hi Guys, need some advice. My boy decided to wrap his colt around a hedge stump, could have been worse, he could have missed the stumps totally and gone right into a farmers front garden.

 

Upshot is i'm going to fix it, i've stripped it down to its metal work and have removed what ever i can with bolts on. I'm now down to some chassis and engine support frames, i'm sure its just a matter of drilling out the spots and the piece will just come away. (i hope) tricky part is putting the new ones on. Reasons as follows.

 

• i assume i will need to spot weld it back on, i've never done spot welding before, is it fairly easy?
  
• if ive drilled out the previous spots, is it just a case of trying to find other places
  
• Can spot welderes be hired?
  
• Does the place to be welded need to be bare metal, ie no paint
  
• anybody done this before and can throw a few morsels of help my way.
  

 

ANY help would be appreciated.

 

Rich

Hi Rich, theirs not much you can't hire these days, you will need to make sure you get an assortment of attachments so you can get to all the places that need welding. The old spot welds can be drilled with a spot welding drill, this just takes the top part of the weld away and the panels can be split with a thin bolster and yes the metal will have to be free from paint and rust.

 

Paul

Thanks Paul

 

Why not drill the spots all the way through? on removal..

 

Rich

That way all you need to do is apply a small skim of filler before painting to the top of the new panel without it falling through the hole.

 

Paul

Paul

 

Filler!!! where i'm spoting, no one will see , its buried deep in the chassis. Would there be a different technique then?

Rich, missunderstood what you were doing, that's a lot of work your taking on there, you might be better off preparing all the panels and getting them in position and getting a mobile welding firm to do the welding.

 

Paul

Shame you are so far away I have all you need. You dont need a spot welder you can use a mig welder.

try and pull the front out befor removing any of the structure that way should return mos to its original postition then cut out the damage will save a lot of swearing in the long run

I have a large tree at the back of my house, it has come in very helpful to pull some dents out. Like dragon said pull it out 1st saves loads of time.

Paul, thats a good idea, get it all prepared and fitted and call in a pro...

 

JMW, Shame to, however , ho do you spot weld with a MIG welder?

 

DragonB, dont think me plus my Bro and a neighbour could shift it...ever..

 

Reason i'm doing it, is Its My Car, Registered to Me, fully comp, with My lad a named driver. if i go through the insurance for this, ALL my policies for the zed, shogun and this car would go up,. I've already had to give my details to the local council when he knocked over a lampost.

Thought about stripping it, but thought the damage wasn't to bad, the more i took away, the worse it got. Never mind, 500-600 quid maybe and sell on for 2K

 

Moral? Dont have kids, but if you must, make them start work before they get a car...

 

Rich

hi mate the idea is to only drill through the panels you will be taking off this way when you offer the new panel up you only have to spot the panel on ,if you drill all the way through then youll have to plug weld the two panels together alot harder work filling in holes with weld also as above get it as straight as poss before removing and trial fit everything before you go to made with the welder try and work out direction of impact and reverse with pulling hope this helps andgood luck

the idea of spoting with mig is drill a hole in the new panel and weld it to the old panel filling in the hole penatrating on to the old panel hence if you drill all the way through makes much harder as nothing to weld to