Repair/restore fender and rear hatch or replace them? (1 Viewer)

[Francis K]

My 97 LC is going in for paint soon and in the process I am having some rust on my rear hatch window dealt with as well as some damage on my driver side fender repaired. Well I’m also having some new seats and a bunch of other parts picked off a very clean scrapped truck in NM coming on a pallet. I had the thought that instead of treating rust with it just to return and bondo’ing to also pick up the fender and hatch off of that truck and replace them instead. What do you guys think? The only drawback I can think of is that my truck is originally green and I’m having it painted grey while the scrapped truck is white, I was thinking I could just rattle can the inside parts that won’t be painted green to match the rest.

Any other drawbacks that I’m missing here? What do you guys think?

 

[FMC80]

How’s the time. If I was in your position, I’d grab good metal and have it painted along with your truck. Seems like a no brainer to me. Why would you need to rattle can anything? Who cares? If you care about the door jambs and mismatched paint, again, nows the time. Do it once and do it right if you have any doubt you won’t be pleased with the mismatched internals.

 

[Francis K]

How’s the time. If I was in your position, I’d grab good metal and have it painted along with your truck. Seems like a no brainer to me. Why would you need to rattle can anything? Who cares? If you care about the door jambs and mismatched paint, again, nows the time. Do it once and do it right if you have any doubt you won’t be pleased with the mismatched internals.

Well green vs dark grey I can work with that’s no problem I don’t even think that would look bad. But white vs dark grey….yea that would be a bit off to say the least. If I have the parts loose and not worried about overspray obviously because they are going to be painted I can just bomb them I was thinking. I’m not looking for perfect on a 25 year old truck but I do want it presentable at the least…

But yea I definitely think I’m better off going with a non rusted hatch and a straight fender. Just wanted to make sure there wasn’t anything I was missing here, this is my first experience with “restoring” a vehicle and i know I’ve been heavy on the threads and questions lately I sincerely appreciate the help…

 

[FMC80]

Well green vs dark grey I can work with that’s no problem I don’t even think that would look bad. But white vs dark grey….yea that would be a bit off to say the least. If I have the parts loose and not worried about overspray obviously because they are going to be painted I can just bomb them I was thinking. I’m not looking for perfect on a 25 year old truck but I do want it presentable at the least…

But yea I definitely think I’m better off going with a non rusted hatch and a straight fender. Just wanted to make sure there wasn’t anything I was missing here, this is my first experience with “restoring” a vehicle and i know I’ve been heavy on the threads and questions lately I sincerely appreciate the help…

Who is painting your ride? Do you mind sharing the details? I assume they’ll paint the hatch and fender separately?

 

[BILT4ME]

Front or rear fender?

 

[Francis K]

Who is painting your ride? Do you mind sharing the details? I assume they’ll paint the hatch and fender separately?

I had an estimate from maaco which apparently was really cheap and a lot of people tried to dissuade me from it so I got an estimate from a local distant relatives body shop and I am still deciding. I will definitely update either way when I decide and when it’s done.

 

[Francis K]

Front or rear fender?

Front driver side…

 

[jpoole]

Front fenders and hatches are easy to remove/replace so it's likely that your best results and lowest cost option is to skip repairs and just replace them. Have them both painted while off the truck and they can spray the jambs/backsides for you for a true match (vs. rattle can).

 

[BILT4ME]

Get with @arcteryx and @slow95z for used parts. They can both ship and do salvage on these trucks.