Driver-side Quarter Panel Replacement

I used the C-pillar brace from the donor quarter panel.

Now to transform a square-taillight quarter panel into one for a roundie. First, the bumper mount hole was filled.

Here's a view of the same patch from the inside. The patch came from the old quarter panel.

Filling the big-bumper trim holes that won't be needed on my car (arrows point to holes).

A view from the inside after welding.

Two square-taillight mounting holes had to be filled. I used some small pieces of 20-gauge sheetmetal to fill the hole...

And then welded them.

I used 3M 8463 Flexible Foam to seal the baffle that separates the passenger compartment from the trunk.

Here's the foam.

I moved the car outside and shot the inside of the quarter panel and the rear quarter of the car with PPG DP primer. Before priming I removed and/or roughed up any excess POR-15. POR-15 is so glossy that other paints, primers, and even POR-15, have trouble sticking to it once it has dried.

Rubber weather stripping was used to seal the baffle against the quarter panel. You can also see that I have applied some weld-through primer (the silver-colored stuff) to areas that will be welded.

The fender lip was a perfect place to use 3M 8115 Panel Bonding Adhesive. This method was faster and neater than welding, plus I won't have to worry about rust forming here again.

Both surfaces were stripped to bare metal and roughed up with a 36-grit disc. Then the adhesive was spread on both bonding surfaces with a popsicle stick.

The quarter panel was set into place and the fender lip was clamped. The adhesive has a 2-hour work time at 70 degrees Fahrenheit, so there was plenty of time to adjust things. I left the clamps on for about 24 hours. Later, I did several tack welds before lifting the car off of the stand.

Next, I tack welded the C-pillar. It took lots of clamps to pull things into shape.

After tack welding.

Then I tack welded the rest of the panel. Here is the B-pillar. More clamps to pull things into alignment.

A bunch of welding. The rotisserie makes it much easier.

Welding the latch plate. A large C-clamp and a block of wood were used to pull the latch plate tight to the quarter panel.

Final welding on the C-pillar.

After grinding.

The kink after final welding and grinding.

The door opening after final welding and grinding.

Even though the tail panel will be replaced later, I tacked the quarter and the tail panels. In order to verify proper alignment, I'll keep the tail panel on the car until the other quarter panel has been replaced.

Jack Fahuna suggested to me that I weld the rocker panel seam on the bottom of the car. He explained that this helps to stiffen the shell. I welded four locations where it was easy to get MIG torch into position. Even with the rotisserie this was pretty awkward.

Two more welds in the middle of the car. This is under the driver's seat. I did one more weld at the front of the rocker.

This is a picture of the inside of the wheel well looking out. You can see the seam weld and the two braces that helped to ensure the replacement inner fender lip was placed in the correct position.

Done with welding and grinding!

Applying adhesive to the B-pillar braze joint.

Adhesive was worked into the joints from both sides and then clamped for 24 hours.

Excess adhesive was removed with a small drum sander on a die grinder and smoothed with sandpaper.

Done!