Shaved Trunk Lock (Welding)

[94blaze1.6]

Agreed. Maaco is lamo

[wilko33]

Your other option for the boot lock is just dont weld it up. The hole is small enough stick some mesh or fine wire behind the hole, skim over it with filler, sand and paint. Thats what I did and its come out fine.

As for the security aspect, for those who even know you have a fibreglass hole in your boot, all they will get through too with that hole is a metal hook. The release is located in the bottom half and everything else you would be able to open the boot with is removed when you take out the locking mechanism.

This does not work however for door handles, the ares is too big and it WILL crack and fall away.

[Yoda]

You could always use structural adhesive when shaving lock and door handles since it is not a structural part of the car. Some things like screw holes should still be plug welded but for things like locks, door handles and bullet holes. I've started to use adhesive rather that mig or tig welding the patch in place. Larger hole I will flange the panel around the hole so the patch will sit flush with the body skin and glued. Things like bullet holes I will take a knock out punch to remove the displaced metal and make a clean round hole. It is just a matter of cutting a patch to fit the hole and hammering it to shape. Then make a backing stripe to tie the patch and body skin together until the adhesive cures. Structural adhesive works well for large cosmetic parts the quarter panels or my original project custom hammerformed rocker panels (side skirts) where it is too easy to warp the sheet metal and no room to hammer it straight after. If you are welding the patch in make sure you have the largest copper back-up strip possible clamped directly behind your weld to conduct heat away from the weld seam and to prevent burn through

[Tunes67]

I have seen the adhesive patch done on Trucks on Spike TV. Didnt look all that difficult to do either. They used it to patch a lower corner of the cab behind the doors where the chev S-10 commonly rusts. They even used a roll-on primer once the repair was done.. kinda nifty.. and it was sandable primer to. You'd still have to pay for painting and finishing though.. still wouldnt be cheap.. but it is a alternative to a welded plug.

Tunes67

[illapino]

bullet holes

now i'm really starting to wonder ur true location yoda ...

[Vanished]

OMG, I'm getting a visual here ........ Eric climbing through the hatch of his MX because the battery died and the popper won't work.

not gonna lie...i did this once...haha.

Interesting about adhesive yoda, has anyone else tried this? I've only ever welded. It was rough tho, didnt' want to warp the door pannel or burn holes. both of which i managed. Look at 93_4bangers work log for info.

[Yoda]

bullet holes

now i'm really starting to wonder ur true location yoda ...

That was from my days growing up on the Canadian prairies and building hot rods. I been putting that skill back to good use in South Central Pennsylvania helping out some of the guys I work with.

[rsroadkilla]

if your gunna shave the boot lock and handle, you may aswell do the aerial too!!!

You say about the boot lock mech fookin up, but dont worry about it. How often do you worry about the bonnet cable snappin? If it starts to get slack, you replace it before it goes!

[Yoda]

Interesting about adhesive yoda, has anyone else tried this? I've only ever welded. It was rough tho, didnt' want to warp the door pannel or burn holes. both of which i managed. Look at 93_4bangers work log for info.

I was just thinking about why you guys have never read the magazines article on the subject of structural adhesive and sheet metal patching techniques. I just remembers I stopped buying SCC, Super Street and the like and started picking up Grassroots, Street Rod Builder, Street Rodder and Rod and Custom. The only Sport compact magazine I still buy is HCI because it is published by Buckaroo so they they tend to publish less flash and glitz and more tech info that isn't basically a multi page ad for their advertizers. Over the past few years most of my new moddification ideas and power adder mods to the engine have come from thes magazines. For those of you interested in sheetmetal welding and fabrications Ron Covell writes some good article in Street rodder every month.

[Josh]

you could always use some JB WELD and a quarter. lol

I shaved the back on Dans car. it really takes like 3 or 4 spot welds. it took me a whole half hour from start to finnish without paint or primer.

if you cant find a welder the adhesive looks like a good compramise. heck most of thiese import guys just fiberglass their bodykits to the car, or Bondo them to the car. the adhesive will definatly hold up in a quarter size hole.

i have torn down cars where people use tuna can lids for patches in with there bondo, or soda cans. they just cut the rite shape, glue it in place if they do that, then bondo the hell out of it.

[illapino]

i'll keep searching for resources then. i'm not a particular hands-on type of guy but would like to be, as long as i have a step by step guide on how to do things properly. "bondo it" tells me nothing at this point in my brain. I agree, most of the import magazines are garbage and the last one i did pick up was HCI because of its ACC carpet install ... Import Tuner has the worse content out there. Modified is decent sometimes

[Yoda]

Something to think of when shaving all the door lock. I've been working at my friends shop on the weekend. On Saturdays we close an hour later than the speed shop down the street and around the corner. Taking a car out for a test drive. He see one of the guys that works there and some of his friend out on the street try to figure out how to getting it to his car after draining the battery so there was no way to activate the solenoids. Calling us at the shop he has one of us come over with a booster pack, a phillips screwdriver and some 12 gauge wire. Without saying what was actually done my friend surprises everybody by using the booster pack to pop open the door and trunk without the remote and had the hood open and the booster pack connected to the battery before anyone realized he was in the car.

[Silkwyrm]

I agree, that panel adhesive is the way to go here, you dont have to worry about warping the metal, any one can do it with little to no skill. and adhesive has the benefit of not damaging the primer on the inside of the skin, which welding would do, creating a spot that will rust easier. If you weld you want to be able to reprimer (or other sealant) the welded area which I believe would be hard around the inside of the hatch lock. If you want to know how to do this, heres how I'd do it.

Purchase from a body shop supply store:
Panel Adhesive
wax and grease remover
sandpaper 180 & 320 grit dry, 400 and 600 wet.
small thing of standard body filler (should come with hardener)
small tube of flowable body filler
combination etch and fill primer
powder guide coat
masking tape
masking paper or plastic (dont use newspaper its just not good enough and sometimes the paint will dissolve the ink in the paper which can leave the news printed on your car.)


Create a patch from sheet metal that just fits in the indentation where the lock cylinder was. Should have enough overlapping the hole for a good bond. Paint the patch so there is no exposed metal that will rust, glue it in place using autobody panel adhesive, I like 3Ms 8115 adhesive. Get a wax and grease remover and clean off the whole back part of the hatch. Then scuff up the outside anywhere bondo will be with 180 grit sand paper. Bondo the indentation from the lock cylinder. Sand with 180 till smooth with just a slight depression. where the lock was. When sanding always use a block. You could just sand it smooth and flat with 320 grit, but I prefer a flowable body filler over the top of standard bondo, they flow on nice and sand easier. So spread flowable bodyfiller over the sanded bondo. If you got the filler on nice and smooth finish smoothing it with 320 till it looks and feels perfectly flat. Now mask off the area, and spray a combination etch and filler primer over your work. Never spray primer all the way up to your masking if you can help it. Spray two coats. First coat should go to just past where the filler stops, let it flash (this should take 5 to 10 minutes, it should look dry) spray your second coat, this should go past where the first coat stopped by a few inches. I'd let that dry for a at least a day. I've seen a lot of nice cars in shows where you can see sanding scratches in the paint because their filler was sanded with too coarse a grit, or when the paint was baked the primer shrank revealing sanding scratches that wernt visible before. By baking the primer first, or at least letting it sit a good long time. It will cure properly and shouldn't get those scratches showing through the paint. Now I prefer a wipe on powder guide coat. This is usually a black powder that colors the area and fills in every imperfection with black. Then wetsand the work with 400 grit wetdry paper till most of the black guide coat is gone. Put another layer of guide coat down. Now wetsand with 600 grit paper until all the black is gone and the primer feels silky smooth and perfectly flat with out sanding through the primer and exposing the filler. If you sand through the primer you'll have to re-prime it and start again. If you succeed in getting it perfectly flat and smooth without sanding through the primer. I strongly suggest you now take it to a body shop. and have them paint it Especially if you have a metallic paint. You've cut out a lot of the cost by doing all the prep work yourself, but for a good paint job and color match it should be painted in a dust free paint booth by a pro and baked. Also the pros can point out any flaws in your prep work.

If you do this and take it to be painted be aware they are probably going to scuff and paint the whole hatch. If the paint color they have is not perfect, or a troublesome color, they will also want to scuff the surrounding panels and blend the paint into those panels. They may want to remove the hatch glass and if you haven't removed them, the tail lights. So if they tell you they are charging you for removal and reinstallation of these things as well as painting and preping more than just the area you worked on, they arn't trying to rip you off, they are trying to do a good job.

Hope this is helpfull and gives you an idea of whats involved.

Rik