Hi All. I am doing a full body off rebuild of a CJ7 1982 and have discovered that it has been rear ended sometime in the past. It's just body damage not structural. The driver's side rear wing (right side in the photo) has been pushed in causing the radius of the curve to increase.
Is there an easy way to tighten the radius to match the passenger side without taking it to pieces or causing a crease to form in the damaged panel?
The radius at the top is OK, it is only splayed at the bottom. I have thought about using a sash cramp (clamp) at right angles to the wheel arch and drawing it together where the join in the panel is. Any thoughts?
I've never had this issue but the first thing to come to mind is to make a wooden pattern. based on the good side, out of a couple of 2"x8" nailed together in a stack. And if you could have it made out of a chunk of oak and cut on a bandsaw with a thin blade, that would be even better. Then you could sandwich the corner and draw the two together with C-clamps in both directions simultaneously. Just a thought.
I think this is a good suggestion. You will have to over-draw/over-bend the shape slightly because the steel 'bounces-back' some. Like a spring.
When you clamp, put a bigger footprint under either side of the clamp's feet that is not against a form. I forgot to do this on one of my re-shaping projects and it left enough of a crease at the foot that I had to go back and fix it.
Without a form, I've just taken various wood shapes and several clamps and slowly tweaked the metal around several times to get it back in shape. Just takes some time and patience. Can't tell that anything was ever wrong.
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