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Floor pan welding
Blue Fox - 16/4/08 at 07:47 PM

Hello all,

I'm about to order my 1.6mm metal sheet for the floor pan, footwells etc. In the book it shows a picture of the floor pan welded in but its only "stitched" with a 1 inch weld then a couple of inch gap not a continous weld, is this ok for the floor pan and footwells and gearbox tunnels or do they need to be fully welded, and will a gasless mig be ok for this?

Thanks

[Edited on 16/4/08 by Blue Fox]

mark chandler - 16/4/08 at 07:55 PM

IMHO better off with an ali floor rivited and glued unless you are building to race.

If you do go steel floor then stich welded is fine, if you try and seam weld the floor it will probally distort and look horrible.

Regards Mark

blakep82 - 16/4/08 at 07:56 PM

well, you'd think it would be a bad thing, but on my chassis (pro built for racing by SHP they do lots of natioal hot rods and stuff) the 4 link axle brackets on the chassis are stitch welded. if its good enough for them...

COREdevelopments - 16/4/08 at 08:46 PM

i would go for an ali floor, i put a steel floor on and am not happy with it, it distorted even though i welded a bit at a time. its too much hassle to change it but would go for an ali one next time.

hth

rob

Dangle_kt - 16/4/08 at 08:47 PM

Why do you need a steel floor to race? My part built has been a race car or was going to be a race car and it has a steel floor - I'm just curious as I've just been drilling it.

quote:
Originally posted by mark chandler
IMHO better off with an ali floor rivited and glued unless you are building to race.

If you do go steel floor then stich welded is fine, if you try and seam weld the floor it will probally distort and look horrible.

Regards Mark

indykid - 16/4/08 at 10:08 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Dangle_kt
Why do you need a steel floor to race? My part built has been a race car or was going to be a race car and it has a steel floor - I'm just curious as I've just been drilling it.

quote:
Originally posted by mark chandler
IMHO better off with an ali floor rivited and glued unless you are building to race.

If you do go steel floor then stich welded is fine, if you try and seam weld the floor it will probally distort and look horrible.

Regards Mark


because it's not a proper book locost without it, and to race in a locost series, you can't go saving weight with an ally floor!

it should really be the roof of a mk2 escort.....
tom

MikeR - 16/4/08 at 10:56 PM

if you really want to weld a steel floor without distortion, you need to cut it so that its approx 0.5 mm smaller than the hole its going in. Tack each corner then weld it into place. with it being a smidgen smaller it will pull itself tight with the heating / cooling cycle of the weld.

(found this out a month ago from a coded welder!)

I did a series of stitch welds on the inside then fully welded hte outside of the floor. The distortion is bowed towards the floor so perfectly fine (ie no "boing" when you get in the car.)

dogwood - 17/4/08 at 07:54 AM

Hi
Just a question
If you can glue and rivit an alloy floor.
Why cant you do the same with a steel floor?
No distortion then !

David

[Edited on 17/4/08 by dogwood]

MikeR - 17/4/08 at 07:57 AM

p.s. i used 1.2mm steel, i did a spreadsheet (prob 4 years ago) and posted it on here. It compared it to 1mm, 1.5mm steel and diff thicknesses of ali.

I decided that its similar in penetration to 3mm ali but lighter (or something similar i can't remember) and it was easier for me to attach.

i know peeps have used down to 1mm ali. Their choice, my car will probably only ever see the road and i wanted something to try and stop stones / bricks / branches / road kill going through the floor.

D Beddows - 17/4/08 at 08:55 AM

> Just a question
If you can glue and rivit an alloy floor.
Why cant you do the same with a steel floor?
No distortion then ! <

No reason at all been there, done that and 4 or so years later the floor is still attached to the chassis!