is in the background with my race car. You can see the metallic brown and gold plus the perfect velour interior. It dragged my Miata to Solo Nat's where I lived in it for a week and bummed showers off people who were staying hotels. I pulled my race car with it for a year to Waterford. It ended up succumbing to tin worm here in Michigan, but I sure do miss it.
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