Teach Me How To Pop Out a Dent...

For that smaller, deeper dent from the door opening against the fender: fix the check strap inside the door while you're in there.
My `63 C-10 had that same rash when I bought it. The truck had recently been nicely repainted and the PO had drawn black legs from the mark with a sharpie to make it look like a bug crawlin on the door. His answer to the faulty check strap was to sheetmetal screw pieces of canvas webbing from the door to the jam. I restored the straps to function by putting pieces of rubber from tire thread and washers. Maybe just another level of gettho repair but it worked great and it's out of sight inside the door.

 

I would stop by the local body shop to see if they got any junk panels laying around. Would be good to get a feel for how the metal moves before you start on your truck

 

From your description and the picture, I would say that a good bodyman could have those dents in primer within an hour. Best advice - remove the door, find a body guy to put in on his bench, and pick it up at the end of the day with C-note in hand ....money well spent. Good Luck. Bondo Bob

 

Yeah, that's the same problem. I haven't seen a whole lot of these trucks that don't have that dent. Thanks for the tip on the check strap. I've just been "careful" with the door since I've had the truck.



And for an update, the big dent popped right out with a plunger and a little water. There is still a very small crease in the top of where the dent was (maybe 1/2" long and very shallow). I'll get to that when I go to do the other small dent. Thanks again everyone for the advice. Feel free to keep offering tips.

 

Most times with tiny dents and shrinking you are backing up the hammer with a dolly.
To flatten out tiny imperfections you are planishing. The hammer is striking the dolly (lightly) dead-on straight with no sideways action through the sheetmetal.
Shrinking involves using a wiping technique against the dolly. You establish an imaginary circle and strike from outward toward the center into the dolly with a wiping motion. You continue this around the circle clockwise or counter-clockwise untill the metal is shrunk enough to become flat
There's a technique called off-dollying. Your pounding in a high spot and have the dolly in a low spot on the other side to move the metal more dramatically.
You can use anything as a dolly even a 2x4. If you can get behind that dent to "back it up", then carve the end of a board into the shape that you want to attain. use the board to push up the low spot off-dolly and then on-dolly as a form to tap against.
If you cannot get anything behind the area you can still work it out with dent pullers. If I was going to pull that dent I would not use a slide hammer to do it. That would pull out both the low and the high spots.
The metal is stretched and will need shrinking. Buy some T-handle pulling rods where you can find body tools.You will not be pulling on them very hard. If you do you will break off the tip.
It is a delicate issue of what to touch, how to touch it, and what not to touch. I'm still green with more academics behind me than ply of the trade but the physics of the metal will talk with you and these "conversations" will develop in you a relationship with the material and tools you are working with.
You will need to drill some holes along the low crease just big enough for the hooked rod to slip in and not too close together. You will be able to work the tip of the hook around the panel from behind to push out in different areas.
How you get the metal to move is by tapping along the high crown of the dent as you pull out from the bottom. The metal in the creased area will be work-hardened from being bent and stiffer than the surrounding metal. Applying a small amount of heat from a torch...just enough to make it sizzle spit, not enough to make it glow will anneal or take the work hardened temper out of the bend allowing it to bend where you want it. Work the lows up not the highs down. the highs are actually almost where they should be. The high crease may appear to be pushed out slightly from the main panel because the center of the dent was was stretched and is trying to spring back. When you shrink the stretched center the highs will mostly spring back down on their own.
You will be reversing the accident/reversing the forces which created the dent and have to imagine how it happened. The first thing done to a heavily damaged area is before you take anything apart pull and push the damaged area into shape with chains and port-a-powers then dissassemble the parts for more work or replacement.
Start in the center of the dent and work outward to shape it. Work it untill the stretched metal is higher than the surrounding metal then shrink it back with on dolly hammering and/or heat
If I cant get behind the area I work it out untill it is as straight as I can get it before shrinking and the creases are gone. Heating an area to just before visible dull red and then quenching it with a wet rag or even blown air will shrink it. It takes alot less than you think at first.
The shrinking doesn't need to cover the whole dent. a small spot can pull the stretched area back into tension, flattening it out with very little effort.
The shrinking will pull in 360 degrees. To pull directionally, you line up the shrinks perpendicular to that direction but keep in mind each shrink is still pulling in 360 degrees. You will get the shrink you want in the direction you want but then may need to go back with the hammer and dolly to stretch the unwanted shrink that occured in the other direction.

To get back to your little dent, once you have it worked out mostly smooth and shrink it back a little you might need to stretch it out again to get it on the money. if there is stretch in the metal and not tension, when you try to flatten tiny imperfections they will cause other areas to move out of shape.
Another way to describe it is If you shrink just past perfect and then planish the imperfections out, the on-dollying is going to create a little more stretch. The tension from shrinking will soak up the stretch and the imperfection will suck back into the smoothness of the panel instead of traveling.
When shrinking you do not need a torch. hammer and dolly work can accomplish most of the shaping needed and using a shrinking wheel in the grinder or just an old dull grinding disk will provide enough heat to shrink out imperfections. I worked under a bodyman who could work out hail dents and tighten wavy panels that weren't creased with nothing but an old grinding disc.
here is a pic of a firebird I sold. I had several cars of different years and decided to keep just one and sell off the other cars and any parts that were not for the one I was keeping. The drivers side fender was accordioned from an accident that pushed the corner of the bumper back 4" The fender was not on this car. I didnt have anything to pull the corner foreward and I pushed the corner foreward back into shape in how I worked out the compression dents. I did not get the sheetmetal baby smooth but it was where it was supposed to be and everything lined up correctly and I shot it with black as-is. It would have needed less than .030 of filler to block it out

 

Torchman, thanks a lot for the info. That is really good stuff and exactly what I was shooting for with my question. But, I think my head just exploded from info overload, lol.

 

Has a football been mentioned here??

I have used a deflated football between the inner and outer skin and then slowly pumped up the football. After it pops out just deflate the ball and move on.

Just a thought.



BloodyKnuckles

 

Nobody's mentioned it before you. Another great idea to try before I start hammerin'.