1984 318i Resurrection

[Sunnyledge]

I also needed to reconstruct the inner wheel well. And a little patch to the wheel arch.

[Sunnyledge]

Clamps, welds, grinding and the repair is complete. Since the majority of the welding is hidden by the bumper trim and stone guard you don’t need to get super picky. A little filler on the repair to the wheel arch which will be the only visible aspect of the repair.

[Sunnyledge]

I also repaired the drivers rear rocker. As it was beginning to get cool I decided to put off paint until the spring.

[Sunnyledge]

After finishing these two repair I created a 3-D collage titled “Henna Rot”. (Giving new meaning to Hennarot). Don’t think I’ll get $120,000 like that guy did for taping a banana to a wall.

[2mAn]

This is going to be quite well!, while you're doing all this, get Euro bumpers and weld up the holes that the US Bumpers leave. It will be fantastic with fresh Hennarot

[Sunnyledge]

The rear inner rockers were also badly rusted and certainly a structural concern.

[Sunnyledge]

The right rear involved some minor rust damage to the outer rocker. I traced the profile of the damaged segment onto a piece of hard maple, cut and shaped the profile I was looking to achieve and used it to shape the patch.

[Sunnyledge]

I located a factory replacement panels, what BMW calls a side member. I decided not to separate all the factory weld and replace the entire panel, but to use it as a patch.

[Sunnyledge]

The left side suffered greater damage, affecting all three structural layers. So repair one patch or layer at a time trying to maintain some of the damaged metal to help with proper alignment of the patches. It would not be until I reinstalled the rear subframe that I would know if everything was ok. On both sides I used a backer strip of 16 gauge steel to allow me to use Clecos to position the patches. The plug welds Into the strip further reinforce the repair and the backer allows me to weld the seam with good penetration reducing the chance of blow through.

[sebe20]

Sunnyledge great progress! Really like your attention to detail when replicating panels.

[amcp]

Solid work.

[Sunnyledge]

One last little rust repair to show, thought there we many others. The left rear wheel well had rusted through. While not overly important structurally, I couldn’t ignore it.

[Sunnyledge]

Three pieces needed to be fabricated in order to complete the repair.

[Sunnyledge]

Welding completed and in epoxy primer.

[Sunnyledge]

In order to make the previous repair I removed the gas tank so I had a prime opportunity to replace the hard brake and fuel lines which suffered from rust. The main brake line had a patch with compressing fitting and one of the fuel lines broke from rust during my initial inspection of the car.