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I'm thinking that I could tack all the sills together, set up door alignment, take it off, weld it all up including the rust patch and then weld it to the cross members, supports and pillars as one piece???

Originally I believe the inner and outer sill, A and B pillar and quarter panel were assembled first. Then they were attached to floor, firewall, beaver and roof panels to form the body.

FB ute driver, EK van project

I can foresee problems with the A pillar with my pre- welded approach. Unless I pre weld that patch to it as well.

There may be a simple way of opening up the back space and the re-closing. Will just have to have a go I guess.

Someone must have done this before surely.

I speak out of my rear here, not having attempted this repair on a ute -

Starting from the outside, you would have to work your way back towards the inside. Let's disregard the tricky bit around the B-pillar for the moment. The "rear door skin" could be plug-welded onto the outer sill by working from inside the sill cavity. If you were doing this on the vehicle the middle and inner sills would have to be absent. Then (in theory) you could attach the middle sill to the upper and lower flanges of the outer sill. With the middle sill in place, you'd then lay the inner sill in position, and plug-weld all three together. And finally, you'd attach the floor pans to the sills.

The B-pillars could be repaired similarly. With a nice big part of the quarter panel cut away (like you have) you could repair the B-pillar bottoms. When time comes to attach the outer sill, drill the sides of the "mesa" in the outer sill, and plug-weld the B-pillar to the sill, working from inside the sill cavity.

You'll most likely have to use a mirror to guide the welding gun.

Or, if you're not scared by the prospect of a looong seam-weld, you could plug-weld the quarter panel repair onto the top section of the replacement outer sill, and weld the two parts of the outer sill together. B-pillar repair is a problem here though.

Rob

Thanks Rob, much appreciated.
Patrick has also reminded me of his approach, which was to use panel fastener/glue where the patch panel attaches to outer sill.(see Gimme 5 years).

One option that would work ( thanks Sasha) would be to slice the bottom inch off the patch panel, weld it to the outer sill and then use the remaining gap for weld access. This of course leaves 2 long welds to do to finish the repair on the quarter panel. I'm thinking currently that this would be worth a try.

Hey Brett
When I did Frankenstein only the passenger side lower rear quarter needed doing.
You can usually tell when that repair has been done because of the difficulty in doing it as you have said, they way you can tell it that the seam that runs between the outer sill and the rear quarter from the B pillar back has disappeared, this is the easiest way to replace the lower qtr section, I wanted to maintain the the seam and was lucky enough to have 5mm or so of reasonable metal on the top of the outer sill and the bottom of the qtr so I trimmed my new outer sill down actually the whole way along from front to back and carefully stitched along and then the same with the lower qtr.

By the look of your photos this may not work for you and you may just need to lose the seam.
Neil

Thanks Neil. I am going to keep the seam and weld the patch in two parts- well I'm going to give it a go anyway

Cheers Brett with what I have seen of your work I have no doubt that it will come out fine, just keep the lower qtr cool when your welding the two piece you don't want to warp it.

Couldn’t you fold the return at say 60 degrees so there is a gap , fully weld it to the top of the sill then fettle the patch panel into position once it’s welded along the bottom???

Maybe Blacky, but it would have to be folded outwards because of internal supports and patch panel bevel is on the inside so that makes it complicated.
I have discovered today that if I leave the rear floor panel off, there is enough access to weld the outer to inner sill together in situ. Reckon I will use RHS on inner as the reinforcement- it would be more complicated again to have a middle piece that needs attaching as well.
B and C pillar stumps are going to take some sorting too.
More thinking to do.... Other life things are happening between now and monday so no cutting before then.

Good point about the B-pillar bottom Brett. Mine is missing the bottom 50mm. This really needs to be fixed after the outer sill is installed, but before the quarter patch goes on. I may end up losing the seam but at this stage I don’t want to. A mate suggested welding the seam from the outside and then cutting the line in with 1mm grinder blade.


FB ute fixer upper, EK van on rotisserie

Thanks Clay.
I am determined to keep a seam and I doubt a cut post-welding will give me the profile I'm looking for. So, I'm going to make a 25mm high cut off the sill end of the patch panel, make a ledge on it with the bead roller in an to attempt to strengthen the join and minimise distortion and weld that on the outer sill after I have sorted what remains of the 3 pillars. Then repair the rest of the guard.

I'm fortunate because I have one of each spare FC guards that are pretty good and another pair off 'old rusty' that can be salvaged. So... if it all goes pear shaped I have contingency.

I agree about the grinder cut Brett. I am leaning toward using panel glue on the bottom seam now, after installing the outer sill and replacing the A-pillar bottom. It should be possible to get the mig in behind and carefully zap a few spots along the edge after the glue has set. I may even use it on the upper patch join as well.


FB ute fixer upper, EK van on rotisserie

Patrick was pleased with it I think, Clay.

A bit of prep work. Cutting away enough to mount new inner sill and A pillar bottom pieces. Looks pretty grim but pretty much identical to how Wilma was, so this time I have a rough idea of what to do. Unfortunately though, I will have to make the curved rail piece from scratch as my only remaining cut is for the other side.
Bloody inner sills were not from my usual supplier and are about 200mm short. I don't know why you would do that, but it was the same bloke who supplied me with the k frame mounting pad that had the wrong angles when I was doing Wilma. Can't blame anyone but me for trying to skimp. On the bright side they were about half the price of the good ones.
Anyway, as with my usual posts, I have an assortment of non-metal in the pics
Plan here is to clip on the inner and then do the A pillar repair, then sort out the other rusty crossmembers and then fully weld the inner in.
Time for a cuppa.

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