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Bushwacker holes

Lurch

NAXJA Forum User
Location
Long Beach, CA
Removed the Bushwacker cut-out flares from my rig the other day. Now I'm left with a nice row of 1/4" holes above each fender.

Any suggestions or bodywork tips for patching or filling these short of bringing the surface down to bare metal and tack welding them closed? Is there some sort of plug or patch material that can be used and then painted over? I'm not expecting the sheet metal to look like it did before I drilled, I'd just like to tidy it up some.
 
in short, no.

anything you try to fill a hole with like that is going to fall out the second it makes contact with a tire or a rock. weld em shut grind em flat and spray bomb it :D

alternatively you can get some plastic plugs (like what holds the stock inner fender liners on) and pop those in there. it won't look great but it wont be a bunch of holes either :dunno:
 
MIG or will fluxcore cut it?

I've tried filling some of the hole with different types of screws, not crazy about the look.

I guess ill just weld em if thats the right way to do it.
 
Back the hole with copper while welding. It really helps.
 
Probably easier and less time consuming to put a/m or used fenders on the front. They can be found pretty cheap. Then the amount of holes u need to weld and finish will be cut in half.
 
Call 'em speed holes
 
So, I FINALLY got around to working on this.



I used the Harbor Freight copper spoon to back the holes while I welded and it worked great. I blew through the metal a lot at first, but once I got the copper back there and the technique and wire speed correct, it went pretty well.

Anyway, here's the finished project. My only remaining question is, Bondo the bare steel or just prime and paint? I'm not going for a professional look by any means, but I'm wondering if using a little body filler would help even it out or just unnecessary work.

 
Time to put a bow on this one. Went ahead and applied some Bondo, glad I did because it filled some low spots and the corner area that I had crushed previously when I landed on a rock before I had my bumper on.

A little of this stuff goes a long ways and it sets up really fast. I applied it when it was around 90* outside and only had a few minutes to work with it.



After some blocking:




Finished product:









I used Duplicolor paint and a clearcoat to finish it off. Pretty happy with the results. One lesson learned is that high build primer is a must to use with body filler. I used it on the passenger side and it came out almost flawless (relatively) but I only had about half a can and ran out so I just used self etching metal primer on the driver side. You can see the body filler texture through the paint which i didn't realize until I started painting, but oh well it's just a Jeep, right?:conceited
 
Looks nice, glad you did the bondo.
 
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