12-FEB-2014
Inner wheel well removed
I drilled out the spot welds and cut out the rear section of the wheel well to make room for the new sheet metal. The new sheet metal will follow the contour of the new fender cutout. Since the old fender cutout was round, it had to go!
12-FEB-2014
A view of a big hole!
This view shows the sheet metal work that will need to be done to fill the new larger opening in the fender.
12-FEB-2014
New pieces cut for wheel wells
Now comes the task of bending and molding these pieces of sheet metal into shape so that they fit the inner wheel wells tightly with no gaps.
13-FEB-2014
Bending the radius
After making the pattern for the wheel wells, I used the rods on my bead roller to bend the radius in the 16 gauge sheet metal to match the paper pattern. Using the rods allowed me to actually roll and form the sheet metal to the correct radius that matched my pattern perfectly.
13-FEB-2014
Both fender wells bent
Now the fun begins! I need to bend a flange all along the outer edge on the fender side, this will allow me to weld it to the body. Intersecting the vertical section of the wheel well is going to be a slight challenge to say the least.
16-FEB-2014
Wheel well sheet metal
I was able to finish the wheel wells for both sides. I bent all of the mounting flanges and rolled a couple grooves for a little strength and to match the OEM front half of the wheel well.
16-FEB-2014
Patterns for sides
I made some patterns board out of poster board and then laid them out on the sheet metal to be cut out with the power shears. These had a tricky design to make everything match up.
16-FEB-2014
Both side pieces bent
I had to match the same angle as the OEM wheel well sides so into the brake they went!
16-FEB-2014
The right angle bent
I bent the side metal to match the existing wheel well angle.
16-FEB-2014
Test fit of the sides
I fine tuned the the sides with a little grinding to get them to fit just right.
16-FEB-2014
Side tacked in
I shaped and flanged the main cover to fit the side and the fender side. I drilled all the flanges to able to spot weld all the pieces together.
16-FEB-2014
All welding complete
I finished putting together and welding both sides complete.