Need advice with body work

Appearance, Paint & Body Work
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Need advice with body work

By OmarG
- Fri Mar 05, 2010 6:54 pm #179396 So I traded my coupe for this hatch almost a year ago. My coupe needed body work, and I did it all with bondo, not too bad, mostly hail damage and a couple of minor dings here and there. Now THIS hatch has me beat. I'm thinking about just saying the hell with is and fiberglassing up all the monstrous dents. Of course, It'd be easier to just weld in new rears, or just find a new shell all together, but those aren't an option for me. I'm on a tight budget, with no welding experience. I just want my rear panels straight. Once the body work is done, I'll just rock a flat black hatch until I can repaint it phantom gray. ANYWAYS, I need some advice as to how to repair these suckas. It's a CX, and you can't really tell from the pictures (blame my cell phone) but the places were the side molding WOULD be are dented in pretty good. I'm thinking about just shaving the side moldings all together just to make it less of a hassle when it comes to body work.

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Tah Dah! The damage looks WAY worse in person. don't let the pictures fool you. :P
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By forcefedEG
- Fri Mar 05, 2010 6:59 pm #179397 one right way to fix it would be by stripping the pannel to bare metal and try straightening it with a stud wleder and a slide hammer... but that is very time consuming and if you dont have the equipment it would be costly to go purchase the stuff for this repair... and you would still end up coating once with fiberglass and maybe several coats of filler, depending on your abilitys... anonter right way and probally the best route would be to actually cut and replace the pannel with a new one or one from a salvage yard... id recomend getting one from a yard so you get an oem pannel... but you would still need several air tools and a wire feed welder and alot of patience... i wouldnt recomend salving it up with fiber glass if you plan on keeping it lol... but its your decision
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By OmarG
- Fri Mar 05, 2010 7:11 pm #179401 See, thats what i was thinking too. It also has rear end damage, (the part where the spare tire goes is crinkled in like an accordion) I straightened that out, but the rear subframe was pushed in about an inch (towards the gas tank) where the passenger LCA bolts to it. Lots of minor things like that. I don't plan on keeping it forever, just a year or two until I can build THE EG. from there I'll just swap all of my parts over. In the mean time, I just want to make the panels on this thing SEMI-straight. Atleast make it look nice, you know. I'm not striving for perfection, just... something I can cruise around in and feel good about. Everytime I hear the song "I wish I was a baller" I think of my car. It looks like such a beater...

"I wish I had a brand-new car
So far, I got this hatchback
And everywhere I go, yo I gets laughed at
And when I'm in my car I'm laid back
I got an 8-track and a spare tire in the backseat
But that's flat
And do you really wanna know what's really wack, What
See I can't even get a date
So, what do you think of that?
I heard that prom night is the bomb night
With a hood rat you can hold tight
But really tho' on figuero
When I'm in my car I can't even get a hello"


HAHAHA! This is SO me.
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By forcefedEG
- Fri Mar 05, 2010 7:15 pm #179402 lol honestly its up to you... if you know your not keeping it forever i would just salve it up then... it really is just your call... theres nothing wrong with trying to make it look decent... i wouldnt recomend shaving the moldings... thats is a b!tch to do! :lol: way more work than itd be worth...
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By teal_dx
- Fri Mar 05, 2010 7:46 pm #179407 if you're trying for the least amount of time/money/work route, then you have the right idea. But I would at least take out the rear panels and try to tap the dents out from the inside so your fiberglass/bondo won't be so thick.
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By OmarG
- Fri Mar 05, 2010 8:08 pm #179412 Beat you to it Teal! You should have seen them BEFORE i started. I'm gonna try and dolly them out a little bit more. I have false floors I'm rigging up too. :)

I'm just worried about getting the body lines right, you know? With the "OEM curves" haha. I guess i can worry about that when I get to the finishing stage.
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