1955 Chevy Tri-Five Body Rust Repair - Body Check

After a cleaning with a wire brush, the horror was sickening. Time and the moisture trapping properties of the lead filler and Bondo had taken a bad toll on the tailpan.

Tommy Barber of CARS spun up the cutoff wheel and began removing the cancerous outer metal so we could get to the inner tailpan/rear body mount area.

Peeling away the outer piece, we found more holes in the inner structure than a piece of Swiss cheese. Don't be alarmed if you find something similar. The replacement part from Danchuk takes care of everything.

Underneath the old outer tailpan, we found evidence of a decades-old repair from some sort of rear end collision, where patch metal had been hastily welded in place.

Barf! Here's another close-up of the inner area showing how bad things were. This area is actually made up of two individual pieces of metal, both of which we'll be replacing.

Moving over to the driver-side corner, Tommy began cutting away some of the inner corner to make it easier when drilling out the upper spot welds.

A good look inside the driver-side fender revealed another past repair, probably related to the '60s corner-cut job after the car had been hit in that area sometime during the Johnson or Nixon administration. We'll be handling this problem in a later story.

Tommy Barber of CARS spun up the cutoff wheel and began removing the cancerous outer metal so we could get to the inner tailpan/rear body mount area.

After marking out what metal needed to be removed (we wouldn't have to use all of the Danchuk replacement metal), Tommy began cutting so we could get the rotted steel out of the way. Having a good complement of air tools, including a cutoff wheel, is a must for this job.

Before joining the two new Danchuk pieces together for installation, weld through zinc primer was applied to the mating surfaces. When built at the factory, these two pieces didn't receive any treatment like this, hence our rust issue. The zinc primer means moisture won't be able to attack the new steel, but still allows for proper welding.

Once the last cut was made, the old inner mount/trunk end came free. Before installing the new metal, we'll do some dressing and cleaning back here before welding everything in.

Ready to go, the new rear body mount/rear trunk floor area was located and tack welded in place. We only tack welded in case we have to make any adjustments when welding in the new inner fender corner pieces on both sides. We also have to transfer the trunk latch and guide pieces to the new metal. All of this will be covered in our next installment.