Re-body project for my 24V e30

[Northern]

Do you use a welding spoon at all?
If not, it helps a lot with the gaps. Hell, I just use some crushed 7/8" copper tube.

[bimmer630]

Do you use a welding spoon at all? If not, it helps a lot with the gaps. Hell, I just use some crushed 7/8" copper tube.

After getting super frustrated with welding the gaps and having some burn through, I did order a Welding spoon. It proves to be not very helpful though becauseIt was tough getting it into position by holding it with my arm through the shifter hole and all the complex shapes and what not on the inside of the tunnel Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[bimmer630]

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[Northern]

If you don't have a second set of hands, try to find some way to secure it so you don't need to hold it: Small vise clamps, or drill a hole in the spoon to use a bolt through whatever void you're welding across, or a big welding magnet, etc.

[bimmer630]

I was more than unhappy with the results of my floor/tunnel repair.. I think my lack of proper cleaning of the metal combined with some huge gaps was a recipe for disaster...
I cut it all back out and grabbed yet another donor section from my silver parts car.. and this time I went all the way from “rail to rail” (there are rails midway between the rocker and the tunnel)
this time I made a template of the new piece and marked the cars floor using the template and subtracting about an inch from that and cutting the hole in the car itself WAY smaller than it needed to be, and then gradually scribing, trimming, grinding, checking, measuring, cutting, etc etc... until I ended up with this. I think I’m happy with the fit.. it’s even too tight in some spots...
And this time we have a new tool at the shop, a “crud thug” that easily removes undercoating and paint. A process which I performed lazily the first time around with a wire wheel.. and didn’t get everything down to bare metal.

[bimmer630]

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[bimmer630]

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[bimmer630]

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[bimmer630]

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[bimmer630]

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[bimmer630]

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[bimmer630]

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[bimmer630]

Finally got this thing burned in, and it worked so much better this time around (cleaning the metal fully really helps, who knew? Haha)

[bimmer630]

Some shots of the floor after smoothing out the welds a little. I actually plan on making the transitions almost invisible, even though it’ll all be hidden under the carpet... I don’t know why..I’m just crazy I guess

[bimmer630]

I’m happy with the way the cuts worked out on the underside of the floor. The booger stuff is just the welds that came in from above. I need to get it up on the lift and burn this all together, and make it look nice... and then seal/undercoat it. I’ve been looking for 3m or Wurth “body shutz” in tan and it seems that they don’t make it anymore... just white and black...but it’s paintable.. this worked out so much cleaner than my previous attempt which required taking all of the cross member pieces apart separately and welding them in after getting the sheetmetal in. In this version of the repair I simply cut the piece between the frame rails on each side, and didn’t have to mess with any of that Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk