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Core support: cut and splice or replace?

M

miketyler

Member
My 70 Mach 1 must have been hit at some point. The core support is all original but the drivers side looks like cottage cheese. Apparennly, they were able to save it and may have saved the owner $$ at the time but it looks like hammered $hit now. Also, the drivers side is about .5-.75" too far forward and as a result, PO had adjusted the twist lock on the hood where it would just barely line up. This needs to be fixed but how best to do so?

Found a great deal on an original core support with crossmember, strut channels, and front frame rails. Should I cut and splice the drivers side or replace it all? I hate taking out good metal, the passenger side looks so nice, still has buck tag attached.

Car is not concours. Look at the pics and tell me - what would you do?
 
Cool - becuase that's where I am leaning. I took a different approach on my 72 Cuda when I discovered all the multiple rust spots in the cowl. There were holes in it but the more I looked, the more I found. Ultimately, l elected to replace the complete firewall and cowl.

Best place to splice? In the radius of the upper corner the section gets very thin so I am thinking that would be a good spot for the upper cut. For the lower point I was thinking along the flat just above the beam support. Any thoughts or suggestions there?
 
I'd cut it to minimize welding. I cut it like this and use some small plates on the top from behind as gussets to strengthen the joint and do a little body work to the outer side. If you are careful cutting and welding the bottom joint you should be able to hide it with out any mud.
 
hmmm...What are the benefits to replacing the entire unit? Car has spliced-in front floor pans and patches in lower firewall extensions.
 
"miketyler" said:
hmmm...What are the benefits to replacing the entire unit? Car has spliced-in front floor pans and patches in lower firewall extensions.
Click to expand...

Structural integrity.

The upper seam would be pretty hard to hide also. If you think about it, by the time you are done splicing it and welding/dressing the seams you probably could replace the whole thing in a similar amount of time.
 
Considering there is no apparrent rust, and if it's not terribly distorted, why not just hammer and dolly it back into shape... A little skim coat of filler to dress it nice isn't going to hurt anything.
It seems to me that with it exposed as is it should be fairly easy to get it straightened out.
 
I agree with Sluggo and stangg. Faced the same issue with my car and ended up just replacing it. Turned out to be a good thing, as my lower crossmember was rotten and I didn't see it until the rad support was off.

But, if you can straighten it, that might be the way to go. Can't beat OEM Ford parts.
 
I think it looks worse in person than in the pics. Plus, the radius in the upper channel has been crushed slightly, just enough to throw the hood twist lock out about 1/2". If I could get it straightened so the alignment was right I'd probably consider attempting to straighten it.

Its almost like the drivers side of the core support was located just a little to far forward throwing off the hood lock hole location. I have tried taking a sledge to this to get it back in where its same distance as the pass side with no luck.

This, coupled with the really wrinkled up lower side is what motivated me to replace that half. Maybe I need to hit it harder? :dh
 
I had a panel that was seriously wrinkled. I used a dolly and a 3.5# sledge, and got it pretty damn straight! I then used a true dolly hammer to finish it off. A very thin smear of mud and a good paint job, and you can't see that it was wrinkled.

Try it first; it's a lot of fun to whack the hell out of sheet metal and relieves a lot of frustrations. It's free, so what can you lose? Worse comes to worse, you replace it.
 
I think if the panel was flat I would go for it but I would never get the perfect machine stamping that has been ruined by the previous hammer masters. I possible could get it close after several hours but I would still have that alignment issue where the damaged side is about 1/2" forward of where it should be (according to the opposite side).

I think I'd rather spend a few hours splicing in a section that would look perfect than hammering this thing into oblivion and ultimately be able to detect a lesser degree of hammered $hitness. Am pretty sure I am going to cut and splice this thing.
 
One side of mine near the battery was getting thin and had a bunch of pin holes in it.

I thought about just welding in half and leaving the good half but then decided to just replace the whole thing.

I was worried about structural intergrity as someone noted above.
 
I installed a new radiator support and cross member on my 67, and it wasn't that bad of a job. I can't imagine it would take much longer than cutting and splicing in a new patch piece.

If it were me, I'd just replace the whole thing, because I think it'll be difficult to cleanly weld in a new patch panel without grinding welds and using some filler before paint. If you do it all as one piece, you know it'll look great.
 
Am still thinking about it but in the meantime, can someone give me or confirm some location measurements? Measuring from ctr line of hood lock hole in core support, I have ~43 3/16" from top cowl face at pinchweld to center of radius on core support.

On the damaged side I have 43.5". Is the 43 3/16" dim correct?
 
anyone? I could also use these dimensions:

1. dimensions from center of hood lock hole to center of hood lock hole

2. from the center of above holes, distance to front face of upper cowl or any dim to confirm for and aft positioning

3. dimensions between the radiator mount holes or whatever those 4 large holes are I have illustrated below
 
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