Rear tub piece

[Dan kemper]

Looking for a piece of rear tub from wrecked tub. I need the upper half of either side. Contemplating patching the 4 holes from my safety devices exo cage as contemplating either going back to stock or soft top. Rather not lose the spot welds by grafting in new sides. Here is a pic of the area I need to make 4 patches

 

[chuckc4]

I have always wondered if Aluma-weld (sp) or similar product that uses relatively low temperatures would work for patching small holes like this. Anyone tried anything like that?

 

[evilfij]

Just get a rusted out door. The profile is the same.

 

[erover82]

A hot rod shop should be able to patch this up. They'll probably cut and bend a patch, then bond, prime, fill, sand, and paint.

 

[evilfij]

Seriously, there is no need to bend/fabricate a piece. Just find someone with a rusted out door and use the metal from the top of it. Any door from 1958 on should work. Whatever you do, use a rover panel (someone could probably just bend circles and weld them in) because the aluminium you buy is not the same as rover body panels.

 

[Dan kemper]

I found a donor panel to cut out 4 patches and yes my guy (hot rod shop) does not think it will be an issue to graft in a patch and beat the distortion out.

 

[Dan kemper]

The plan will be to tig weld in the patches.

 

[Dan kemper]

Some may be looking at the steel plate within the cut out and thinking it is just 4 holes. They are large holes. I will be removing the supports and having the rectangular cut outs patched.

 

[evilfij]

You are certainly supposed to cut squares (the aluminium in between would rot away anyway). but I could not tell.

Seems like you have the path forward. Good luck.

 

[JimC]

Alumaweld works like crap on Rover panels, you have to pour heat into the panels otherwise you get cold joints. i couldn’t grt enough heat in without distortion that was worse than the original problem.

 

[erover82]

Another problem with Alumiweld is that you're basically doping the aluminum with new elements to lower its melting point, so when you move on to another area the heat soaks into the previous area and the whole work area begins to melt away. You'd probably need oxy acetylene to get heat in it fast enough locally, but would require significant skill.