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On 01/10/97 12:42:21 you wrote: > >I would definately recommend taking the rear panels out of the car so you >can see if the wheelwells are still there. Although I paid next to >nothing for my Square, I was very surprised when I got it home and pulled >out the back seat and panels. There is a two inch wide rust gash that >runs from the top of the wheelwell outline all the way down to the heater >channel on both sides. I haven't committed to making the car driveable >yet b/c I'm not sure how to patch these holes cheaply to keep water out of >the car. Although these holes were partially visable by looking at the >joint b/t the fender and body from the outside of the car, it's difficult >to guage how bad it is from there. Ditto on the fronts. When I pulled >the trunk liner out, I could see daylight through to the wheelwell from >where the body rusted through b/t the fender and body. > > Bottom line: a few hours worth of sweat and investigation can make >a big difference. Good luck! > >Rich >69 Square >71 Bus > > > My '71 had a similar problem in addition to having the FI harness butchered by idiot PO. The car came out of Nebraska, so had a lot of salt exposure, someone had literally stuffed socks in that crack in the wheel well on each side, then had liberally ladled some kind of rubber sealant over the top. Probably was OK for a year or two, then cracked and started leaking again. Original cause was factory undercoat cracking and retaining salt and water against the metal. Had that problem anywhere there were seams or welds. Hadn't realized it at the time, with what I know now, would probably have left it sitting in the guy's back yard where it had been for 3 years. Got it cheap, but sure had to put a lot of time into getting the body leak-tight. In your position, might be worth it to look for a car with bad mechanicals and a good body and do some transplanting. Check up under the front fenders in the corners next to the door posts, I'll bet there's some holes there, too. I ! thumped around the body, got about two grocery bags full of rust and assorted mud. I fixed mine by liberally trimming the holes back to good metal, then sanding/grinding down to bare metal. I used fiberglas gel and woven glass cloth to patch with, three layers. I didn't have access in the apartment parking lot where I was working to power tools, lots of work with hacksaw, file and sandpaper, just had to redo some of the holes this year, five years later. It would have cost a fortune for some body shop to weld up all my holes, I just have to watch things to see that the patches are still tight. I used a prep/prime compound under it all to convert the rust to phosphate, seems to have worked so far, also promotes fiberglas adhesion. I had a tread belt come off a Dunlop tire at 70 mph. Bent the rear outer fender at the rear of the wheel well badly, just polished my fiberglas patches in the front of the well well. I consider that a good test of its durability. Optimum pat! ch in your case, if you don't weld, would be to use pop-rivets to fast en a metal patch across the hole, then fiberglass over the top. The absolute stopper would be bad holes in critical areas like the front axle beam fastening area or shock-absorber, motor mount or torsion bar mounts. Only you can judge. In my case, I was in CA, had had the thing running for six months before the rains came and got my feet wet. The sealant had masked the worst of the holes and hadn't kept the rust from getting worst. Took me 4 days to get the engine running, patched holes for the next 9 months, but I had no bad rust in the critical areas when I got it. Just tackled it one hole at a time.