Repairing rear wheel arches

[cibvr4]

Guys

Started what i thought would be a quick repair job on some bubbling and flaking paint today on the rear wheel arches of my KE55....

Well i found more rust than i'd hoped for, lip is rooted totally, lost the edge and inner and outer skins are now seperated! Does anyone know if u can buy repair sections for KE55 rear wheel arches? I'm gussing not so it's gonna be a bodgy repair job. My panel beating skills fall short of rolling metal to shape so it's gonna be a lot of fibreglass i think.

Anyone attempted this sort of thing before and got suggestions?

Thanks

cibvr4

[Silly Rabbit]

...if you are handy with the fibreglass then give it a crack since it ain't gonna rust again ....but if you want to replace it with metal i'm sure you could find a wrecked car that may yield you some decent replacement bits.........then it is a case of cutting and welding and sanding and probably costing you a decent amount..........it all depends on how far you want to go and how much you want to spend........then it boils down to whether the car is worth that much to fix.......sucks i know but if there is rust in that section there will probably be rust in other parts too and there is no point in fixing one bit if you are just gonna be chasing it all over the car and throwing dollars at it.........good luck with sorting it out and here's hoping you can get a reasonably cost effective solution to it

[cibvr4]

hadn't thought of cutting good bits from a wreck.... I'll see what i can find in the local yards. The car is a little PRC rally car, handles well and plenty of go. As long as it's not structual i'm happy to repair as i find it, but i can't justify paying a panel shop to do it.

I used to rally a Datsun 1600 but gave up with all the rust. Great car but i was repairing rust between every event, it just got to the point where for my sanity and safety i need a newer car that wasn't a rust bucket! Hopefully i don't find too much more in the little corolla...

[Silly Rabbit]

...yeah well give the wreckers a crack and see what turns up..........if it doesn't have to be the prettiest job then you should be able to get away with tack welding the replacement guards on and with a skim of bog and some paint over the top you may have it looking near the mark......and since it isn't structural it should do the job...even if you get a panel shop to line the stuff up and weld it on it shouldn't cost too much if you can do most of the other stuff yourself

[sillycar chick]

They all seem to rust there. Mine had it when I got it, we just glassed and bogged to pass roadworth with the hope of finding better ones to cut and weld later on. Never got that far though. Its not all that hard either, since my KE55 was my first car, it was my first attempt at bogging and glassing. Turned out alright, no one noticed. I think its hard to find good arches for them.

["Z" UTE]

Check the old forums mate, I posted details of a bloke in Queensland that makes rust repair panels. Unfortunately the magazine where the info came from is long gone.

Failing that, buy a copy of the Parts Peddler magazine or Just Parts, that is where I found his ad. And yes, he will make repair panels for just about anything.

cheers Chuck.

[cibvr4]

Check the old forums mate, I posted details of a bloke in Queensland that makes rust repair panels....

Rust repair panels, guys as I said I found these guys through the Parts Peddler magazine.

Craig Vayne Sheetmetal Fabrications
Phone: (07) 4122 2326

I''ll give these guys a call tomorrow and see what the deal is. I'm in a fair bit of strife with my rust problem, i can slide my hand into the boot between the qtr panel and the wheel arch! Should of just left that damn bog alone......

[cibvr4]

Lucked out with Craig Vayne, he's got rid of all his old dies and doesn't do any old Toyota stuff anymore

[rob1]

The 55's all rust there. there is a sort of foam strip in between the inner and outer skins on the back guards. This is I believe why they rust there. I simply cut the rust out and bolted on flares. Warning, the foam stuff is flamable. I found this out while angle grinding. The thing is if you weld new sections in the welds will most probably start to rust in a few years anyway, and you can also get rust under the fibrglass. Go the flares, they look better anyway......

[Dimitri]

greg at taylor street auto here in qld runs and IPRA ke55 racer. he uses fibre glass over fenders (flairs). cheap and easy, job done?

let me know i can chase him up if you want, or just look him up on www.whitepages.com.

[Trent-KE30]

Yeah my KE55 has this problem as well although it was only a bit of surface, i grinded out the rust and put a light skim of bog over the top, glad to hear mine wasn't rusted into the boot. Fix it mate its for a corolla its always worth it

[cibvr4]

Flairs aren't an option. I have to stick with stock coachwork as per PRC guidelines. You're right though, nearly every KE55 i looked at was rusted over the arches and quaters. I went to the 2 yards i normally go to but they had nothing suitable. So i drove out to another yard that i'd been told was pretty big. I found one that had good arches. They even have an on-site panel beater, who'll do all the work the smash repair shops wont. $150 for the pair of arches & $300 to weld them in and patch the rust in the quaters. No filler or paint but i don't mind that, means i can see what sort of job they've done

I'll post some pictures of what they're repairing, makes $450 look cheap!

[cibvr4]

RHS has had the rust cut out, LHS just had a wire brush on it. I was initially going to do this myself but for $450 i get my weekend back and a professional job. Money well spent i think.

[30psi 4agte]

Im interrestd to see what sort of job is done too !
So post up some pics if you get it done