Roof repair

[ranger]

I see quite a few piggies with roof rot but never seen anyone repair the damage, well besides hacking off the top. Has anyone attempted this feat with any measure of success?
I just picked up an inexpensive 72 FJ55 with the normal rot. THe roof is in bad shape, but I can't see why it would be an extremily difficult task to fix. It would take alot of time but I don't charge myself for labor. I will be able to dig into the body a little more this weekend and really get a good picture of how far the rust has gone, looks to me the bondo king had a huge had in hiding rust.

 

[clemson55]

I obviously chopped a section of the roof as you can see in the owners rigs section, however I still had to patch about 12 holes where a roofrack had been poorly done which had rusted to about the size of a penny. I ended up welding them had to turn the mig way down and slowly tack around the edges and work my way in. Then just ground off the excess cant even tell they were there now. I also had to cut off the drip rail which basically removes the roof from the top except for the front area above the windshield. But the metal at the edges is just to gone and I cant weld it so I will be using a piece of steel and welding it over that.

 

[cruiser_guy]

On my daughters FJ55 we had a California truck with the top down rust and a midwest truck with the bottom up rust. I just cut the roofs off at the original spot welds, taking the best of both and swapped the roofs over. Not all FJ55 roofs are rusty.
After that there was just a few areas that needed patching on the rest of the truck. We got a good truck, a stock piggy look and a head turner!

Clemson, there is an easier way to patch holes using the welder. Hold/clamp a piece of dis-similar metal behind the hole (I used 1/4" aluminum) and just weld over it all. The aluminum keeps the weld from falling out and because it's aluminum, it doesn't stick! I used that on several holes on the FJ55 as well such as where hood pins were installed or where I inadvertently drilled right through spot welds. I'll be using the same method on the FJ45LV as well in areas where the PO drilled holes for antennas or lock cylinders.

 

[clemson55]

Thats a good call cruiser_guy but its pretty hard to hold anything against the roof. Can't really clamp anything there.

 

[cruiser_guy]

I used a stick of wood or whatever was handy in order to jamb the aluminum where it needed to be. It got awkward sometimes and the wood smoked most of the time but all in all it worked OK. There's going to be some real creative spots on the FJ45LV like a hole in the cowl up behind the dash!

 

[clemson55]

Yeah I saw when you got that and posted up about it. I want to see pics of the progress as you go. Either in here or regular tech or 45 board let us know where to look.

 

[ranger]

THe drip rail on the drivers side is about to come off. A PO sometime ago installed a sunroof and did a halfassed job, this is what caused 70% of the rust. This is an orriginal California truck that was brought up here to Alaska 2 years ago. Two years of sitting outside with snow on the roof didn't help matters. Hopefully this weekend I'll get a better idea on how bad the rust is.
Normally I use copper as a backer for welding thin stuff, like filling holes when you remove trim.