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Restoring Rear Tail Panel


Arvizu9618

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The prior owner tied a piece of rope around the trunk catch area to pull the car out of the garage, hence the panel is now bowed out. He attempted to straighten it out with alot of bondo but the bow is still there.

I've dremeled the trunk catch away from the panel in order to deadblow hammer the area to attempt to straighten it out.

It's moving ever so slightly but its really distorting the point area all to H#LL. blush

I'm obviously not a body guy, any suggestions short of replacing the whole panel, to straighten this area out?

Is a replacement piece available aftermarket? thanks guys

Area 1

Area 2

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Arthur here is an ideal you might be able to use slide puller across that area and pull the bow back in towards the trunk. The only other think I can think of is a little heat (not good as it will wrap the panel if there is to much heat) and work the bow back in using a hammer and a dolly.

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You have to think in reverse order of how the damage occurred. If a truck with a rope or chain pulled a 3800# car out, tied to the trunk latch area, with possibly flat tires, that's a lot of force/pressure concentrated in that area. So to put it back into place its going to take as much force/pressure if not a little more to return it to its original position. Of course you cant tie a rope or chain in the same position and pull in the reverse order here, so you must think of other options. I would probably take a 2x4 and a BFH and beat the H377 out of each side off center, alternating side to side. You don't really want to beat on it dead center on the point (center) as you will really make a bunch more work for yourself later. You may also need to beat inward and downward at the same time. Doesn't look like you need to got to far 3/8" inch or so. Also looks like towards the outer it lines up OK still, you may want to brace each side where it is still in line from the inside while your "beating" so these areas remain inline vs. moving inward with the center area. If you have a porta-power and an immovable object to butt it up to, then you could "walk" the center back inward. You will always have to overpull/overpush to get the metal to stay in the desired area. No matter what Im sure some filler will be required in the end to tidy things back up. If all else fails back it up into a brick wall lol

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  • 2 weeks later...

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