Body hardware questions...

[Eric VerValin]

Ok.. well sometime this spring, I'm going to need to address my rocker panel rust issue. Unless I find a cheap black Taurus / SHO, from somewhere down south, that has a blown motor or something. Anyway.. I'm assuming rocker panels cannot be bought, so I'll have to either cut some good ones out of another car... (seems impossible to find) or bend some sheet metal to fit.

I'm sure someone has done this somewhere on here before, and I'd like a little help or direction to get stuff ready for this spring. The work dosent have to be ''perfect'' being the welds would be inside the door area, and under the car. But I dont want it to look too terrible either. I would assume it wouldn't be too bad to grind the welds down a bit inside the door to make it look a little better, or maybe install some of those aluminum door sills on top of the welds to hide it maybe?

Anyway, just looking for ideas on how others have fixed their rockers. And also when adding the ground effects back to the new metal, should I use sheet metal screws like the factory did, or would it be a better idea to actually tap a few good holes and run some machine hex head screws in there? 1/4 20 's ?

 

[bubba]

Eric I will give my parts guy a call to see if you can get new rockers for them. I'll pm you. I lose you number in my other phone.

 

[Eric VerValin]

Sweet man. I'll be home all day, give ya a call when its not 3:00 am..

 

[bubba]

Hey man I still lookin for ya. I think I can find repro.

 

[pjtoledo]

check a crash parts source, I would think those would be plentiful. sheet metal screws from the factory??? in the plastic on top yes, in the lower outer panels no, they had plastic thing-a-ma-jigs that expand when a plastic screw in inserted into them.

By the way, rocker panels are composed of 3 pieces: an outer one you can see, a verticle middle section, and the inner piece thats part of the cabin floor. Together they form the outer frame of the cabin. You will probably find a lot more rust than you suspect is present.

 

[Eric VerValin]

Oh yea, from looking up in there.. I can tell ya the floor has to come back a few inches at least, the side is gone.. lol and the top part is just starting to work its way back. I have people who do body work say its not beyond repair, but when I think about all the work.. it makes me want to just find another car without rust and a bad motor. Granted swapping interiors motor, wiring harnesses and all that would completely suck.

 

[93rev2sev]

Looks like it's time to find an Arizona roller.

 

[pjtoledo]

Oh yea, from looking up in there.. I can tell ya the floor has to come back a few inches at least, the side is gone.. lol and the top part is just starting to work its way back. I have people who do body work say its not beyond repair, but when I think about all the work.. it makes me want to just find another car without rust and a bad motor. Granted swapping interiors motor, wiring harnesses and all that would completely suck.

I've chopped up a couple of rust belt cars, what you say is a bit disturbing. With extensive rust in the rockers I would be very concerned about the lower section of the front door pillars. Thats kinda where the heart of the body starts, damage in that area is real hard to fix. Time to pull the carpet back and give it a good look.
Same thing for where the rear of the rockers attach to what goes up and over the rear suspension.
Gotta just love that road salt.

 

[Eric VerValin]

Now when your talkin about the front door pillars.. I'm assuming you mean the front where it hinges? I haven't noticed much there, but then again, its been a year since I really looked. I'll have to get some good pictures once it gets a little nicer. This car was never really rusty until I left it sit for those 2 years.