Body Guys, I need help fixing this crunched fender...

4/7/10 UPDATE<<<< GO To post 42

The rear quarter was crunched when I got the car and after just a few weeks on the road I'm already tired of parking it so the passenger side doesn't show.

What do you guys think? is it savable? Should I just cut out the bad areas and patch it back together? Should I put a whole new fender on and if so how do I cut out the old one? I know my body skills are limited but I know there are a few metal magicians here. Thanks in advance.

Edit: forgot the pics

 

i can't see it..

 

few more pics

 

Replace it...there's plenty of them in the junkyards ('53 and '54 are the same) and for sale as parts cars...trying to bang that all out is an effort in futility...

It's not that hard, just cut it where it's factory seamed...

R-

 

start searching for a quarter in the boneyard

 

alot easier to find a donor than to spend days trying to hammer and straighten that out. Finding one shouldn't be that hard. If you have a plasma cutter at your disposal that fix could be done fairly easy

 

the time you would have in trying to straighten that would be double of you just throwin a new quarter on.

you could probably get away with welding it under the trim to save you a little work .. the lower door post is spot welded . and then weld to the rocker and inner rocker

 

I've never attempted a repair like this before. Would I need to pull out the rear glass?

 

i dont kno
i would probably leave it so things dont flex but im let someone else chime in on that one
maybe pimpin paint will chime in he knows his shit

if ya do leave it make sure you cover the hell out of it so ya dont ruin it with the weld spals and grinder sparks.

 

proubably dont have the skill if you never have pried and hammered jacked or chain pulled a squashed panel but if you do attempt i suggest you make a series of template jigs drawn from the good side (supposeing) like 5 or 6 shape guages made from cardboard do this by holding a peice of card board up against the good fender at a measured line ( mask tape lines) on the good side oposite the bad side , do so by traceing the contour of the good fenders profile with a pencil slid alongside the card board and cutting away the passes of lines draw until you have a peice that fits tight agaist the good fenders profile ,... make several of thes jiggs at say 4 to 5 incc label them like A ..B... C or 1..2...3...4 ect
sideways positions and proubably 3 laterally locations mark the bad fender at the same cross lines by measurement at least you can use these to attempt to reposition
the fenders correct shape (right ) i suggest first jacking the fender with a jack ( screw or bottle from inside the car or trunk use wood to ( 4x4) cut to extend your
jack to sideways position also holes may be drilled (5/16) and chains attached from which a cume along can pull the panel sideways atach one end to something solid like a truck hitch or tree ect. put plate inside where your pulling of jacking to prevent puckers and punctures the fender have a heavy hammer and a block of oak wood to hit kinks a torch is helpfull on tight kinks after the jackeing you wil acheive
a phase where it will be nessesary to hamer the metal into the proper position
use the cardboard guages (templates) to check whats high and whats low try to get every thing down in synchronacity work the full fender as much over the area
not one spot say like first it will be off 2 inches so hammer al sections till you get 1 and 1/2 then work all areas buy jack and hammering till you like into 1 inch of original
then work over the panel til its down to 1/8 th inch ok? thar ready for bondo
it will take maybe a gallon for the quarter ? use less hardner in the first coat (tacky)
slightly more (hardner)in the remaining ( up to 5 coats ?) befor the bondo hardens . grind the fist few coats with 40/60 grit and the last 1 or 2(bondo coats) with 80 or 100 use a airfile or
board sander to finish the finale contours it can be dune ive dune it dont forget to put a peice or something behide the metal when hitting a high spot or wrinkle to make it level or you will stretch the metal to far use wood or even a brick,... if? useing
a sledge hammer ?have someone hold a large peice of wood on the oposite side and be prepared to sweat lol" ..also somewher into the first two coats of bondo you will find more spots to hammer (level) but like they say this ones more or less shafted a good miller mig welder might be easy to learn on

 

Hey,

I can't see the detail of the area of the B post in your pictures, and can't see the amount of any rot in the lower areas of the quarter, but I'd give a try at saving it, prior to repalcement! You'd be surprised what a couple hours of bumping, a couple pulls with a com-a-long, maybe a push or two with a 4 ton porta power, will do to an old panel like that. Unlike todays POS vehicles, the metal in old vehicles lends its self to repair even when badly bent and crushed. The book time on hanging a quarter in a shop would be about 14 hrs, so figger you'll have that in straighting with mud and primer and all .
If you've never hung a quarter before, I'd hunt down some help jus' to cut down on the learning curve. There than too, if you don't have alot of welding experance, find someone who does, and do the mud and paint work yourself. The replacement of a panel may be faster but not always better.

Swankey Devils C.C.
"Meanwhile, back aboard The Tainted Pork"

 

I do have welding experience and I have done a fair share of mudding on cars. I'm sort of the opinion that I cant hurt the fender that on there so i might as well give it a shot.

I just went out there and removed some of the flaking bondo revealing some rather disturbing looking patches. I'm leaning more towards replacement now.

 

There arem quite a few 53s and 54s in a couple yards around here but they might be considerably rotted,check out west. Jeff

 

I would replace it. Its getting harder to find complete quarters but you can find them. I bought a 54 that needed a quarter and found just what i needed at a swap meet.

 

before cutting off quarter[if you do] jack it all back and get your alignment back, taillight ,wheel opening , and trunk opening all need to be right before cutting off tin , you will need a 4 or 10 ton porta power
HF will do for limited work actually the 10 ton is best , and this is built like a tank and the pipe will bend on a 4 ton ,and for future work on frame align and stuff the 10 ton is best

I bought a 53 and they make about 3 partial panels that will replace most of your damaged areas so it would need to be straight before starting

its too old to find any good used tin, by the time you cut it off it will fall apart

 

Just put a 700lb pile of Bondo in the driveway and cut away everything that DOESN'T look like a Chevy quarter panel. Easy. Just pullin' your chain. I'd replace it. By the time you banged that one out to a reasonable similarity to its former self, that metal will be stretched all to hell and really thin in spots.

 

I'd try and hammer out the bottom of it - the lower quarter and the wheel arch - mostly because I'm cheap and I know if I go cut a quarter off somewhere, it's going to be rotty on the bottom, because I'm going to cut it off local and as cheap as possible.

Other than that, I'd say replacing it will be easier, that's a pretty heavy duty dent.

 

Find a good used 1/4 and replace it.

 

I would spend some time looking for the best donor I could find, and replace the whole thing from the door jamb and window channel back. It's way too far gone, been beat to death from a previous repair, etc.

 

wow that realy looks bad...

a old shop owner told me when he went to the USA to buy cars he always take magnets with him he says filler and paint are realy cheap in the us- and these guys are great filler-artists..

 

I don't think you need to take a poll for this. 5 gallon pail of bondo should do the job.

 

replacement is going to be the easiest way to do it.

 

with the way that is twisted and crunched, not to mention the shotty patch work on it I would say finding a replacement quarter is your best bet, but if you can't locate one or you don't want to spend the time and money on one then you are in for a real project being that you don't have much experience with that kind of repair.

 

the latest dent could have been repaired by someone who knows how to move metal around but that quarter needed to be replaced before it even got hit the second time due to the previous damage and incompetent "repair" shown in this picture.

the best way to fix it now would be a full original quarter removed and replaced as close to how the car was originally assembled as possible.

it will be spot welded at the door jamb, those spot welds would be drilled out to both remove the dented panel as well as the donor panel, then use the holes from removal to weld it back on. or you could possibly use the door jamb off the donor part. (I would not) the original quarter most likely included the part where the quarter window is all the way up to the drip rail, I wouldn't go that far.

EDIT: just looked at my 49 and the door jamb is a part of the quarter....

most likely it is attached to the inner fender structure with spot welds in the wheelwell, and then more spot welds along the bottom from the wheelwell to the door along the rocker panel. the rear inner trunk to from the wheelwell to the back corner of the car is not welded but has a rubber seal between the trun floor and quarter panel. (that's how 49's are anyways.

there is a leaded seam by the trunk corner to the window channel... I'd think part of the window channel is on the quarter based on how other cars are constructed but I have never taken apart a 54. so you's prolly have to remove the window

IMFO (in my fucking opinion) it is always best to use full factory parts when replacing a body panel rather than a partial

of course a proper quarter panel replacement could cost you $1000.00 plus the new panel. you could get a bondo special for much less.

if you know how to weld it really wouldn't be as difficult as it may seem. cut off the old one and replace with the good one. door gaps should line up pretty easy, the trunk to quarter gap will take a little more finnessing for a good fit.

that's how I got it figured anyways.

 

pull it out enough to get your gaps correct, find a replacement qtr and get er done.

 

Hey,

I'm not seeing any major rot in the panel, the Midwest/Eastcoast kinda rot complete with cardboard, aluminum tape, window screen, cigarette packages all used to BS the panel out of the shop. I'm seein' piss poor metal repair, but still plenty of metal to work with.
I'm still on the side of savin' it! Hell, hold a HAMB "poundin' party". Don't ,what ever ya do ,call it a" paintin' party" because those usually turn ugly quick, with broken furniture, liquor bottles everywhere and the law being called and all. Start the repair by working back from the B post, bumping the damage out from inside the back seat and trunk areas. This panel doesn't have alot of crown or character lines in it, so once you get that nasty ridge that runs above most of the damage unlocked and hammered out most of the damage will follow. Yeah, some of those old "repairs" don't look too good, just cut those welds as necessary and reweld them. What is it that Sibley says? "It's just metal". Buy the time you hunt a quarter, drill out all those spotwelds, flange and trim that replacement, weld it in and mud as necessary, you could have this one in primer!

Swankey Devils C.C.
"Meanwhile, back aboard The Tainted Pork"

 

Considering the damage is mostly toward the back, you could fix this with a 4 door quarter panel, which will be a lot easier/cheaper to buy than a cherry 2 door quarter. At least around here, 2 doors with clean quarters are buildable cars.

There's a couple of 53's in a local junkyard near me that could donate quarters, but I think once you had the straight one welded on, you'd have to replace the bottoms with patch panels. You'd have a lot of seams but if you lined them up nice it wouldn't require nearly as much filler as trying to pull that out.

 

Yup, cut it off and get another one. Period

 

wish you were closer im hopeing to get a couple 54's to make a good one.....went and looked at one the other day, and the others Im dealing with online through e-mails.....by the time I make a good one I may have a skin for ya.....

 

I see it's been "fixed" a few times before. Take notes, this is what not to do. I second all the ones that say replace. Oh and then after you replace, see my avatar.