XJ Floor Pan Rusted Floors FAQ

[1985xjlaredo]

Yea you should weld those repair panels in especially if you are going up the trans tunnel. You'll notice that with all that Metal gone as in the above pic on this page that it is very flexible and weak. I even welded a couple 1/4" angle piece inside the frame rails to help stiffen them up.
I am thinking of filling up the frame rail with that injection foam insulation now that I have the metal done, to keep out the water and mud cause i couldnt paint under the frame rail once i welded it into place.

 

[BSH]

What about the cross piece?

I've learned enough from this thread to feel confident about doing my floor, but I have trouble with the cross member that the rear mounts for the front seat go through. How do you replace those? The cross member on my passenger side front seat is shot. What do you replace that with?

 

[bacelaw]

if you can weld, i imagine the rusty crossmembers can be cut out and replaced....you could even cut some good sections out of a junkyard xj.

my crossmembers were rusty, but still strong, that's some thing guage metal. i grinded the surface, primed, painted.

 

[1985xjlaredo]

Just fab up your own cross member. There reeally is nothign too important about it so It doesn't need to be very precise. Run it al the way across the under side and weld it into the metal lip on the door sill area. that'll stiffen everything up while your at it.

 

[rag]

my 89 had no floor above the muffler. my girlfriends xj has atleast some floor leftabove her exhaust and she has some minor holes by the pedals.

someone reccommend me an arc welder+spot welder and/or a mig with price in mind. my house is all wired for 115v. i dont mind having a 50%duty cycle but id rather keep the percentage higher.

all i plan to do with them is weld up a bunch floors and eventually do some bumpers and rails

money is an issue for a poor college student earning minimum wage.

thankyou

 

[MattAnonymous]

Bringing this thread back from the dead.

I finally got sick of wheeling and having water come up through the floors. I found a full pan a Morris 4x4 in Pompano Beach, FL. It's only an hour away from my parents' house, so I went down and picked it while visiting. $160 after tax. Pretty damn good IMO. They're good people, too. Very helpful. Great prices. www.cyberjeep.com

Ok, so I go to school at the University of Central Florida and I live on campus. This is my only vehicle (that's driveable, anyway), so that complicates things slightly. I've opted for SEM Weld-Bond due to the lack of 230v outlets near the parking lot. I also like what I've read about its strength.

I have a 50' extension cord running out the window of my dorm to the parking lot. This allows me to get power to my Harbor Freight tools (they do the job, most of the time).

And that beautiful new pan:

I plan on herculining the pan once it's in. Actually, since I'm not welding, it may be better to do it before I put it in.

Matt

 

[TMXONR]

Bringing this thread back from the dead.

I finally got sick of wheeling and having water come up through the floors. I found a full pan a Morris 4x4 in Pompano Beach, FL. It's only an hour away from my parents' house, so I went down and picked it while visiting. $160 after tax. Pretty damn good IMO. They're good people, too. Very helpful. Great prices. www.cyberjeep.com

Ok, so I go to school at the University of Central Florida and I live on campus. This is my only vehicle (that's driveable, anyway), so that complicates things slightly. I've opted for SEM Weld-Bond due to the lack of 230v outlets near the parking lot. I also like what I've read about its strength.

I have a 50' extension cord running out the window of my dorm to the parking lot. This allows me to get power to my Harbor Freight tools (they do the job, most of the time).






And that beautiful new pan:

I plan on herculining the pan once it's in. Actually, since I'm not welding, it may be better to do it before I put it in.

Matt

Cool they pre-rusted the pan for you. j/k


I just put in the Sherman Parts floorpans. I tried making my own pans, but it was a pain.
Hers is a link to my write up.
http://www.naxja.org/forum/showthread.php?t=906957

 

[MattAnonymous]

Lol. Rust? I don't see any rust:

mmmm. So much more manly than carpet. I used rubber undercoating on the bottom and bed liner on top (both spray-on). I'm kinda diggin' the undercoating feel, so I may be spraying it on top too. Both were very easy to apply and came out beautifully. I used 3M oil, grease, wax remover and roughed up the surface with a scotch-brite pad before applying the coatings.

 

[maine96xj]

does anyone have pics of a bed lined floor pan(no carpet) installed, do you like this? do the drian plugs get in the way of you/your passengers feet? do you just pull a plug to drain it if water from shoes and stuff gets on it?

 

[montanaman]

does anyone have pics of a bed lined floor pan(no carpet) installed, do you like this? do the drian plugs get in the way of you/your passengers feet? do you just pull a plug to drain it if water from shoes and stuff gets on it?

I think one of the advantages of bedliner and a drain plug (vs. carpeting) is that you can wash the floor really easily after a day of mudding, then just pull the plug to drain the wash water away.

 

[1985xjlaredo]

Dam that pan Is SWEET! I covered up most of my drain plugs only left the 2 lowest ones on each side Are u going to just cover what is there or cut out and fit the pan in?

 

[MattAnonymous]

Dam that pan Is SWEET! I covered up most of my drain plugs only left the 2 lowest ones on each side Are u going to just cover what is there or cut out and fit the pan in?

No way man, I'm doing this right. All of the old pan is coming out. I'm going to hammer-form the drain plug holes downward. This will allow the plugs to sit flush with the pan as well as persuade liquid to drain through them.

I'm not going back to carpet for several reasons:
-Cost
-It's just gonna get ruined
-It's a Jeep
-It looks better w/o it
-Easy cleanup
-No more layer of 'oxidation sponge' (ie that cushion beneath the carpet)
-If the bed liner gets messed up, I just spray some more on.
-Rust won't be able to hide as easily (ie I can treat the cancer long before it spreads. I don't plan on having to deal with floor rust again, but this'll be much better in the event that I do.)

I'll do a write-up on the removal and installation using the Weld-Bond. I don't believe you guys have one on here where someone replaced the entire pan and used adhesive to secure the new one.

Here's the latest:

I'm out of cutoff wheels and I'm tired of removing stuff, so I'm gonna start straightening the rails and remaining sheet metal out so I have a level surface for the new pan. I've also gotta take care of the rust in the driver side frame rail. I'll be giving the inside of the rails a coating of rustoleum.

Matt

 

[1985xjlaredo]

I would at least tack that new pan in. And be careful to not tweak the body too much when you install the new pan. Thats about 70% of the strength of the body you ohave sut out there. But it looks like you have a good thing going there for ya.

 

[maine96xj]

Matt

i think i would try to strenthen that rail someway, is that a big crack at the top of the pic on the ride side of the rail???

 

[MattAnonymous]

No crack, just the way the pic was taken. The rust isn't as deep as it looks. I'm gonna grind it away and throw a nice coating of paint on there.

I put the pan in to test fit it. Everything seems ok except the studs on either side for the rear of the front seat brackets closest to the doors don't line up with the pre-cut holes.

Next, I'll be drilling holes through the pan into the mating parts of the frame. These holes will allow me to pull the pan down securely to the frame while the adhesive is curing. I don't know what I'm gonna do with all the holes just yet.

 

[montanaman]

Next, I'll be drilling holes through the pan into the mating parts of the frame. These holes will allow me to pull the pan down securely to the frame while the adhesive is curing. I don't know what I'm gonna do with all the holes just yet.

You're talking about using screws with the weld-bond glue, right? That would be a must.

 

[MattAnonymous]

Yeah. The fact that I didn't mention screws in there is beyond me. I bought a box of 100 sheet metal screws that will be going into those holes. I'm gonna have to get creative to figure out what I'm gonna do to fill or cover those holes after the screws come out. I'm sure I'll think of something.

 

[4xBob]

Treating the inside of the frame rails: mud and water get stuck in there, and maybe road salt too (depends where you live). It just sits in there, and doesn't dry. NO PAINT can stand up to that. Since you have the frame rails open from above, you can permanently solve the rust problem by rubbing a coat of grease into the inside of the rails, leave it a couple mm (1/8 inch) thick. It will trap dust and dirt to become a water-proof layer, self-healing if bashed/bent. My approach was to inject chainsaw bar oil (not mix oil) into the rails with a home-made sprayer. Good quality bar oil has a rust inhibitor (phosphoric acid) and a tackifier (makes it tacky, it really sticks). Down side is it drips for a few days- I park over a plastic drop-sheet, which cost about $2 at the paint department. Yes, it is overkill, but I don't want to ever mess with rusted out rails. One of my XJs is a 1990, owned since new.

 

[MattAnonymous]

For most of my Cherokee's life, it was driven around Ohio. The salt is what really did it in.

While we're on the topic of 'more extreme' frame rail rust prevention, what about an expanding foam insulation like "GreatStuff"? Even better would be some polyurethane structural foam to provide rigidity in addition to sealing the rails.

I think I'll prime it with a rust converter and then hit it with some rubberized undercoating.

 

[montanaman]

I'm gonna have to get creative to figure out what I'm gonna do to fill or cover those holes after the screws come out. I'm sure I'll think of something.

You know ... if it were me, I think I'd put about 20 or 30 nuts and bolts around the perimeter of that new pan (in addition to the glue) and just leave them in there. I'd snug them up tight with the threaded end going down, and cut off the excess bolt threads to make it look somewhat clean from below. You'd only have the bolt heads on the interior, and they would be covered by carpet and trim ... or at least made not obvious by the bedliner spray.

I'm sure that weld-bond stuff is the latest and greatest, but over time epoxies can crack.

Not trying to tell you how to do your job, just saying what I would do if I wasn't using a welder.