Interesting repair today. Had a newer Ford PU in the shop with a wavy pass door. Obviously had been up against something "stationary" at one time and had kinda "oil-canned" the door skin. Appeared to be a real simple fix. I fig'd a couple tugs with the cup in one or two places and mabey wet sand & buff a scuff mark from the door moulding and we're good to go. The paint wasn't broken, no creases, scratches, ect. No obvious impact other than what appeared to be a tree sap scuff on the moulding. Boy was I wrong... I've been doing this line of work off and on for about ten years now and I learn something new EVERY day!
Well, long story shortened a little, I fiddle-f-k'ed with this durn door for close to four hours before exasperation set in and drastic measures needed to happen. I'd pull here and it'd pop in there, back and forth. It was like the whole panel/skin was stretched. I broke paint and started placing studs in stratigic locations to try to pull it to stay without over-stretching it. I even broke the skin loose to try to reposition it a bit. Still no luck. I gutted the door to see if it was sprung somehow, no... looked great fit good, shut good ect. I tried shrinking here and there with still no luck. Man, I was scratching my chin! :confused: I was thinking I'd need to re-skin the Damn thing. I finally won; I grabbed the cut-off wheel and sliced it about 8" in the middle of the problem and wallah! it pulled out and stayed out! Rolled the welder over and carefully stitched it closed again and a small skim of filler at the incision and looks great! I've never had to do that before. I usually could allways find the "culprit" before and attack that. I guess sometimes you have to create damage before you can fix damage. ;) Just thought I'd share.

I have done that before! I have had luck fixing oil cans with a stud welder. If you hold the oil can about halfway between in and out, and have someone go in a circle around it with a shrinking tip on the stud gun, get it nice and hot,then rinse it with a cold wet sponge and continue to hold it till it cools it will usually stay put. I have had panels like you described where it seems like your just chasing it all over the panel.It can be frustrating. When all else fails - cave it and pave it!

Boomhauer Wrote " Cave it and Pave it "
Ohhh Yeah.....For thosw who buy there mud in FIVE
gallon buckets... :D

The stud gun shrinking technic works great . graemlins/thumbsup.gif !

Originally posted by boomhauer:
When all else fails - cave it and pave it! LOL...... :eek:

Yeah, I attempted the shrinking method. Hard to do with one guy. I have a couple of old playground balls that I deflate and slide behind the panel and reinflate partially to help, but he heat from the gun creates havoc with the rubber ball.... :D

It seems like we replace everything these days and I hardly ever run into something like that. Yesterday a guy in the shop replaced both door skins on the pass side of a Honda for one small gouge that ran across them. He is not too good at door skins and had more plastic filler on the new skins than if he would have repaired the old doors. LOL

Anyway, I do remember having doors like your project and I was taught a cool trick to do them. Put a sqeeze clamp at each end of the door and put a porta power between then and stretch the door! I used that many times with great success.

I also remember doing the old pick hammer into a socket trick to tighten up a panel. :D

If I were to find myself in that position today, I would pull out my Friction disc and make short order of the problem. smile.gif