RH tail light ready to weld

Last Sunday's session went really well. I even remembered to take the camera. Unfortunately my laptop is unavailable due to a problem updating the operating system so no pictures until that's fixed. When it's working I'll update this post. Before starting I took some pictures of the patches as they looked at the end of the previous session.





When I started the plan was to weld the two halves of the patch together before welding to the car. As I fiddled with the fit I decided it would be better to attach the bottom half first, then use the existing structure to align the upper. To get the angles right while off the car would be highly unlikely.

I made the lower patch larger than it needed to be to simplify shaping it. Now I had to cut away the badly rusted places on the car side and fit the patch to what remained. Along the way I had to leave a 3/8 in. border to form a flange to attach to. Midway accross the bottom I had to deal with the tab that reinforces the bumper mount. I ended up keeping most of the height on either side of the tab and cutting a large notch to accommodate the good original sheet metal at the tab. The last step was to trim off the excess on the left side of the patch.







I really wanted to weld it in place, but it was getting late and I was tired, not the ideal conditions for an inexperienced welder. I ended up painting everything with Weld-Thru primer. Next week I'll start with welding.