1978 Barn door FJ55 "daily driver" (1 Viewer)

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Fixed it for you. Seriously though, hope it works out in the end. Will be a cool pig. :cool:

Classic blunders:
  1. Getting involved in a land war in Asia
  2. Going in against a Sicilian when death is on the line
  3. Buying a Land Cruiser Pig from S. America w/o inspecting it in-person
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Decided to get Frank to have his guys strip the rest of the paint, kinda “rip the band-aid off”, snd let’s see what we got, because, as Miracle Max the Wizard said in that movie: “You rush a miracle man, you get rotten miracles.”

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Who knows, maybe I’ll be able to build a shop outside Denver and can spend a couple hours/day on them myself.

it’s been a long time for most of it, and I never was much of a body man. Always found sheet metal (anything under 1/4” really difficult to weld, with arc welding, but a bunch easier with a acetylene torch. Way slower though.

Maybe I should learn TIG first?

I still have the little wire feed machine I bought to rebuild the wife’s boat trailer in Hawaii seemed really “light” to me, and I’d have to wait to let it cool off after 20 minutes of continuous use.
 
I have to try tig, such pretty welds, but a good mig is fine for body work - hard part is folding the welds into old thin toyota metal.

Just looking at that ground clamp, damn, that's either a lot of experience or someone likes it on the bottom during upside down welds
 
Maybe I should learn TIG first?
Great idea, one continuous weld is always a better option than a bunch of random spot welds on a butt joint and a TIG would be the tool for that job. Metal finishing a weld with a hammer and dolly would be another handy skill to look into.

If you look at how the factory builds car and truck bodies you’ll almost never see a butt joint for good reason, a butt joint is acceptable for smaller repairs with the MIG spot weld method like filling a quarter size hole with a small patch but if you plan to make longer patch sections then then other methods should be considered, the easiest for the home gamer is a lap weld similar to what the factory would do and this is what you’ll see most of the body shops do when replacing something like a quarter panel on a car.

Rust in structural areas like roof pillars and body mounts require special attention and a spot weld butt joint should never be an option. Something like an automatic center punch and run around the roof line of this pig will give you a good indication of the integrity of the steel that you can’t physically see the backside of, solely relying on the rust poking through the front side to layout your rust repair strategy is a sure way to have future rust bubbles poking through your new paint that we all see so often on these couple year old Pig restorations.

None of what I said should be taken out of context, I appreciate all of the photos and the guys working on your pig are doing a fantastic job with the tools and direction they are given. Having spent several years in both China and Mexico watching guys fabricate complicated parts with very basic crude tools I’m always amazed watching them problem solve.
 

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