[mbmmca]

I will do some more searches after posting, but help is needed. Upon deciding to keep the car, I thought I'd start cleaning up the underside. Looked pretty good (I thought) when I brought it home so I wasn't too concerned. Low and behold, when we started peeling away layers of coating, we found poor patch jobs. Looks like the P.O. put new floor pans over the old ones, from the underside, and then put some kind of sheet metal over those. When he got done, he coated the whole underside with a tar equivilant. YUCK! It took an air hammer to get thru the 2 layers he added which left me the original pans that look like swiss cheese.

My question is this...the tunnel looks good, so far as do the pans under the rear seat. Can I replace the pans using the LH and RH sections I see that are about 60" long? I can't really afford to use the 1pc pan. What else do I have to consider when replacing pans? This wasn't part of the plan when I got this thing....

 

[go2fast]

Got a pic?

 

[mbmmca]

I'll try for pics tomorrow, with the daylight. There isn't really much to see but you'll see one side peeled away and the other side untouched. I'll get them up as soon as I can.

New camera, pics are a breeze now. They are in the album in my sig since I don't know how to do thumbnails...

 

[bearcat44]

I will tell you my experience. My floors were ROTTEN.I ripped out the floor in one day. I then bought a whole new floor pan and let me tell you the piece is beautiful. Fits like a glove and is really easy. Now all we have to do is weld

 

[JimM]

I recently did one side, from the front of the front seat to the middle of the back seat. The "quarter pans" worked out OK, and the job was much less intimidating than a full floor would have seemed.

The peice didn't really have enough "flange" to weld to the rocker pinch weld as the stock floor did. I had to leave a lip of original metal along the rocker and lapweld it there. Those areas where the original metal was completely bad all the way thru the pinchweld were "interesting."

If both sides are bad, you might find the full floor is both easier to do and makes a better repair when complete.

 

[choptop]

Mary Beth, I'm in the middle of replacing my floorpans with the 60" long sections. Had the full floor been available when I began this repair (my project has been on hold several times over the last 3 years) I would have gone that route instead. The only problem with the full floor is having to pull the subframe to get the piece in- currently I'm doing my pans with the subframe on the car (no room to pull and store parts). Tricky but workable

The main problem with doing a full length pan is dealing with the subframe support and seat brace. They are a pita to remove (about 40-50 welds to cut) and lots of fun to re-install. I used one of the eastwood weld cutters that leaves a "plug" behind. You can use the plugs as a guide when reinstalling the support and brace (mainly I used this on the rocker and tunnel- the others I just drilled through since I was discarding the old pans). I also had to massage the seat brace to fit snugly on the new pans. Just be prepared to do lots of fitment work (beat with a hammer, test fit, beat some more with a hammer, test fit etc.).

I have some pics of the left half process if you would like to see how I did mine.

 

[Everett#2390]

But then think about the floor pan does hold the rearmost bolt for the subframe. Maybe move another set of stands to the rocker panels.

 

[mbmmca]

Yes Scott, if you have pics I wanna see them. The check book says I do the 60" side pans, one at a time. The credit card is maxxed out with plumbing repairs, (don't ask) and I can't take away from the kids activities.
It would be my preference to do the full pan as well, but you know how it goes...no room, minimal money, and kids come first.
What I would most like to see is the weld spots to put these back in. I can get anything out, I just need to know what needs to stay. I think Jim mentioned a short weld flange? I guess I better account for the possibility.
Jim where was that at?

 

[RockinRob]

Marybeth,

i have the left and right floor pans if your interested in them. Or anyone else for that matter.

Rob

 

[mbmmca]

Mine!

MB

 

[JimM]

MB, the pans I got, the flange where the floor side is supposed to bend down and meet the rocker flat just weren't deep enough. Where the original floor, that "pinchweld flange" is an inch deep, on the pan it was only maybe 1/4".

Here's the post where I did mine, if you missed it. LOT of pics and good advice in there. http://www.camaros.net/forums/showthread.php?t=97501

 

[mbmmca]

Hey Jim, are you sure that those aren't pictures of my car? Actually, yours looks better than mine does. I think I'm going to finish with the cutting wheel. I got a bt carried away trying to remove some of the patches the PO put on and ended up going all the way thru. Oops Guess I wasn't supposed to do that.

 

[choptop]

I think Jim mentioned a short weld flange? I guess I better account for the possibility.
Jim where was that at?

The flange he is talking about is on the rocker side of the floor pan. The full side pans have about a 3/4 to 1 inch tall flange that butts to the rockers and the original is more like 1 3/8 inches tall. I found some difficulty in getting the flange welded to the rocker, but I was able to attach it with some careful work. If your original pan is solid near the rocker you might want to leave about an inch or so to lay the new panel on and lap weld onto this area. I chose to remove all of the old pan flange that attached to the rocker due to some rust that made that area relatively useless to try and save.

Here are some pics of the cutouts I made. These were just rough cuts which were trimmed up later. I'll upload some of the installed results soon.

 

[mbmmca]

Thanks for the pics. Most helpful. Keep them coming...

 

[choptop]

For some reason I cannot find the pics of toe section of the installed pan and seat brace. I'll see if I can snap some quick pics of those for you tomorrow.

I did find the pics below. Basically what I did to install the pans was dry fit several times, cut the pan to overlap the existing edge by about an inch or so, attached the pan with a few tac welds and then adjusted the gaps with hammer and dolly as necessary. I put in plug welds along the edge to firmly anchor the pan. After that I welded some short beads along the seam (about 1/2 inch each run), alternating areas to allow the metal to cool and avoid warpage. Once I had closed the entire seam I ground the welds a bit to give a more finished appearance.

 

[mbmmca]

Looks great. My can of worms just keeps getting bigger. It looks as though water sat in the front end for some time. The toe board is toast about 1/2 way up and the inner rocker is shot from the seat mount forward. Any suggestions for that? I don't want to replace the whole inner rocker if I don't have to.The PO put in a layer of sheet metal and covered everything with bondo and a tar like substance. Had I known that I never would have bought it. Oh well hind sight is 20/20.

 

[mbmmca]

Scott, what did you use to cut thru all those welds? We have gone thru 1/2 dozen spot weld cutters, both sides.

 

[JimM]

are you oiling them? you gotta keep em wet.

 

[choptop]

Mary Beth, I used a cutter similar to this one:

I got away with using only one for both sides, but I supplemented cutting with a 3/8 inch drill bit for the areas where it made no difference to punch all the way through. The good part with this cutter is you can replace the cutting head and it has two cutting surfaces. I tried not to bear down on it too much. An adjustable speed drill is a must for these cutters. I turned mine all the way down! A drop of oil in the groove now and again works wonders.

The long cuts I made with a cheapo Harbor-Freight 4 inch electric grinder fitted with an abrasive fiber cutting wheel. You can see the orange case in one of the cutout pics. Works well but makes lots of sparks, dust and keep a close eye on your fingers!

Usually the 60 inch floor pans come with a section of toe board. Can you tell how high the damage is?

Hard to say what is best for the inner rocker without seeing the rust. If you can post a couple of pics that would be great. Patching might be an option, but unless you can fabricate the patch you'll likely have to buy a complete inner rocker to get the section you need.

Took a quick snapshot of my driver toeboard area:

I would show you a pic of the re-installed seat brace but parts of the welding job I have done so far are very ugly (I'm a little embarrassed ) and some will have to be worked on before I can call it finished. Good thing this will all be under the carpet!

 

[mbmmca]

I'll post pics for you tomorrow so you can see how bad it really is. Not enough light to do it tonight, even with a flash. Did your pans come with that lower half of the toe board (under the accelorator) or is there more I have to buy?