Gerahead's 71 Dart
I got the front passenger side frame rail cut out as shown in the last picture of the previous post. In order to straighten out the side of the rail, I clamped a short piece of angle steel in the hole to use as a dolly and hammered from the outside to straighten out the side.
IMG_4669.JPG
Then I started to weld the cut piece back in. The area where it had buckled took some trimming, but I finally got a fit I was happy with. Tacked the piece back in and then it all went haywire. All a sudden I couldn't get a good weld. No "sizzle", all that would happen is the arc would strike and then the wire would burn back to the tip. Took the nozzle apart and cleaned it up thinking that the wire was hanging up, still no joy. It was getting late so I called it a night. When I got back to it over the weekend, I went back over the set up. Duh!!!
While jockeying the welder around on the opposite side of the car so the cables would reach, some dumb *** moved the wire speed dial down to virtually zero. The welder works MUCH better when set up correctly! In the meantime, I had some really ugly welds to clean up and do correctly. It took longer than it should have, but this was also the worst of the four repairs needed. It looks a lot better! Two down, two to go. L8r
IMG_4670.JPG
I got the front passenger side frame rail cut out as shown in the last picture of the previous post. In order to straighten out the side of the rail, I clamped a short piece of angle steel in the hole to use as a dolly and hammered from the outside to straighten out the side.
IMG_4669.JPG
Then I started to weld the cut piece back in. The area where it had buckled took some trimming, but I finally got a fit I was happy with. Tacked the piece back in and then it all went haywire. All a sudden I couldn't get a good weld. No "sizzle", all that would happen is the arc would strike and then the wire would burn back to the tip. Took the nozzle apart and cleaned it up thinking that the wire was hanging up, still no joy. It was getting late so I called it a night. When I got back to it over the weekend, I went back over the set up. Duh!!!
While jockeying the welder around on the opposite side of the car so the cables would reach, some dumb *** moved the wire speed dial down to virtually zero. The welder works MUCH better when set up correctly! In the meantime, I had some really ugly welds to clean up and do correctly. It took longer than it should have, but this was also the worst of the four repairs needed. It looks a lot better! Two down, two to go. L8r
IMG_4670.JPG