So my '97 has cancer. I've already replaced all of the rear brake system because of it. Now, the biggest piece of rot on the body is the rocker panel on the drivers' side. This isn't new. It's been obvious since I purchased the vehicle, but I've finally got everything else the way I want it and it is time to get this repaired before it goes any farther.

Here is a picture of what it looks like from the outside. Pretty rusty.



After an hour or so of hacking at it with tin snips, cutting pliers, a chisel and hammer I'm left with this:

A pile of crap: (you can see the replacement panel under the truck.)



And a hole that has to be filled:

 

Luckily, I suppose, the existing panel is basically solid at the main panel sill bend. That will be where I trim to with the rotary cutter. Plus, it allows the remaining tin to keep most of its rigidity and shape during the repair process.

The inner rocker panel is pretty thin at the rear, under the rear door. I may scab a reinforcement piece in while I've got it open.

I powerwashed the hole to remove as much crud as possible. Then I started readying the hole for rust-stop.

Got the panel squared up with a cutting wheel, ground off the spot weld remains, wire brushed all of the surfaces I could attack with my 4" angle grinder and hammer & dollied the lower lip back to flattish. Now I'm just waiting for the rust stopper to arrive from CT. (My dad has some good 2-part stuff left over from his ElCamino restoration. It should be here Wednesday.)

 

Nice job, I need to do this soon, my rust is way worse!

 

Thanks.

For a Pennsylvania truck, I'm pretty happy that this is about all that is problematic.

 

Any updates? Pics of finished product

 

lol, my rockers don't exist anymore basically.... 2x6 steel is replacing them soon though

 

So I tackled the new rocker panel installation this morning. Not the easiest thing I've ever done, and I certainly proved that I am not a welder. The little welder I do have was too snappy for the material and it forced me to weld in 1/2 second bursts. Not a good thing for clean, neat beads. Oh well, after a bunch of grinding, it was solid from one end to the other and looked better than the old rusty one any way.

Before welding:



During welding:



Finished panel:

 

Since the seam is embarrassingly hideous and I needed to match both sides anyway, I decided to hit the bottom of the truck with a couple coats of rubberized bedliner. Looks decent and will hide most of the terrible weld job.

I pulled the flares off as well so I could hit them with the bedliner, too. (This is usually a death sentence as it is not straightforward to pop them back on but I figured, what the hell and went for it.) I also pulled the side moldings off and cleaned up around them. I'm going to leave them off.

Before:





After:





Not bad for a couple days' work if I do say so myself.

 

Dude looks awesome, I'm about to black out my bottom like that too. I did the rockers first then decided I wanted to do all the way up to the molding, and now I see yours and it looks sweet.
Did you do the metal work yourself?

 

Thanks!

I bought the replacement panel, but the rest of it was all by me. First time doing body repair. I'm not good. But, it will more than suffice for the Jeep.

 

Yeah for a jeep it will def work lol. Where did you get the replacement panel?

 

Of all places, Amazon.com. It wasn't perfect, but worked for me. (For $24 I'm not going to complain.)

 

Yeah $24 isnt bad

 

fixed