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Camaro Door Straighten

10K views 41 replies 14 participants last post by  mitmaks 
#1 ·
After replacing my fender it's now time to try to salvage the door skin on my trusty 78 Camaro. It got slammed into by an errant motorist on a cell phone and dinged up the passenger side of the car including the quarter panel and a badly crumpled front fender.

I did not want to spend any money to buy a stud welder so I did the old tried and true method of drilling holes and pulling out the dents. A 4-1/2 foot long pipe, some hardware chain, tapcons and my spare tire as a pedastal for the bar and chain and out came the 4 foot long depression in my door.

This is what we did thirty years ago with a morgan knocker and then just filled the holes with filler. I am tempted to go back and weld these closed but there is enough depth left in the dents to allow a primer coat of duraglass before hitting it with some regular filler.

If it wasn't for the guard beam in the door I would have hammered this one out. I was not willing to put forth the effort to replace the skin or cut the door apart to fix. We would not have done it back then in the collision shop I worked at and I ain't doing it now.
 

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#12 ·
Hi Jester,

Here is a pic where most of the nasty dent was already pulled, if I can find a good before shot I will post that too. In this pic you can see the little bit left to pull out. Note how the crown line is pushed in too, you can see allot of little hammer marks in an arc above the crown line where dents are pulled out. By pulling below the crown line where the nasty crease was I was able to strike the crease line above the crown with a pick hammer. This released the stress in the metal and popped out the top of the dent too and brought the crown line out to about where it was before the impact. To add insult to injury this door had been smacked once before too, so it was good and work hardened. A PDR guy would have broke his tool trying to straighten this one if he could even get to it because of guard beam inside door. Oh yeah, thanx for not flaming me, my wife is complaing how hot our living room is getting.
 

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#5 ·
Duraglass isn't what it was years ago! You didn't have to drill holes to get it to adhere! The instructions on the back say to drill holes in the repair area years ago the product didn't say that! I weld holes!!!!! I don't want more of em! Ive seen bump shops do a lot of short cuts to save and make money but your not in a bump shop! Show the young guys on here how to do it the right way not the bump shop in and out the door way:thumbup:


Jester:D
 
#8 ·
Why not go to the local U pull it and get another door 10 min and your done you'll spend more than the price on materials alone not to mention the 20 hrs of time you'll e wasting ...theres lots of those cars in the yards. and in all likelyhood it'll need pins and bushings anyway so why not just replace it...
and still get a respectable job

Bondo...30.00
primer ...50.00 a qt
20 hrs labor
not to mention 50.00 worth of sandpaper (all the grits)



a good used door .....50.00

OH yeah and save THAT kind of work for something thats hard to find like a Mersadies ,LOL.
Seriously though Its good to see someone with enough confidence in themselves to think they can spread that much bondo & primer and have it look perfect or even good for that matter...
 
#11 ·
My Green Camaro took best in class it's first outing, I blocked the whole car, even reworked the roof to quarter seems, yeah the confidence is there.

A good used door for fifty bucks, LOL!!! I searched for months around here and ended up buying one on evil bay for $180.00 only to find out is waffled worse than the one already on the car. $50.00 Camaro doors are in the same plausibiltiy as car craft making money on all their six cylinder to v/8 swaps by selling off the parts for $500.00 that nobody else could give away. We never had a car come back to our shop with bodywork falling out of it. An 1/8" of filler ain't gonna fall out. Just saying.......
 

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#9 ·
holes and bondo ?

Knocking holes is just for getting it straight enough so the window will still roll up in the winter beater rust bucket , It's Cold outside around here. A few years ago I collected enough from people's insurance running into me, I didn't ask for a new paint just make things work. , My winter beater truck ended up free.
 
#10 ·
I hope you made enough to buy a stud welder...back in (The Day) thats how it ALL was done, there were no stud welders and a lot of those jobs are still holding up..
I've had my stud welder for over 20 yrsand I love it but I still use my knocker for old crap that needs to be done quick and cheap.
 
#13 ·
I was going to post earlier...didn't...to disgusted with the repair...I've been in the business for over 30 years...never drilled holes to pull a dent without welding them up...if your getting any flaming...it's well deserved...I feel sorry for any novice reading the OP's original post and thinking "that's a great idea".

If nothing else we are saving you money on your heating bill in your living room...Oh wait, you live in Florida...no money to be saved.

Sorry for the temperature of my post, but, I couldn't leave well enough alone.

Ray
 
#15 · (Edited)
And as a plus that I really love is you can weld the studs in the windshield frames that hold the molding clips...just need the proper head and studs ,they came with my magna spoter...the only thing I dont like about it is you have to grind before you can pull so its hard to see how much your pulling compared to the knocker where you can see exactly how straight its getting.
 
#17 ·
If that car is kept in a garage, the mudded up repair would last forever... how do I know? The old school body man who painted my Nova 20 years ago fixed a big dent in the door the exact same way. The filler never fell out or cracked and the backside never rusted. Not saying its the "right" way, just sayin it can work. The guy has a right to fix his car however he wants...but I think he HAD to know his method would be frowned upon here!! I think he's pushing your buttons guys!!!

What he's doing is a little different than stuffing newspaper in a rusted out dog leg and mudding over!!
 
#18 ·
Your right Andy, he has the right to fix the car any way he wants...I couldn't care less if he used a can opener and the filled the dent with drywall mud, but, there are a lot of people that come on this site to learn howto do things and as you said...that your not saying it's the right way...it's not the right way and if a newbie comes on and thinks to himself "I can do that" how does that help the hobby, as not all cars are in a garage.
 
#20 ·
There's been enough responses to his post that I think a Newb might somehow get the idea this isn't the right way in restoration or reputable production shops. I'm with Andy that he's just being ornery but it is acceptable in some circles and I've just finished grinding 1/2" of filler out of the quarter of a "pristine" 1990 TransAm with new BC/CC paint a buddy just bought from a collector car dealer. When I started color sanding the car, then run off was red. You couldn't notice the filler work but my buddy dropped it off and wanted me to buff it and give it a killer shine, when he saw the red sanding residue, he wasn't happy. Now I'm finishing up replacing bad metal and about ready to hit it with epoxy and then surfacer.
 
#25 ·
right begind the dent

you can drill a hole behind the dent careful not to go tru the outher panel just the beam and use that to get to the areas you need to push out but it will allso lossen the bond that was used between the beam and the panel so it you dont want a rattle you should use a good body caulk use a auto caluk not one for home
 
#26 ·
Hay hook time .

In the factory a lot of the metal finshers had their own special tools they made. Most had some J or L hooks, usually 12 to 18 inches long, made from trunk lid or hood torsion springs. The ends were sometimes pointed or with a ball end. they were used in areas where you couldn't get a hammer, On cowl tops they would punch a hole in the upper firewall, insert the end of the hook then using leverage work the ding up , sometimes by twisting the T handle . On minor dings on doors behind the guard rail. The holes in exposed areas were filled with a pinch of body sealer and thumbed kind of smooth.
 
#27 ·
If you ever watched a paintless dent repair guy they will work miracles at getting around intrusion beams. And of course there is always the possibility to cut it out and weld it back in. Yeah I know it won't have the same structural integrity but the year before there wasn't even one there and we drove those cars without fear.

Brian

 
#28 ·
thing that sucks about the hole era is a lot of guys just used the screw slide hammers and made teepees out of the hole and stretching the metal in those areas and thinning it. Instead of rolling the metal out they just yanked hard and if you don't roll it out right you get teepees. If you know what you're doing the teepee effect won't be an issue.
 
#30 ·
I was a master slide hammer dent puller. :D or should that be :sweat:
One of the worse things we did was drill the holes, the teepee or as we called them volcanos were a sure thing with a drilled hole. But if it is punched with an awl the volcano is going IN so when you pull it out you end up with something much flatter.

I can't believe that I just did a "Basics" on a slide hammer dent puller. :spank:

Brian
 
#31 ·
don't get me wrong, I get the volcanoes too but on most repairs of that era I see no clear direction as to where to put the holes. They're usually all in a straight line, as if the guy said, "this is the lowest spot I'm pulling here!", and because they didn't put the holes where they needed to be to roll it out, or perhaps didn't hammer down highs while yanking they create huge volcanoes. Seeing this is just a head ache to fix. I'm sure I wouldn't have done any different...I probably would have mudded over them to top it off. :D

Thought it was worth mentioning because the severity of that could be a determining factor on whether or not to skin. I did my mustang and it had holes all accross the door and as I was half done I wanted to just toss it but also didn't want to throw away all that work. I got to keep my original sheet metal allright...some odd hours later.
 
#33 ·
I'm building an 85 camaro(Iroc) my drivers door had about a 1/3 of the damage yours does and full of those holes too...so off to pull-a-part I went, there was ten to choose from I found a real nice drivers door undamaged with O rust...48.00..
I found a real nice pass door while there
I suspect my pass door is in the same shape so I'll take the grinder to it to be sure but for 50.00 I cant even weld up the holes that cheap,never mind all that filler work and in the end I'll have a filler free set of doors with very little time in them...
Skinning it would be my next choice, it sould only take 1-2 hours to skin that bad boy and not only would it be cheaper in the end it'll be filler free.

There are those that love doing filler work though,I'm just not one of them.Its dirty and time consuming ,that door would take me a min of 10 hrs to get ready for paint,at my shop thats 500.00 for a door full of bondo..a skin would be 2-300.00...a good used door 150.00 but you have to look them over real good...
 
#34 ·
There are no $50.00 Camaro doors in my area, I don't remember $50.00 doors ever now that I think of it. Guess it depends on locale. If you count the time it takes to go to the salvage yard, scout the door and then remove it, plus you have to remove door off of "good" car to replace it and then get everything to line up with replacement door plus you usually have to strip the paint off old door to prep for paint and transfer the insides of your old door and glass, reinstall interior door panel. That takes less time than popping out a 1/2" depression and filling it? That was never the case when I did it for a living. Plus 35yr old door gaskets don't transfer over very well and the one on the donner door ain't gonna seal either. I can weld allot of holes for less than $50.00, it would cost a DIY jobber much more to change out that door, just saying........
 
#35 ·
Your on the right track...I was stripping the whole car anyways got the nose done and the door when I decided to scrap the door it takes less that an hour to strip a door but thats the easy part I'm rebuilding the door with new seals window regs& motors,rebuilt hinges etc...
Yours is a whole different type of job,I understand this..taking the door off will open a big can of worms and get expensive so you just want to fix the damage and only the damage...two completely different jobs...
That said, I dont just go wandering around the yards looking for a part ,I get online find the part and how many there are so I can pick and choose..Once I found the best door it took less than 15 min to pull it ,its a complete door so if I wanted too I could just replace it as a unit and just change out the lock cylinder Once I left the shop I was back within two hrs and had lunch too.
so far I have two hrs getting it ...100.00
the door itself.............................50.00
1 1/2 hrs stripping the outside and rebuilding the hinges...75.00
today I'll spend a few min and spray the epoxy primer on the outer shell and tomorrow 1 1/2 hr fixing 1/2 a dozen dime size dings but lets call it another 4hrs or 200.00 altogether thats 425 for a freash door ready to paintmost of that is all preppeing that I'd have to do anywayactual body work is only 1 1/2 hrsSo in my case its the way to go being my labor is expensiveIf your not counting labor its ok to spend two days doing body work only its just 10-30.00 for a can of bondo.
But to tell the truth ,if I was doing that job I would'nt bother welding up the holes,I'd just stuff it too...Theres the right way for every job and thats the right way for that particular job...mostly I was just showing there are good doors out thereand they are prtty cheap I found two less than 5 mile away ....and dont buy stuff from Ebay and amitures get your parts from yards that know how to grade the quality of the part so you donet waste time and money buying junk....Location DOES have a lot to do with the selection and quality of parts.... a good salvage yard will ship all over the country....
 
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