Remove Quarter or cut out?

[BunBun]

Got a question here for the "experienced" ppl. As you may or may not know I'm in the process of completely rebuilding a '66 coupe. I want to clean up every square inch of the car if possible. One of the only problems I am having is with the quarter panels. Getting inside there to clean up everything in there and putting in some rust preventative (thats the plan anyway) looks to be quite difficult.

My multipart question is this:

1) Is there a way to effictively clean/ treat in there (big problem being wheel wells) without cutting anything out or off? If so, please enlighten me!

2) If, in order to clean and treat all the metal correctly, I need to cut out some pieces I will do it. Would it be better for me to remove the entire quarter panel or just cut out the large majority of the QP skin? I'm not afraid of more work in order to achieve excellent results. I just don't want to make more work for myself if I don't have to.

My fears with removing the entire quarterpanel are: 1) A lot more work for negligible if any benefit 2) Having the dang things not fit correctly when I put them back on.

What have y'all done in this situation or what would you do were you in my position?

Vielen Dank

Bun

 

[charlies]

i would not remove it of you don't have a rust problem.

 

[zookeeper]

I agree, cutting the quarter panel would create more problems than you'd cure. Just clean and treat what you can reach without surgery and you shouldn't have a problem.

 

[Gellpak]

I cut my quarters about this time last year just prior to repainting, and if you look closely now, a little bit of rust is already coming back. I keep the thing i a carport where it's pretty safe from the elements, so this seems a bit soon to me for the problem to be returning, but maybe my experience can help you out a bit.

 

[Fredo]

See the January edition of Mustangs & Fords. The article name is Sheetmetal Mania. This should help you make up your mind.

 

[Carnivore]

What about spraying some POR15 in there?.. mine have a lot of crunchy rust on the surface inside the quarter panels... I'm not looking to pull things apart but would like to stop it...

POR15 is suppost to bond best to rust so perhaps that would work okay if I scraped off the bigger chunks?

 

[GaPonyFarm]

Got a question here for the "experienced" ppl. As you may or may not know I'm in the process of completely rebuilding a '66 coupe. I want to clean up every square inch of the car if possible. One of the only problems I am having is with the quarter panels. Getting inside there to clean up everything in there and putting in some rust preventative (thats the plan anyway) looks to be quite difficult.

What have y'all done in this situation or what would you do were you in my position?

You'll never get quarter panels to fit as well as they do now...never.

I can only tell you what I did to my 66, when I restored it. I removed the gas tank, rearend, and shocks to get some "elbow room". I used a heat gun and propane torch to heat the existing under coating so I could scrape it off with a putty knife, but you can actually just chip it off easier, I think. I used a cheap ($39.00 gravity feed) sandblaster with my air compressor to get down to bare metal and found I needed to replace the trunk floor extensions. After washing everything down and letting it dry, I applied a liberal coat of self-etching primer and applied new undercoating to the wheel wells...

Its a lot of work for no visible improvement, but its a great way to check for normally unseen problems. Best of all, I know I don't have to worry about rust for years to come. The key to a good job is getting the elbow room to get in and do the work.

Hope this helps!