Productive week on the bus. I finished up the welding on the passenger side rear lower corner and got some Duraglas on that to seal up the weld.
Then I turned my attention to the driver's side. This was pretty much the only area with bondo on the entire vehicle, but judging from the inside the damage didn't look too bad.
Propane torch and a 3" scraper made quick work of the plastic, then I hit it with a flap wheel to strip the remaining crap off. I had to do some work straightening the rear wheel arch corner section but I was able to keep it intact on this side.
First I painted the aux battery tray and got that tacked and spot welded in place.
This is the method I use for cutting body panels (when I can). I'll roughly sketch out a line on the Bus to where I can see the ends of the line with my replacement panel over top. Then, I clamp the panel on in a few places and then transfer my line over to the replacement metal. I use the body saw to cut through both pieces of metal (OG and the replacement) at the same time. This leaves an identical cut line on either side of my joint, eliminating the need for adjustment afterwards.
I mocked up the panel with butt welding clamps and scored a line on the inside of the panel where the flange joint needed to be. I trimmed the panel and then transferred the curve to a piece of cardboard and made a template for my flange. Cut that out of 20 ga, refined it a bit and then welded it on.
Tacked in place, I had to fight this one a bit (again) due to previous damage on the OG metal. I had to stretch out the OG metal a bit and shrink in the replacement metal to meet.
And welded up.
I was running out of gas for the MIG when I was finishing up the lower corner so I wanted to get the decklid hinge repair panel at least tacked in so I could mock up the decklid. I decided for times sake that I'm going to leave the upper lip and weld the new panel where I drilled out the spot welds to remove the old one. The worst part of this repair is removing the very ends of the original panel where the rear corner and its inner structure meet the decklid hinge panel.
Once I got it tacked in, I threw on the donor decklid with new hinges courtesy of WW (these are super nice). Overall very happy with the gaps, this was my first fit up and I didn't adjust it one bit. The decklid is tweaked a bit and sits about 1/4" proud on the passenger side, so I will have to devise a plan to straighten it a bit before paint.
Hoping to run to Airgas and swap out the bottle this afternoon so I can keep rolling.