toolman

Thongs are acceptable wear except when welding. Hammer welding was used when both sides are accessible. Must use a dolly on backside to hammer weld flat after welding with steel rod. The advantage is the weld is flat on both sides. Any welding on the Datsun 25 gauge metal requires a lot of patience.

corner opening left front of floor pan using a bench vise slowly pound in circular pattern from inside to out. Open jaws as you increase pounded area. used the vise jaws to bend the top edge of pan after matching the patch, tack weld patch to pan check pan alignment then final weld patch

Decided to strengthen the left side panel because of all of the corrosion. So I added a 16 gauge piece welded to the side panel and firewall. trail fitting the piece in place welding strengthening panel in

cardboard template transfer to sheet metal rear view of floor pan my tiny work area

exterior view of firewall and rocker panel interior view of firewall Put a cardboard on a floor jack under the hole in the floor. This is used to create a template for sheet metal replacement floor pan. The hole was traced with a flet pen. Notes and measurements were written on the cardboard for reference. Always add additional sheet metal as you can always cut the extra material off. Adding material later is more difficult. I replaced the floor pan with 20 gauge sheet metal( the original was 22 gauge stuff). The pan consists of both straight bends but have curved edges too. sharedmedia=gallery:images:35465] fitting and cutting the pan aligning the pan