Well my problem is that when i pulled my body off my frame the rust on the body under the doors where the body bolts to the frame ended up being pretty bad. So i was told by someone here locally that i should build my floor first where i want it channeled to and hack off about the 3.5" off the bottom of the car before i chop it or do anything else. Personally i dont know if this is the way to go or not and would like some help because i have all my suspension, steering, etc. to start my frame. Heres a pic from the side. You can see the rust just under the door and on the cowl. Ill have to get more detailed pic of the rust.
I would repair the bottom edge. Otherwise you might lose the shape of the body and doors. Mostly it's just sheet steel...John
Thats what i was afraid of. But i did notice when i was looking at it that i might not have to cut off the bottom of it because it looks like 1x1 square will tuck up under the door seals but not sure if it will actually work.
I did square tubing under the doors, like thin rocker panels. It looks good on a channeled car. One nice thing about the small square tubing is that you can bend it to follow the curves that you need at the bottom of the body. If you can get it tacked in place and aligned good, then you now have something to build from....meaning you can set a 90 degree sheetmetal piece on top of that in each door opening, then find a way to hook it to the floor. I used the 90 bend but then did another 90 the opposite way at the top, to meet the raised floor. I can take a pic...let me know
Thais is a 28 chevy sedan with no body channel, but I hope it gives you an idea of structure. Even though I kinda over kill...John
Im glad yall are sharing pics of your floor frames i havent been able to find a much on them and even though i have the general idea, its always nice to kinda see what im up against. Thanks!
some pics; a 31 Dodge, was a cut up 4dr turned into a channeled pickup. The whole bottom was gone, where to start? ...get the door gaps correct by shimming, or bracing, hanging, whatever works. Next step was to make a square tubing rocker panel. Bend it to the shape of your car's lower curve. Next, repair your firewall enough to weld the front of the tubing to the car, then find a way to tack it to the center door post and rear of car. Now, make inner doorway pieces with 2 opposite 90 degree bends. Make these as high as you want your floor to be. Make them wider than the door opening because you need to weld these to the insides of your door posts. Your posts may be rotted off at the bottoms, but the tops of these panels should go up above the rot. Weld it at the top where you still have good posts. Then weld to the square tubing at the bottom. Make the same sort of part inside the cowl. So now you have a good solid bottom edge, and a solid door opening, and now you can rebuild the rotted lower door posts LAST. Cowl patches can be done last, too. Pics are: one of the left outside of doorway one of the outside of left cowl one of inside of left cowl one of the inside of rear left doorpost (this is now a pickup cab) You can see that the cowl still needs a new patch panel, and the lower door posts still need fixing...but the cab is now solid as a rock.
Heres those pictures. You can see the chalk line where i planned on cuttin across to just section off the bottom then build my floor to the height of my channel, but building the floor before i cut it off of course.
The Jalopy Journal
