A customer has a '95 Astro van with the exterior trim removed. The holes for mounting the trim are about .375" and there are about 6 per side, spaced about 6" apart. He doesn't want to use bondo, but he doesn't want to provide access to the back side of the panels either. I would ideally use a copper spoon to back up the weld, then use a hammer and dolly to flatten/stretch the panel. Having limited experience doing body work of this kind, I am reluctant to shrink this guys door doing a bunch of welds. I considered using tapered plugs just slightly oversized and doing small autogenous welds around the edge, but I think in practice this method would give inferior results. Anyone have ideas?
Hello devo, this may sound simplistic, but how about just soldering a small plug of steel into the holes and then smoothing them over? Solder used to be the staple with body work prior to the introduction of bondo. Just a thought for consideration. Best of luck and regards, aevald
In the old days of soldering body pannels there were soldering irons with conical tips made for soldering holes shut. The tip was inserted into the hole and solder was fed as the tip was withdrawn. The excess was filed off afterward.
Hello Dave, that's great info, dating yourself a bit eh?...... Sorry, I couldn't resist. Best regards, Allan
I have only seen this done in a book "Auto Body Repair" by Bill Talbot if i remember corectly. The book belonged to one of My friends when We were teenagers. It was suggested for trim holes and dent puller holes.
Soldering iron (or bondo) is probably the only safe way to do this. Anything that involves a flame or an arc also involves the danger that some unknown material between the metal skin and the inner panel might catch fire.
Bill
This is my suggestion for and answer to your problem. I would make sure that you have a good thick backup, aluminum or copper. Go down to the welding supply and ask them for something called Heat Fence if he does not have that then tell him what you are doing and then he will know what it is because some places call it other things such as Thermal Gel. It may come in a paste or a gel. Put it around the hole, be careful not to get it to close to the hole because it does not weld very nice. There will be a problem if it is on the surface that the filler metal will need to be in.
Weld up the hole let the back up and the heat fence stay on until the weld is completely cool and you should be in good shape.
Those holes are so small that I see no fire hazzards. Personally I would clean all the paint from the surrounding area and use GTAW. Set the filler metal in at about 90 amps after it has cooled for a few minutes you could crank up the amps to about 145 and them go over the filler metal to smooth it out. You might get lucky and have very little grinding to do. Good luck.
Topic American Welding Society Services / Technical Standards & Publications / plug welding on body panels
