Repairing Engine Tin, A newbie's lesson in welding - second side Options

[seanpaulmc]

I recommend all new welders to get some 50 year old thin gage sheet metal to learn with. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/welder.gif) How hard could it be?

In doing so, you’ll practice with voltage and wire speed, stick out, part set up, metal cleaning, contamination and porosity, work area lighting, youtube, weld grinding, fabrication, clamping, gapping, blow thru, backing materials, warping, patience and wire brushing, to name a few.

What I have...
How many cracks can you spot?







Save your original OG engine tin they say. It's the best they say.

So after a few hours...
I'm not kidding anyone here with these pictures, after many days I find myself with this...










I have several questions for those with at least a few hours more experience.

1) How much more, if any, should these welds be ground down? Or, will the weld beads provide future strength to the thin, stretched sheet metal so leave as-is?

2) In order of preference, what would be the best three tools to use to grind down welds on thin sheet metal? Assume you don't have an air compressor. I don't.

3) For the top section where the coil attaches on the tin, the coil bracket uses P/N: N 010 210 13 which is M 6 x 10 hex-head bolt. Is the tin supposed to have a captured nut on the backside or just thicker sheet metal in the locations that are missing on my tin (see first few pictures).

4) Should the coil mounting location be relocated in order to avoid whatever the hell happened here? If so, where?

In actuality I'm quite please with the results so far, maybe not the pace of the work, but at least the product thus far. It'll be useable tin and certainly better than it was. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/screwy.gif) This is literally the first time I have ever fabricated a patch and tried to weld anything. I'm working my way up to the easy stuff if there such a thing?

I appreciate you entertaining my questions.

Thanks,
Sean

[seanpaulmc]

Finally got back to finishing up the tin repair.
Another tin saved, sort of. At least it is better than what I started with and can now be used.

I chased all the cracks to ends.
I welded in patches for the two torn out holes.
I filled all the pin holes (held up to the light to find).
I'm not grinding down further to leave strength in the welded areas and remind me of this when I look back on it in the future.
Best part is I'm learning to weld - first part ever welded.

I appreciate all the advise provided. It's helped a ton. Using a copper weld backer has been crucial to working on the thin metal of the tin. Because of the complex shapes of the tin and where the cracks were I had to make a copper thimble to hold in place while making a spot weld. Worked pretty good. So, here's the pictures...