Help! What is the best way to fix this?

[Cuda Cody]

Taking the advice of many members on this site, I got a blasting pod and used Plastic media to blast some large body panels that wouldn't fit in a blasting cabinet.  Let me tell you the plastic media was awsome!  Not fast, but very easy to keep the panel cool and no warping!   

So now I have this front valance to the 71 B body all blasted and I found that it had several layers of paint and bondo.  The panel still looks fairly solid and usable, but I want to fix the rust areas right this time.  What would be a good way to fix these areas?  Can thses holes just be welded up?  Any ideas?

Thanks!   

[bigblock4speedman]

Grind out rust to solid metel, braise pinholes with HTS aluminum rods, weld in small metal patches in the bigger ones.

[EvilTwinATX]

never used this place www.rustbusters.com.... but the concept is very cool. It might be simpler...

keep us informed about what you do.

p.s. What is a blasting pod?

[Cuda Cody]

The pics look good on the site, but I'm not sure what they are doing?  It looks like all the after pictures have been primed, so it's hard to tell what they are adding.

As for the portable blasting pod..... here's the one I got (from a local dealer),

http://www.mytoolstore.com/cyclone/pt100.html

I guess I should call it a Pressure Blasting Pot.  It makes a BIG mess and is very hard to keep the media in an area, but works very well on big panels.  I plan to blast my projects myself.  However, I will not do it outside again.  I think I lost $100 in plastic media in the grass!     It's best to do it in a area that can be swept up and the media reused.  The pot was just under $500 and a huge drum on plastic media (250 lbs) was around $300.  That is about what it would cost to have someone blast one car.  If you reuse the media you can do many vehicles.  The plastic media is about 3 times has much as anything else.  Walnut shells cost $.35 per pound compared to the $1.20 for the plastic, but the walnut shells will take much longer.

never used this place www.rustbusters.com.... but the concept is very cool. It might be simpler...

keep us informed about what you do.

p.s. What is a blasting pod?

[AARGeister]

Grind out rust to solid metel, braise pinholes with HTS aluminum rods, weld in small metal patches in the bigger ones.

Do you cut out a larger section so you can weld a square piece in?

[ShelbyDogg]

Easy fix with  mig welder, some sheet metal from Lowes, and some .023 wire.   Time to cut out some metal and start butt welding.  Like bigblock said above. small pinholes can be brazed but I don't like torches on large flat panels. It'll shrink right before your eyes.  A mig butt weld can be ground down on both sides to make the patch invisible.

[HemiDog]

You can mig weld the pinholes and smaller holes shut.  Just use a copper block on the back side.  The weld will not stick to the copper, help keep the hole from getting larger as you weld,  and end up saving you a lot of frustration.  When you are doing this, do it like you are doing tack welds to help keep the head down and avoid warping the metal.  Once they are welded shut, grind em down! 

If you come upon a area, such as a floor pan, with a ton of pinholes, it might be faster and easier to cut out the area an weld a patch in.  It is kind of a judgement call.

 

Oh, and if you try to put the welder to those rusted areas directly, it will pop and make it bigger.  Cut and clean all the rust you can out of the parts and life will be simplier.

  , and sand the surface of the metal before you shoot primer.  I never really understood why bead blasted metal is smoother than sanded, but primer doesn't stick as well to a blasted surface as it does to sanded. 

[ShelbyDogg]

Yeah, Hemidog, you can see that he stopped blasting because the hole would have been huge if he waited till all of the rust was gone.  Too big to fill with wire, time to patch. 

Cody. I bought a large flat plate of copper, (palm sized) from the local metal supplier which I use behind flat panels for filling like Hemidog said.  If you don't use a copper backing, sometimes the moving wire will push your weld right through to make another hole. You might want to get a couple to switch with because I noticed it gets very hot after a while, working as a heat sink. Get some curved scrap pieces too because most of our stuff isn't flat.