Front lower wing repairs

[Les]

The weather is improving, and I retired a few weeks ago so it's time to venture into the workshop and continue work on the 2.

 

I have fitted repair sections to both of my front wings. A ready made 12" section to the nearside, and a 4" home made section to the offside. The original edge wire is extended well into the new sections and mig welded at the ends of the seam. The seam itself is joggled and spot welded every 1".

 

Question is..... what's the best way to finish the seam?

 

1. I could fully seam weld across either the inside or outside of the seam, but I don't want to risk distorting the wing.

 

2. I could just lead the outside and seam seal the inside.

 

3. I could use filler, but this would probably crack in time.

 

How have you chaps done yours?

 

Les

 

[AlanT]

Don't weld the whole way or you will be knocking out some ripples.

 

But I do about 1.5in welding at the ends to try and prevent cracks.

 

I also weld between the plug-welds on the reverse side so as to catch the edge of the repair.

I use copper backing when I do this so I don't go through.

 

Mind you I probably have more distance between the plugs than you have.

 

I leaded areas low down, like this one.

 

Edited March 28, 2016 by AlanT

[foster461]

Les, I chose to seam weld the outside seam and tack weld the inside seam every inch or so. I had a hefty heat sink clamped across the seam on the inside while I did the seam weld and I went slowly doing short welds from alternating ends to allow the panel to cool. When I joined the repair panels to the wing I left about 1/8 inch gap to weld in as per instructions from Stuart. After priming I used seam sealer on the inside then the underside got a coat of stone chip.

 

My big fear was water getting into the seam.

 

I did not experience any significant distortion from doing this. I used the off the shelf repair panel on the left hand wing and a home made patch on the right hand but used the same procedure on both sides.

 

Stan

Edited March 28, 2016 by foster461

[Don H.]

Les, here are a few images of how my body guy dealt with my front wings. (This is beyond my time/equipment/skill level). I'll defer to Stuart's answer when it comes it, but for reference, here's how another guy did it. He specializes in British Cars, but mainly MG so take it for what it's worth... Any of the photos should get a lot bigger if you click on them.

 

My wings before restoration started looked like this.

 

 

After sandblasting and cleaning up, this is what we had. Note the completely untouched corrosion perforation on the inside of the patch laid on the outside!

 

 

 

My guy cut out all the bad original metal and the old patch. He welded in new metal and fabricated a new wire bead for the wheel opening. I believe all the welds were butt welds

 

 

 

[Ian Vincent]

I did mine like Don and despite being really careful about using hit and miss welds and not putting too much heat in and using a heat sink bar, I still ended up with ripples. I solved this by bending up a 1/2 inch angle section and clamping it to the rear of the rippled area to hold it flat and plug welding it in place. I then leaded the front.

 

So my advice if I were doing it again would be to go with a joggled section and plug or spot welds and lead the seams.

 

Rgds Ian

[EdwinTiben]

And while you're at it, enlarge the slots to let the water run off better and taking any dirt with it..

 

 

In the right upper corner you can see a front wing with the rectangular slots.

 

 

[Stevecross]

Tried all sorts for this type of work from spots & tacks, clamping a big heat sink & welding putty.

 

IMHO if you want to seam a panel like this then the best option is this.

 

After joddling a lipthen plug weld. end to end to reduce heat build up.

 

Then seam weld couple of seams (about 1 1/2 in.) well spaced well apart.

 

Go indoors, open a bottle of wine and poor yourself a 1/2 glass.

 

Drink, slowly, go back out to the workshop.

 

Repeat the short weld sections, go in, poor again, repeat. etc.etc.

 

Not recommended for long sections but the idea is to leave plenty of time for everything to cool down to minimise distortion.

 

Steve.

 

Ps

Avoid trying to practice the "wine" process before you attempt the work.

Your partner may have put up with your obsession with old cars so far but trying to persuade her that drinking is all part of the restoration process may be pushing it a bit.

[stuart]

This section is always a b*****r to weld as its a long unsupported run but easiest is spot welds as they are small and can be cooled quickly. if you want to seam then short 1" long sections backwards and forwards with heat sink and hammer and dolly to "planish" the welds is the only way and be prepared to take all day to do just this run so you can leave plenty of time to cool between like Steve has stated. (Cant stand wine so I have another job on the go at the same time) once its done then seam seal the inside and I use lead or a quality flexible filler like UPol D

One extra tip is to add a small triangular fillet at the bottom where the wire edge goes into the flat return as this will minimize the possibility of the lower section front end cracking at that point. (Go and look at a line of TR2/3/3A`s at a show and you will see a lot with a crack at this point.)

Stuart.