A recent project of mine - my son's Fiat Punto

[633Squadron]

Since Christmas, I have been spending a few weekends repairing my son's 2000-plate Fiat Punto so that it would pass an MOT. When we checked the car, I was shocked at how much corrosion damage had occurred, particularly in the driver's side rear wheel arch. It's his first car, so he wanted me to attempt what I thought was the near impossible and repair it. Here's what it looked like before.



I reckon a good 70-80% of that inner wheel arch was missing. The lower edge that welded to the outer arch was also gone. To top it all, when we drilled out the rusted screws to move the fuel filler pipe out of the way, a piece of the recess fell out with it!

Here's what it looked like after I had welded some 20-gauge steel plate into the car. I'm not Leonardo Da Vinci with a welding torch and I hate welding upside down, but we got there in the end. The welding could maybe have done with a quick grinding down, but when it's freezing cold, you tend to put function over style, especially when most people won't ever see your work.


My son also got schooled in how to make compound curved panels when you don't have an English Wheel to hand. Part of that inner arch needed a tricky curved panel to follow the remaining wheel arch metal and we got there in the end. His car passed the MOT and he's said that he will scrap it before the next MOT is due, as he is saving up for a better car.

 

[marlinspike]

Good work. Must admit, I am not good at grinding down welds and getting a neat finish - too worried about thinning the metal.

 

[633Squadron]

To be honest, I had to weld through the 20-gauge into the Fiat steel, as the original metal is so thin. If I tried to weld right on the edges, the Fiat metal just blew through. The panels I welded in all had some healthy overlaps to add some strength and I showed my son the technique of cutting slots into sheet steel, bending it at right angles to the slots, then bringing the metal 'fingers' together to make a compound curved panel. He hadn't seen that fabrication work done before and he was fascinated by it. I also demonstrated that it's good welding when you can drop the panel on the floor or hammer it and it 'rings', to show it's a solid metal panel. Also, how to use a similar technique to make the right angled edge of the inner wheel arch, so that it follows the same curve of the outer arch. Plenty of CAD (Cardboard Aided Design) going on, to make the templates!