fbekholden.com

Now onto the top section. There is a subtle curve here which I folded into the card. Hard to see but I tranferred it onto the metal. Rolled it over a piece of 6mm rod in the sheet metal vice. Now you can see the curve which hasn’t translated with my fold. Out with the cold chisel and hammer - only took 1 pass to get it to bend. Same problem when viewed from the top. Same solution Here’s the finished piece

Bottom section.
Tried something different to get the curve in this as I didn’t wamt to stretch the entire piece. Transferred the curve from card to metal and then got the shop press into action, pressing along the curved line It works! Bit of a hollow to sort out but pretty happy for a first pass. Bit more manipulation with press. Finally some spanner work and its a good match.

Before I start to close everything up I cleaned off all the surface rust. Stainless cable in the power drill gets into some hard to reach spaces. Sprayed in some Rust Reformer. Used the new bottom section to mark out with a sharpie and then cut and fitted. Tacked in and starting to fill in the gaps. Copper bar used to help prevent any blow through, but the metal is pretty thick and only had it happen on the corners I couldn’t get the bar on. Final welding - captive nut for the handbrake pulley was tacked on to prevent it turning. I flipped the sub-frame over to do the bottom. After tacking it in upside down, I realise that gravity is a welder's friend! To dress the welds I had to take my jig off. This is how much the upright twisted when released. Outer skin will help keep it in place I hope. Jig will go back on for that job. After several hours of 40 grit flap disk, 60 grit powerfile, die grinder, and nylon brush, it looks (almost) like a bought one.

That's very impressive Scott. Congrats.

Great work Scott. Subframe for my van has similar issues. Not looking forward to it.


FB ute fixer upper, EK van on rotisserie

You da man

Don’t think I will attempt this in one piece


Scott

Piker

FB ute driver, EK van project

Holy crap Scott! Really nice work.

In the end decided to do this in 3 pieces as the paper templates fit nicely on a small sheet of 1mm cold rolled.
And cos I'm a piker!
Traced and cut with the jigsaw, and after bit of work with the hammer/sandbag/press/spanners got this to fit. For the next small piece I added a drain hole for all the water that will never come down here. Might put one on the other side too. You’d think as I have done one side that things would go easier second time round for the main wing - Nup. Here it is all marked up. 5 folds and a rib - easy. So 4 hours later after pressing the rib a second time to get it to line up at the join, and refolding (twice) the main vertical that joins the subframe wall at the top. Prepped to weld Before I started cutting out the old metal I measured across the sub frame walls - 1052mm. This may or may not be close to what it should be (should have asked), but its what it was and everything bolted together so using a clamp I spread it to that measurement. Welding in progress. A few clamps here, but nothing is forced to get the lines right. Lesson learnt from the other side. Plugged and butt welded. The original metal is pretty thin so had to chase a few blow throughs. Bit of splatter too which was contamination from the easyphos I put on the metal to keep it shiny. Forgot to wire brush it off.

After 3 hours of dressing welds, fixing pin holes, breaking Dremel (diegrinder for those hard to reach spots), end result is going to do the job.

Great job Scott. You make it look easy- we all know it isn't though. Thanks for sharing.

Love your work Scott


FB ute fixer upper, EK van on rotisserie

I dip me lid to ya mate, that is some classy work there - you must be pretty happy with your efforts

Thanks fellas. Just hope it fits


Scott