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#1
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how hard to do the floors
I found a reasonable source for new floors here. I can get a full LH and RH floor as well as some of the other bits it could use. My question is, how difficult a job am I looking at? Assume the following:
1. I'm a bit brighter than my dirty old tailights 2. I can hold my own with a light gauge mig setup 3. I have a compressor and metal shears 4. I have more hand and power tools than my wife knows about 5. The kerosene heater will take the garage up to 10C even when it gets to -20C 6. The rest of the body, engine, transmission (4sp manual jealous?) is really much better than I let on 7. I will be able to pull it from daily service so I can do it up right I like too many things about this old sow to part with it just yet Mark '69 230/8 |
#2
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Mark:
You have two choices: you can butt weld all the way round as the sheetmetal will be good within an inch of the bottom in nearly all places, or you can get an offset tool (if you don't have one) and drill holes in the flange and spot weld it in. Best thing to do is strip the interior, lay pan in, scribe around, and then trim to fit, with or without a flange. Much easier with a complete pan that bits. You can bolt the replacement to the suspension locater and parking brake brackets to locate it while working, very nice. Really depends on your welding skills. If you can rapidly butt weld sheetmetal (an art I've not mastered yet!) you can stitch weld it in much faster than spotting the flange. If you always end up with serious warpage and globby welds (my stage at the moment), flange and spot it as it won't move so much. You can grind flat and heavily undercoat (you want to do that anyway, with a latex/self vulcanizing undercoat) and that way keep the floors flatter. Hopefully, it won't take you as long as it did us -- a year on the floors alone, working when we could. It would have been much faster and cheaper to simply buy a floor pan. I'm deciding what to do with the 220D -- if I keep it, I will need floorpans-- the front is out on both sides, and the rear isn't much better. Peter
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1972 220D ?? miles 1988 300E 200,012 1987 300D Turbo killed 9/25/07, 275,000 miles 1985 Volvo 740 GLE Turobodiesel 218,000 1972 280 SE 4.5 165, 000 - It runs! |
#3
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Mark,
It was certainly a fun job, having never attempted anything like this myself before and not having the benefit of a group like this. Just getting the floor plan home in a minivan was an adventure. The parts guy at MB thought I was nuts to take on a job like this. To start with I had no garage and just a stone driveway. I bought several sheets of exterior 1/2" plywood and laid a floor down over the stone driveway. I put 2 layers down, overlapping them and screwing them together. Put the car on the nice floor and put it up on 4 jack stands supporting the subframes. I removed all the interior include accel. pedal, removed (or loosen) undercarriage component that were attached to the left floor pan (park brake, fuel/brake lines, etc). Unbolted left rear subframe mount. Remove lower body trim. I took many measurements and made several alignment marks to ensure I got the new floor pan in exactly the same location. Unfortunately, I was off by less than a 1/4" which created some problems for me. So be sure everything is very well documented before you start cutting. Using a spot weld drill bit (from Eastwood Co), I drilled out all the spot welds. Several panels meet at the rear of the floor pan, to where I could not drill out the welds. Here I had to cut the pan loose. Remove the old pan, cutting it in section amde it easier. I cleaned up the old surfaces grinding smooth the spot weld from the remaining edge of the lap joints. Using a wire wheel on my hand grinder, a heat gun and scraper, I clean all the undercoating (inside and out). Applied weld-through primer to all surfaces to be welded. Using the old pan as a guide, carefully removed rewelded bracket from the old pan to the new in same locations. I can't remember if I removed the rocker panel at this time or installed the new pan and then removed and replaced the rocker. I want to say I removed it before installing the new pan. Removing the rocker require some surgical work with an air chisel. I basically clamped and tack welded me way around. As I recall the right side floor pan over lapped the left. So I welded the holes where I drilled out the spot welds to the new pan. Before I started welding I made sure the door was aligned and everthing look square. The problem I had was the area of the rear subframe mount. The pan was less then 1/4" to high, I discovered that when I reattached the mount. I tried shimming it, but it's something I still got to fix somehow. When I finished the welding painted all that bare metal with Rust Encapulator (from Eastwood) and I sealed all the seams. Then spray several coats of black primer. As I recall it took me a 2-3 months (weekend and nights). Tools requires: Mig welder, hand grinder, air chisel, various size clamps and visegrips, wire brushes, scrapers, heatgun, 1/2 drill w/spotweld bit. That about what I remember (it was about 3 yrs ago). I had to finishup quickly because the contractor I hired, wanted to break ground on my new garage. After working outside on this project I was definently convinced I NEEDED A GARAGE. I was getting to old to be laying on stone driveways reparing my cars. If anyone has a other questions, I'll try to answer them for you. I did take a few pictures that I have to sort through and try to put something up on my website.. Chet |
#4
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Thanks for the replies.
I expect to get the Jetta finished and out of the garage then I'll park the MB and start poking around before I decide. I'm afraid I'll want to pull the engine to get at everything better, then do the centre bearing I was putting off, then since thats out fix the weeping seal the diff, since the engines out, take a look at the clutch ..... I could get really out of hand. Being a perfectionist I tend to get confused by with whats doing the job right and what is really necessary. For those of us in Canada try this link: www.crosscanadaparts.com This stuff isn't OEM but I got a fender for the Jetta and it looks pretty good. Prices are good as well, take their list price and expect a good parts distributor to discount it as well. |
#5
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OK, you guys that have found sources for floors... how about sharing the contact information with the rest of us ?
There is a wonderful book on sheet metal working by a wizard named Ron Fornier (spelling? close if not correct) ..... I am sure that Eastwood Co. sells it in addition to most car restoration sources... The Eastwood Co. has a bunch of stuff in this line... and an exciting catalog.... Also, Aircraft Tool Supply has this sort of stuff but tends to be pretty high dollar tools... but great for inspiration and general insight on how the real sheet metal guys ( experimental aircraft builders) do things... There are some intermediate combinations of tools which might be handy in places... One can do the offset flange( which I really prefer ) (I found my air operated one at a pawn shop for $30 and it will punch and offset depending on which direction you address the metal edge from) and use either rivets or Cleckos... spring loaded fat nail looking deals which will hold sheet metal THROUGH THE HOLE which one would normally put the rivet once you are satisfied with the alignment of the sheetmetal....They will hold FROM ONE SIDE... so great for places you can not get to the other side to deal with . using cleckos or pop rivets allows you to see if you are in alignment before starting permanent installation procedures... I think that mechanical fasterners rather than welding makes much more sense for most people ... including weld lover me...the new rivets/ glues/resins/undercoats/.... just chemicals in general are so good these days.... and it is sooooo hard to weld sheet metal in any orientation ( without warping)... and you may be close to flamable materials which may be on the other side of the panel you are welding to... What is nice on floor replacement is that none of you construction joints should be where anyone will be able to see them.... so combining methods should not be something you would be embarrassed about.... use the best method on each section which is feasible... While welding is favored for many things for many reasons.... properly installed rivets are actually much stronger in the long run in most situations. This is nice since they are also easier to use...... It sounds like from the descriptions that this would be much easier than usual due to the original floors being in panels to begin with... much different from having to choose where you are going to cut out the floor... as with most unibody construction...and that entire pans are available is very exciting...My 1976 Dodge pickup requires that I become a sheet metal pro to fix properly.... maybe that is why the project has been sitting there for 5 years... |
#6
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I got the floor pan, rocker panels, rocker end caps, jack mounts and other assorted brackets from MB. I think it took about a week.
I got most of the tools from Eastwood Co. Like: Panel Holding System - Item No. - 19074 Price: $29.95 Spotweld Drill 3/8 Inch Pro item no: 19017 Price: $ 19.99 Eastwood Rust Encapsulator Quart item no: 16045ZP Price: $ 26.99 Seam Sealer Brushable Quart item no: 31028 Z P Price: $ 19.99 Panelbeater Sandbag And Teardrop Mallet Kit item no: 28045 Price: $ 49.99 General Purpose Pick Hammer Model 158g item no: 31035 Price: $ 19.80 Cross Chisel Shrinking Hammer Model 153s item no: 31034 Price: $ 22.50 The other tools I found very helpful were: Hand grinder with metal cutting wheels and wire wheel, cordless drill with wire wheel, heat gun and scrappers, air chisel, plenty of C-clamps and visegrips. Chet |
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