The Bronze was done in the 70's, and it uses some of the method outlined in the original How to Hot Rod and Race Handbook, and some gas welding. In my case, panels were made up for my car just as Matt did on his - strait out to the 1/4 panel from the center seam on the wheel well. In my case, the inside was bonded and pop riveted in; then gas welded on to the 1/4 panel.proflex wrote:
The main question I’m asking is what would be the best way to connect this made up piece to the ¼ panel. I’m thinking probably B or C in my pic. A would be easier to do though.
When I took off all the old body work, well you can imagine what effect the gas welding had on a nice large, thin panel! It was not pretty. I hammered out quite a bit more than was done in its original inception, but it still took some fill, especially on my driver’s side (I think they did this one first as the pass side was a lot better).
With the magic bonding agents out there today, I sure would lean on the use of the glue. I actually glued on the rockers onto the Bronze in my restoration, and no side what so ever of any failure in the boding and it’s been 6 years now. And you’d think with the hellish stiff spring rates we use, if it was going to let go, it would have done so by now! I bought the $60 application gun and used the structural Proform stuff available at Lordco.
Here's a dusty construction photo from my build all those years ago. You can clearly see the filler panel was tucked under the seam, than pop riveted into place. The rivets you see on the fenders are the ones securing the flares - those are the original rivets use in 1971 - I never removed the flares themselves as the bond showed no sign of failure so it must have been well done in the first place. This car has been flared with this installation since 1971!