Rust on bulkhead

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Long way to go for a bacon butty sorry never mind. You ever thought about investing in a mig welder they come in really handy owning a Defender and to be honest don't take that long to get used to, you'll be welding in no time
 
Haha aye sadly :( Well, I have never welded before, and I have literally no money, I seen a cheap arc welder I was going to maybe invest in, but again never welded before, and no idea how to remove the bulkhead, so thought it might be better to have a body shop do it, but even at that, no money for it to be done
 
kmanderson62 said:
Haha aye sadly :( Well, I have never welded before, and I have literally no money, I seen a cheap arc welder I was going to maybe invest in, but again never welded before, and no idea how to remove the bulkhead, so thought it might be better to have a body shop do it, but even at that, no money for it to be done
Click to expand...

if you have never welded before dont bother with a arc welder. go get yourself a nice 150 amp mig. and get practising before you attempt the bulkhead.
 
Job needs to be done, but the truck aint gona fall apart if its not done for a couple of months . Its going to be cheaper in the long run to save up for a half decent mig welder, and teach yourself to weld than to go to a body shop, sooner or later there's going to be more welding needed believe me :rolleyes:

Oh and there's no need to remove the bulkhead to repair the top corners :)
 
Yeah good point :) How long do you think I have before its just ####ed? I have had the truck for a few months now and its been in the same state since I got her, sprayed the visable rust with ACF-50, how long realistically do I have until its beyond repair?
 
kmanderson62 said:
Yeah good point :) How long do you think I have before its just ####ed? I have had the truck for a few months now and its been in the same state since I got her, sprayed the visable rust with ACF-50, how long realistically do I have until its beyond repair?
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it wont rust that quick. now we're getting into the warmer months (hopefully) there will be less salt and general ****e on the roads. you wont notice a great deal between now and 6 months time.
 
Realistically you have up until you fail an mot on them. You know they want doing, it is in your interest to have them done. As long as the rot dont spread beyond the size of the repair panel, you have as long as it takes this to happen. Mig welding is the easiest of the two to do as you have more control on thinner panels. whenever you get one, get an old body panel and practice on that. When taking the old corners off, just get a grinder to it.
 
Ah right great, well thankfully right now its sorn and isnt going anywhere on the road, and will I have to remove the bulkhead completely, or just grind the rotted area our and place in the replacement panel, then weld it with a mig welder?
 
Ah right this seems a lot less of a massive dreaded task now haha :p And yeah investing in a mig welder seems like a good idea, just dont want to botch it, hopefully its good for awhile, really can't do it now, just bought a compressor, spray gun stuff, paint and all that for it, sander etc haha
 
Hi,

As others have said, what youve got is a real bodge and definatley not worthy of an MOT in my opinion. I repaired my bulkhead about 18 months ago after the paint started bubbling on the corners. I guessed it might be a bit more work than anticipated so bought a mig welder for the job. Ive got a stick welder and gas kit, bit its not really ideal for this type of work. I wanted a really decent machine so paid around £400 for a second hand 200A~ 32A single phase machine a year or so old, but you can buy cheeper.

To do the work, i just unbolted the doors, loosened the roof so that i could remove the screen. When cutting back, be methodical, the bulkhead has a series of back to back folded sections within it that are welded together. Cutting back stage by stage allows you to take templates from what little metal remains to allow you to recontruct it accuratley. I thought my bulkhead would be little more than replacing the outer skin, but because of the level of corrosion inside i actually had to cut both corners right back to the wing and rebuilt them.

This was my first bit of car bodywork, but with the bulkhead all sprayed up, the repair isnt noticable. Im sure lots of people are lazy and just replace the outer skin, leaving all the crap inside, but just take it slow, dont bother using rust converters, if theres corrosion remove it now whilst you have access and do it right. Just make sure you waxoyl inside afterwards and you should end up with a great result!!

Even if your a little tight up, the cost of someone repairing your bulkhead will be far more than buying a mig and some sheet. It'll come in so handy for other projects too!

Ollie
 
olmasters said:
Hi,

As others have said, what youve got is a real bodge and definatley not worthy of an MOT in my opinion. I repaired my bulkhead about 18 months ago after the paint started bubbling on the corners. I guessed it might be a bit more work than anticipated so bought a mig welder for the job. Ive got a stick welder and gas kit, bit its not really ideal for this type of work. I wanted a really decent machine so paid around £400 for a second hand 200A~ 32A single phase machine a year or so old, but you can buy cheeper.

To do the work, i just unbolted the doors, loosened the roof so that i could remove the screen. When cutting back, be methodical, the bulkhead has a series of back to back folded sections within it that are welded together. Cutting back stage by stage allows you to take templates from what little metal remains to allow you to recontruct it accuratley. I thought my bulkhead would be little more than replacing the outer skin, but because of the level of corrosion inside i actually had to cut both corners right back to the wing and rebuilt them.

This was my first bit of car bodywork, but with the bulkhead all sprayed up, the repair isnt noticable. Im sure lots of people are lazy and just replace the outer skin, leaving all the crap inside, but just take it slow, dont bother using rust converters, if theres corrosion remove it now whilst you have access and do it right. Just make sure you waxoyl inside afterwards and you should end up with a great result!!

Even if your a little tight up, the cost of someone repairing your bulkhead will be far more than buying a mig and some sheet. It'll come in so handy for other projects too!

Ollie
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice, I'm still just really worried about doing an even worse job, never used a welder before or actually done any body work stuff before, I just have a feeling I'm going to botch it haha, will defanitely look into it though, I think first of all the best idea is to get the paint all removed and see what damage there is, then ill post up pictures and go from there
 
Ah great, thanks thats a big help, did you use the replacement panels on ebay? and do I HAVE to take it down to that state of just the bulkhead or removing the entire bulkhead? because I wouldnt have a hope in hell doing that haha
 
Found a few mates who can weld, so hopefully I dont need to strip the bulkhead off, and I can just cut out and replace the panels, and I'm hoping it hasent spread, gotta get an arc welder though, really cant afford a mig
 
kmanderson62 said:
Ah great, thanks thats a big help, did you use the replacement panels on ebay? and do I HAVE to take it down to that state of just the bulkhead or removing the entire bulkhead? because I wouldnt have a hope in hell doing that haha
Click to expand...

I haven't used the panels sold on ebay (I got mine from yrm) But it's all the same thing really.

And no, Can be done in situ. Ignore the fact that its striped right down it was just done like that as it was in bits.
 
Ah right great, seems like way too much of a challenge for me to undertake stripping it down to bits like that, especially without experience and a lot of rusty screws and stuff I would probably need to re thread, and the screw holes, hopefully the damage isnt too great and i can sort it all now, then fill it with waxoyl
 
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