A butt weld patch looks better and much smoother, less body work, but more importantly there is no water trap that could cause more rusting/corrosion in the future. Yes you can seal it but it is not as good as doing a butt weld.
On a frame you can butt weld and then scab weld a plate over it for extra strength, or overlap it if able to overlap the sections being welded (2 sections of frame equal in size is hard to overlap), so it all depends on the look you are going for vs the strength required vs the 2 shapes being welded together…
Body panels are butt welded for smoothness and less body work (Bondo/filler)…
Also depending on the thickness of the metal you grind a bevel on both ends for deeper penetration on a butt weld…
YES! You can go to Walmart today and have new tires put on the front, leaving the mostly worn ones on the rear. Then hydroplane and hit someone head on and kill 2 or more people. But a car that has serious rust gets more attention because it looks bad. Usually the heavier suspension mount pieces take longer to rust through than the other body parts that rust and look bad.
It wouldn’t be hard for him to fix this car if he didn’t care how it looked. He could cut out a large section and then he could take some angle and weld on a whole new left side of that control arm mount. Run it forward and weld along to the unibody. Then paint it for rust protection.
The fumes in a fuel tank will not ignite unless they have mixed with air. If you open the cap on a bottle with a little gasoline in it and light the top, the flames will only exist on top by the cap where the fumes are mixing with air. Eventually the flames may enter the bottle once air starts to mix in. If you were to empty all the gasoline and blow air in it, now it is mixed. If you light it now the flames will go down inside and it’ll go whooosh and shoot flaming vapor out!
Come on, I am as cheap as the day is long, and I would have junked this car long ago…or maybe pulled the motor and transmission to use in a rust-free example with bad mechanicals. But no way would I drive this thing, and if I saw something like this on the road, I would stay far away from it.
So I found out what caused all this rust, the front plastic wheel panel is missing on that side of the car, so all the rain was splashing inside the rocker panel and collecting at the rear.
So what you are saying is that there is NO AIR in a fuel tank???
Fuel Tank Venting
Your tank has to breathe. In order to breathe, your tank must have a vent somewhere that will relieve both vacuum and pressure. Gasoline expands in volume as it warms up and shrinks in volume as it cools down. The fuel level of your tank changes throughout the day, even if you are not driving it.
You cannot put fuel into your tank, unless you can get the air out…and you cannot withdraw fuel from your tank unless you can let air in.
What happens if fuel tank is not vented?
As fuel is consumed from the tank, a vacuum is created which can cause the tank to collapse. This can lead to damage to the tank itself and potentially even cause a fuel leak. In addition, if the tank is not properly vented, pressure can build up inside the tank as the fuel expands due to changes in temperature.
I there is NO AIR behind the gas as it leaves the tank, then it will implode…
Since you don’t understand that principle that you got to have air behind water (any liquid for that matter) for it to flow properly/smoothly then climb up on your roof and find ALL those little ugly pipes that are sticking up out of the roof (roofers call them fart stacks) for no apparent reason and 100% seal them off and then see how well your toilets flush in your house…
So YES, I am a little concerned about the OP’s safety about welding right next to a plastic gas tank that will have sparks flying around and most likely hitting it from not only welding but also grinding that can burn through the plastic gas tank and catch on fire…
I have had welding slag fly inside my jacket and slide down my sleave and burn my arm around my elbow area, so don’t think for a minute all that grinding and welding can not find it’s way to the gas tank… And guess what, if it burns a hole in the tank, then unless he is in outer space, it will have air all around it that will mix with the gas… Again no boom, but a big fireball none the less…
Yes! If the gasoline is fairly fresh and it is warm out, the vapors from the gasoline will push almost all of the air / fuel vapor mixture out, replacing it with almost pure gasoline vapor. The charcoal canister will trap the gasoline vapor and let the air pass through.
Yes air and gasoline can be mixed in the tank over time. If the fuel is fresh the amount of air in there would be minimal.
I don’t want anyone to think that draining all the gasoline from the tank will make it safe. That will make it worse.
It’s what someone told me. If you have to weld on a fuel tank, you have to do it when there is gasoline in the tank since the vapors are pure enough to not ignite. This is probably in a race track type situation where the fuel is very fresh.
If the water was entering from the front, that’s not a good thing for the bottom of the whole rocker panel going all the way back. You might want to cut the bottom of the whole thing out. Sand blast and paint in there at the top to protect what is left. Was this thing always parked up hill in a driveway?
Years ago we’d frequently weld gas tanks. The steps were:
Drain and remove the tank.
Fill it with water, and then drain the water.
Run a large hose from the exhaust of a running vehicle to the inlet of the tank. This causes the tank to be filled with burned exhaust, containing very little O2.
Then put a flame near the tank opening. You’ll get sometimes-mild or not-so-mild “woosh” for a second as any remaining gas and O2 inside the tank burn. You don’t want your head near the tank opening.
Show me wear I have ever said to drain the tank???
Yes and some people play Russian Roulette!! Sometimes you win sometimes you loose… Statistically you will have a 83.3% (5/6) chance of winning, It’s the other 16.7% (1/6) chance that I am worried about… lol
I have also known guys that would cut up a large truck, including cutting the gas tank off the truck with a cutting torch (oxy acetylene), don’t mean I would recommend somebody that has never welded to do…
You can defend and come up with this that and the other, but I am trying to keep the OP from getting seriously hurt… So keep on giving the OP excuses to potentially hurt himself as I figured you would have been the safety 1st one here… I guess you only care about bumper height and how big SUV’s are and other thing that you have no control over, but saving a guys life is something you can help with…
Drain the fuel down low below the filler opening and yes remove the fuel filler pipe. It is too close to the work area. Seal off the hole. Maybe a thin flat piece of metal and some silicone would do it. Vapors coming out of there would catch fire. But the tank is far enough away. Someone would have to be very careless to hit that. It’s either plastic or under coated so the welder wouldn’t connect with it anyway.
A water hose should be available to put out a fire. Even the inside of the car could catch fire.
Maybe I’ll add something later but as we say up nort, uffdah. This will not end well. All I can say is a man convinced against his will will be of the same opinion still.
I’ve been hobby welding for over 30 years. I have a $500 Hobart mig and my dads Lincoln stick welder. I can get stuff to stick together but I am not a welder. I’ve been putting off just sheet metal rocker repair for two years trying to get the courage to start, and it’s just fitting sheet metal and I have the replacement rockers.
My dad was a naval certified welder for arc and gas and welded on ships during the war and missile launchers later. He would not attempt this. I watched him gas weld new bumper brackets on my vw to rusty parts. He did it but was not easy or pretty and this was with new vw replacement brackets to be welded to the chassis. When he couldn’t weld anymore he would watch me and tell me what to do. Sheet metal patch panels are one thing, but structural is something else. My bil has been doing patch panels and restoration for as long as I can remember, so have had some talent around me.
So what can I say? A guy with an $80 Amazon welder, never used it before, attempting structural repairs laying on your back, welding and cutting rust overhead, should at least be filmed. An a fir courage and determination but a grade f for sense. See ya later guys.
Those plastic fender liners were definitely a great invention. Whoever invented those gadgets deserves a Car Talk Tribute Award. My Corolla’s remain intact 30 years later, wheel wells, rocker panels appear to be as robust & rust free as the day they came off the ass’y line. San Jose climate is helpful of course. Corolla is not entirely rust-free, some exhaust system rust is appearing.
I wouldn’t have picked that particular welder for this particular job. (Don’t go by what I say about welding, while I have a MIG flux wire-feed version, I don’t dare turn it on … lol … ) But if OP has plenty of patience, learns how to work the welder first, does the job safely (removes fuel tank etc), doesn’t charge themselves an hourly rate for the time it takes, willing to keep car off the road for some time, it should be possible to repair that section of the Corolla. There are probably pattern replacement panels available since it is a Corolla, lots of them on the roads.
You could probably make the outside look ok with a sheet metal patch panel but that’s the wrong welder for sheet metal, and that’s not the big problem. I remember looking at a mustang dome years ago and the guy had replaced the quarter panels with stove bolts. I passed. Never looked any further to see if he used lock washers or not.
of the list for the DARWIN awords.