A few months back, I bought my Maxima as a project car, and here are a couple pics of how the progress is going. As most Canadian third gen's, this max suffers from some serious cancer. Luckily however, it's limited to the rockers and quarter lips. Strut towers, seat belt mounts, and the rear inside quarters are all very much intact. The car is low mileage (140km) but was obviously neglected in terms of corrosion protection. Anyways, here's some pics...

before...



During


Just about finished the metal work, and testing fitting my new (to me) rims



Anyways, still need to play in the "mud" a bit, but the sky isn't looking very friendly so that'll have to be for another day. Yes I know it's a little ghetto, but can easily done with basic tools at home and should look and hold up well. Comments?

 

hmm well its not how I would have done it but sometimes you have to work with what you have. It doesnt look like you cut the bad parts out though...if you dont cut them out it will come back. If you get a stillen kit it will cover the rockers so you just have to really work on the fender lip.

I will say this...if you can do good enough mud work to make that look good then I will be very impressed with your skills.

 

Good to see more restoration! Too many week stomachs around here disown their cars after they spot a little rust...

Good thing your actaully replacing metal! A cheap mig welder is great for this.

 

lol i have a little rust near my sun roof and i was gonna sell it, good to see someone fight for the cause of a good car lol

but im gonna grind it all down metal it back shut and a new sunroof then some body work then repaint! lol

that sure is a lot of rust lol would like to see how you deal with it

 

Dude, I have to do the same to my car before it spread more. If you look in my sig you can see the rust!! its scary!

 

I have to do the same. Theres also a little surface rust under my rear seat, Im going to try to take care of it this wednsday. I gotta do other general stuff but its clean and getting better!

Nice work with your maxima, like goon said its nice to see people fixing the maxi's body and not freaking out.

~Alex

 

Thanks for the kind words guys!

And Michael, if I had the tools, money and time I'd probably fix it differently too, but since it's a 13 year old sub $1000 car, I think this fix will do just fine.

 

it only will if you cut the old metal out. If you left it in there you are doing nothing but masking the problem because it will continue to spread but yeah I took all those factors into consideration when I said "sometimes you have to work with the tools you have"...it would have been a good excuse to buy you at least a cheap mig though .

 

This the type of Mig welder you talking about??
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...temnumber=6271

My buddy has the same pattern of rust on this project B13 sentra SER and I may try to talk him into getting a mig welder, then I can use it to repair my 89 VG.

BTW the pop rivet method BLOWS. After my 5th rust hole I found inside the rear fender wells I was ready to ditch my max. Stick with it, you will feel right as rain when you finish, knowing your max will last that much longer.

 

I know nothing about welders except that I have a really nice Miller that I "borrowed" from my dad about 5 years or so ago.

 

Amazing metal work - very impressed.

 

Here's a couple progress pics...I know, not much progress, but the car is at my parent's house and I'm in the middle of a move right now so finding time is tough...

and one of the interior in it's current state....

Like I said before, this is no show car, just a respectable daily driver that looks and performs decent. I'm learning as I go, and imagine the other side will be a lot faster, better and easier... I have half a day off work tomorrow so hopefully I can finish up the fiberglass and bondo work on the driver's lip and do the metal work on the other side. Until next time.....

 

Nifty speedometer..

 

looking good...thats the best way to learn...just jump in there and do it.

 

Few more of the left lip in primer...




Hopefully tmw I can sand the primer down, fix and screw ups and get some colour on it!

Ordering my KYB's tonight! Org group deals rule! hopefully I can get all this body work done before they arrive.

 

Sorry to anyone trying to view pics, geocities friggin sucks... the pics will come back soon ...

 

This is a good free pic site http://www.imageshack.us/


And this one http://www.upshizzle.com/uploader.php

one more http://www.tinypic.com/

 

Dude I dont know if thats how its supposed to look but it looks a way better and like you're doing a good job, wonder what Michael has to say...

 

Read newbie

 

you calling me out?...haha j/k.

I think its "looking" good but I stick by my original statement that since he didnt cut it out (at least it doesnt appear that way...maybe he did) it will return...err continue...hopefully after he has sold the car ...definitely not any time soon though.

 

Sthooo-per fantathstik!!

 

Some finished pics!!


Overall I'm happy with the results, it's not perfect, but better then a lot of the cars out there. Cost under 100 bucks too.

 

wow, not bad at all...a lot of people have done their own body-work on the org for less than 100 lately..kinda motivates me but eh. Nice work!

 

Good job

 

I can't see **** except for the last 2 finished pics, but I understand the rust situation. I had a shop fix mine last spring (they did a crap job), and I had to patch up a massive hole in one of my rear fender wells earlier in the summer. Bondo, drywall mesh, and lots of asphalt undercoating were my best friends. I wanted to dump it after I saw the holes, but I'm just gonna keep coating it with asphalt and keep driving her, because mechanically my 93 is in perfect condition without no leaks at 262 500 km if you can believe it.

 

Sorry about the other pics Will, I assume I've gone over my geocities bandwidth limit, check back later and they should be good.

 

Looks great I shold get on the ball and do mine. But I need a trunk lid, 2 front fenders 2 bumpers and a hood. Mine has a mix of rust and lots of hail dents.

 

Nice work! I too had a hole inside my rear fender due to the gas tube TSB, and I patched that up with sheet metal and asphalt undercoating. Works great, and it's nice not getting water in the trunk anymore.

 

that turned out nice man. what did you use for paint? it's sad to see what rust can do to a car.

 

It's not perfect?!!

You could have fooled me.

:

 

I used duplicolor spray paint from Canadian tire. It's a ford truck and SUV colour as I couldn't find the right Nissan one. I even had a jobber make me a spray bomb of the correct code (AL0) and it wasn't even close.

 

spraying out of a can is never going to look like factory.

 

if i hadn't read this thread and seen ur car i would have never guessed that there was rust and u had done any body work to it... great job...

 

Looks good. My 93 has a rust spot on the driver's side rear door that finally broke open. There is now a hole in the side of my door the size of a quarter with a bunch of paint bubbled up around it. I was thinking about fixing that with plastic filler.