Removing rot and welding the passenger side floor

After getting comfortable with the welder on the firewall, I turned my attention to the right rear quarter panel, which is suffering from a bit of rot.

This first one is above the right wheel well.  I started by sanding the area around the hole to determine how far out the rot extended.  It's actually not too bad.  Clearly, enough rain dumped down and got caught in that support bracket without having a place to go.

I used compressed air and a vacuum cleaner to get the dirt and rust powder out of there.  I also picked at it with a screwdriver to break free any chunks.  I have Permatex Rust Treatment (POR-15) that converts the rust into a black polymer that functions like a primer.

Once it's set up and ready, I'll clean up the edges of the hole I've made and weld in a patch panel.  It'll probably be in a month since it's somewhat low priority.

Here are the two other major areas of rot on the back right corner.  The big one is obvious, but the more insidious one in the picture below--and which will take more work to repair--is the jagged crack on the right above the two dime-sized holes and below the main seam.  Behind that is a support bracket that isn't really doing it's job anymore.

I wasn't sure what to make of the big gash, at first.  I couldn't figure out what that fibrous stuff was.  Given the original owner's love of bondo, I thought it might've been some kind of 1970s filler product that just didn't hold up.

I was wrong.  It's wood, used to keep the hat channel here from collapsing under pressure.  Of course, the wood soaks up water and encourages cancer.  That is, without question, the biggest failure of design the original Willys folk made.  Their hat channels just didn't have a fighting chance.

First step to get the largest issue under control is, like the little one above the wheel well, to get a sense of where the rot stops and good sheet metal starts.  For this process, I'm anything but subtle.  I just start prying metal out of the way.  The original 18 gauge, if it's solid, doesn't bend easily, nor does it puncture easily with a body hammer's spike.  Here you can see both holes getting pried open to find their edges.

I used the cutoff wheel to start delimiting the hole.  There's a better shot of the wood in the channel, too.  I'm pleased to report that the hat channel is secure as it moves forward towards the wheel well opening.  That way I don't have to worry about removing the entire bracket and reattaching it.

Here's an undershot of the leading edge of the channel.  That wood chunk is about to make my life tough.  It was quite a pain to get out because I didn't know there was a nifty little nail going through the metal and into the block, holding it in place.  Why could the nail have rusted out along with the back corner?  The rest of that surface rust/scale will be gone at some point.  I've got this great attachment for my grinder, a wire brush cup, that will make quick work of this.  Plus the POR-15 rust converter.  By the time I'm done with the body work, rust will be insignificant, though realistically not gone for good.

Just about done.  All that's left is that stupid block of wood.

Out!  See all the sawdust?  I had to start drilling holes in the wood. Again, if only I'd known about that little nail.

With the sawdust gone, I can finally get a good feel for the condition the channel is in.  Time to grind.

Five minutes of grinder and sanding, and I'm pleased with the condition of the channel.  It's still plenty thick and solid, so there's no need to replace it.

Note the black tint to the channel.  You can also see in the lower right the cuts I've made to that smaller crack.  The bracket behind is all but dislodged from sheet metal, so I'm not sure what to do about it right now.

My guess is that I'll drill some small holes in the outer sheet metal, clamp the bracket back in place, and then weld through those holes to attach the bracket to new metal.  That basically recreates the stock spot welds.  We'll see.  I'm confident it'll come out fine, and I'll do something similar to the sheet metal I'm going to use to patch over the larger hat channel.

I also wanted to get the passenger side floor secured.  For some reason, the original owner booger welded AND bolted it in place, and he did it over the original floor.  As I mentioned earlier, he also removed the original toolbox from under the passenger seat, which I want to put back.  All that adds up to work for me, but at least the floor he installed is 1/8" thick and rot-free.

This shot is of the front/leading edge of the new floor.  You're looking at where the passenger's feet will go.

 Here I've welded around the transmission/transfer case hump.

 This is the back edge and wall of the toolbox.  That hole you can see through is where one of those weird bench seat pipe panels was.

 This is preliminary welding.  I'll make it as secure as I can, and then I'm going to go back and grind down some of those monstrous welds (that look like piles of caked on mud) in the picture above.  There are at least four such junk piles.  I'm thinking he was stick welding, which is an inexact--less refined--form of welding.  His welds make my boogers look good.