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Re: Wampus Cat
Floor Rust
Somewhere in the past, someone had laid bondo and fiberglass on the sides and front of the cab floor to cover the gaping rust holes. At one point I had thought about just leaving this so that I could get the truck back on the road, but after completing all the rust repairs on the roof I couldn't bring myself to leave the floor with this mess, so I started poking at it.
It appears that they slapped this bondo/fiberglass mix on top of the dirty and rusty floor with no preparation, so it was just a crusty mess. The first picture below is about a fourth of the slabs of fiberglass that popped off. Once the loose stuff came up, I used a side grinder with a wire brush cup to remove the rest. It was a dirty, itchy mess.
The second and third pictures show the rust on the driver side floor and the huge hole where the gas pedal was mounted in some of the fiberglass.
The fourth and fifth picture show the passenger side floor and the top of the passenger side rocker panel.
The cab appears to have a thin layer of undercoating on the bottom, and because both the roof and windshield leaked, it appears that the cab floor rusted from the top down (or inside to out).
The good news is that the “A” pillar structure appears intact and the rocker panels are solid except on the top.
I plan to fabricate the patch panels for repairing the floor. I bought a Harbor Freight bench top 30” metal brake for about $50 and a Harbor Freight 2 inch tear-drop mallet for about $8 for doing this. I already have some body hammers and dollys.
I plan to use some of the leftover inner roof panel material (from the Craigslist roof that I bought for roof parts) to form some of the patch panels (it appears to be the same gauge as the floor). I also bought some 18 ga and 20 ga sheet metal drops at a local metal supply shop which sells drops by the pound.
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