New old scout 800 project

[Rustbucket]

So, after going to through my photos, I realize, I have not taken enough pictures recently. There are non of my fuel tank mounts or my fuel/brake lines mounted. I have been slowly working on the door jam/sill. So, I will go outside and take some more photos and upload them to prove I am making some progress....

Yesterday I just finished cutting and bending my inner fender (that goes outs side of the kick panel, but above the vent and the top hinge mount gets welded to it). It is a pretty pia structural part of the cab. I have been going really slow with it so hopefully I do it right. In the process of doing this, I threw down for some copper weld through primer. I don't want to have this rust again, so before I weld these back together, they are getting painted. I have some other weld through primer, but it is not that good when you are doing low amperage welding (like sheet metal). It causes too much splatter and gassing in the weld. I decided I would make my gauge cluster removable as well as my dash. So, I ordered some weather proof connectors off of amazon, and they should arrive in the next week or two. I will take pictures of that and post it once it is done. I plan on rewiring the whole thing, but in the mean time, I will make it easy for me to work on stuff. I plan on getting one of those bulkhead connectors as well so I can avoid rubber grommets and cut wires. I think I will go with one of those ez wire kits. They seem pretty good. Some last thoughts on my bend floor... I think I am going to try and find a junk yard bed from a pick up truck and use it as my floor, cut to fit. I don't know... We will have to see.

 

[Rustbucket]

Here is the panel I have been working on slowly.

I started by making a poster cardboard template

I used dykem and transferred my tp, then cut, ground, and bent the metal



I welded and ground along the curved seam.



I tacked the flange portion of the piece to the main body.


...more to follow today

 

[Rustbucket]

Is raining here today. I finished welding and grinding the piece for my inner fender. Here she is;

here is the piece after I finished welding it....


Here it is clamped in place. You can see I will have to lift the inner fender to match the lines.


I May have to trim a little off the bottom. It looks like it interferes with the vent louvres.


I have to grind down some of my plug welds before I weld it on. I also bought some weld through primer, but because of the rain I am not going to paint anything today. I plan on hitting the surface rust with a wire brush on my angle grinder and then using the primer. More pictures to follow.

 

[Rustbucket]

So it has been a few years since I update this build. I have repaired the area around my drivers side floor, built a floor pan for the drivers side, and I am currently tackling my door sill where the hinges mount. I have been avoiding the door sill for some time now. I have recently acquired two (new to me) welders, a Blair triangle spot welder and a Dayton spot welder. This will let me avoid drilling and rosette welding the panels together. It has renewed my enthusiasm to get this project done. I also have some time on my hands with kids going back to school mostly during the week. Here are some photos.

I welded some angle iron on the bottom side of the floor to prevent oil canning, I got over zealous and warped my ned floor pan I had made, so I had to spend some time cutting and straightening. If you are wondering why it is so rusty, well, I neglected to cover my scout this winter and a lot of snow ended up on my floor pan as it was sitting in place in the drivers side. I know, I know.... I have been kicking myself over this already.

Notice how nice and flat it became once I made cuts along the crown of the warping. It practically fixed itself.

 

[Rustbucket]

I have spent the last 2-3 days cutting and welding this door sill. I am almost done. I have a lot of grinding of welds ahead of me, but I am really pleased with how it came out. I used part of a donor sill and new metal as well.

You see where I cut off the pieces I am trying to use. There is a lot of pitting rust on the back side of the green painted one.

I have also acquired a plasma cutter since I lasted posted on here. It makes cutting sheet metal soooooo much nicer. It's just a little Woodward 40 series.

Just a comparison of what I am replacing. All the extra holes are from spot welds I had to drill out to remove the hinge mounting bracket.

So I used a flat piece of brass for backing and plug welded the holes closed.

Now for the tricky part. This is the part of the project I have been avoiding on purpose for, well, years......

 

[Rustbucket]

Part 2 of door sill: The tricky part

I am using a mixture of MIG and TIG depending on how tight the gaps are and following up each pass (an inch or less) with compressed air to cool the metal quickly to prevent warping too much. A lot if this is TIG without filler rod and really low amps because the gaps were so tight. I am teaching myself to TIG so some welds are prettier than others and I also blow through my material sometimes.

This is the backside. You can see how pitted the back of the donor metal is. I just had no other way to make the gentle bends so close together for this panel.

Getting there

My new sander making a lot of this possible. It works so nicely and smoothly and let changes are a breeze.

And this is where I am at. I have more welding to do and grinding, but I am practicing patience so I don't over heat the metal and get carried away. I also have some work to do and replace metal still down at the bottom. I will share more as I get more done.