The Rogue Element - Update #1
In my previous post I showed a few pics of my new, rusty Element. I've made some progress I thought I'd share. Join me as we bring this toaster back to life!
I got the interior fully stripped out:
Most of the white padding underneath the rubber floor mats was either badly stained or still damp, so I'm going to have to replace all of that. Pulling out all the flooring helped me locate a few more small areas of surface rust. Nothing too bad, though.
You can see in the wheel well a few spots. Nothing some OSPHO can't handle.
Here's a view from the other side after a thin coat of OSPHO, 24 hours dry time, and some Rustoleum Rust Stop Primer. (I'd prefer some Epoxy Primer, but I have none on hand at the moment.)
With the floor mats out, I got my drill and scrub-brush attachment and some various cleaning solutions and got to scrubbing. This...wasn't that successful. I got the easy stuff off, but these are well stained. I tried Simple Green, some Vinegar and Water mix, and a few other household cleaners, but nothing got out the stains. Any suggestions?
I also pulled out the center console bracket - it was pretty rusty, so it got a full treatment and some primer for now:
Now on to the rust holes! Now, I am very much an amateur welder. It's been 6 years since I have welded, and I wasn't that great back then. Plus, welding thin sheet metal is HARD.
Anyway, I decided to start on the driver's side floorboards, since there are only two small holes to deal with. The smallest is a quarter-sized hole by the side door here:
I started with a paper template:
...transferred that to some thin steel, and fiddled with it for a hour or so to get it just the right size.
And then tried welding it up. I blew like a dozen holes in it - it was super frustrating.
After getting frustrated and re-checking all of my welder settings and leaving it overnight to think about, I tried again and did finally get some decent penetration without blowing through too much.
Yes, these are ugly welds, but this will all be covered, so I'm just going to keep rolling.
I dressed the welds a bit more, then primed it and moved on to the spot on the front floorboard. I made a paper template, cut it out of steel, and fitzed around with it until it was close enough to fitting.
Some more really ugly welds later:
This is where I thought I was going to stop for the night, hence the picture. But I knew I'd have to put everything away and then pull out all my tools again the next day, so I changed my mind and kept going. I filled in all of those holes, and dressed and primed it. So now at least the driver's side floorboard is done! (I was so tired I forgot to take a picture of the finished product.)
I'll crawl under and work on the one spot on the frame that's rusted out later this week. It's coming along!
The passenger side is the bigger issue. There's a pretty decent hole in the floor, the whole side of the crossmember that the seat mounts to, and the lower section of the rocker panel to be replaced. I'll build my skills with the small stuff and work up to that.
I hope that this post will inspire folks. Even a chump like me with no money to throw at this can do these types of repairs. It's certainly not show car worthy, but if I can get one of these cars back on the road for a few more good years, I'll be happy!
EDIT: I forgot to explain the title. I've decided to call this Element "The Rogue Element". This is the concept image I created to show my goal:
I learned back in art class that a good concept is to have two main colors (green and grey), but then to have a third, complementing accent color used sparingly. That will be the yellow. The stripe, and yellow H emblem, and the yellow fog lights is just enough to kick it up a notch. I liked the color scheme, and it reminded me of Rogue from the X-Men. The green and yellow were colors she wore a lot. (I read a lot of comic books as a teenager.)