Posted by: pre67vw - 03 June 2012 14:13:11
I'm doing some work on a friends cabrio, there's a lot of rust repair that needs to be done. The front bumper mount panel was pretty rusted and I'd patched it up, but I wasn't happy with it - it looked like a patchwork quilt, so I decided to cut it out and make a new one. You can buy panels for this area, but they have some kind of universal bumper mount and are the wrong shape - so I decided making one would be the better option. Please note that I'm certainly no pro at this! But I'm pretty pleased at how it came out. Step 1, cardboard template and then cut the blank [ATTACH]7375[/Attach]

Posted by: pre67vw - 03 June 2012 14:14:47
Step 2, hammer form the edge over. [ATTACH]7376[/Attach] [ATTACH]7377[/Attach]

Posted by: pre67vw - 03 June 2012 14:17:22
Step 3, stretch and shrink the lower edge to put the creases in the sides (Sorry, forgot to take a pic of this stage). Step 4, this is the panel trimmed and offered up to the car. Still a little bit more trimming to do to lose the hole in the middle. [ATTACH]7378[/Attach]

Posted by: pre67vw - 03 June 2012 14:20:40
At this stage, I decided I needed some intergrips. You can buy these at places like Eastwood or Frosts, but being the cheapskate I am I liked the idea of making some. They're not expensive to buy, but as I had some spare square tube, all I needed to buy was some screws and wing nuts, so these were dirt cheap. [ATTACH]7379[/Attach] [ATTACH]7380[/Attach]

Posted by: pre67vw - 03 June 2012 14:21:37
So here's the panel held in place with the intergrips. [ATTACH]7381[/Attach]

Posted by: pre67vw - 03 June 2012 14:22:40
Next step is to spot along with the mig and tack the panel in place. Tack in-between the integrips, then remove them and tack where they were. [ATTACH]7382[/Attach]

Posted by: pre67vw - 03 June 2012 14:25:28
Finish welding along and then grind it back. [ATTACH]7383[/Attach]

Posted by: pre67vw - 03 June 2012 14:27:17
Thats pretty much it. Next job is to plug weld the original bumper mount back on, then plug weld the horn mount back on. :thumbup: