The longest build thread ever, at least it seems like it!

[Barrman]

If you fix the door crack. Next thing we know you are going to stop the cracks in the hood too!

[Kaiserjeeps]

Where does the hood crack at Tim? I have never had that happen. The door cracks have happened on many civi rigs and the M715. A serious weak spot in design. I am curious on the hood cracks.

[Barrman]

Smack dab in the middle front. With the side M715 hood hold downs and no under hood cross brace/latch like the civilian trucks. The middle of the hood just flexes and cracks. I have welded mine a few times but it just cracks a little over all over again.

[Kaiserjeeps]

Interesting.. I have never seen that. I would think a second layer of sheet metal, possibly 16 GA perfectly shaped to sandwich under the hood or even behind the front curl, glued in with body panel adhesive, would hopefully do the trick. I would think about 10 inches wide staying away from the area where the center drops to the main level of the sides. After a repair weld and sand back first. I wish I could help with that. It is always more fun working on someone else's stuff.

[Kaiserjeeps]

So I can't help but mention this. My uncle on my dads side died from covid on March 22nd. My two aunts on my moms side now have covid and one is very sick. With no predictable way of determining who it will kill, all of you use care and protect yourselves and your families as best as possible. Apparently it is not done destroying peoples lives. 1918 all over again.

So how do you stop the cracks in the jeep doors that plague (fitting word) all full size jeeps? This is what I do to help stop that. First carefully weld up any cracks. Get the metal straight. Get 4 each 36 inch 1/8 TIG welding filler rods. Trim 4.5 inches off two of them. You will need some 3M body panel adhesive and or epoxy such as I am using here. You will need to make a small bridge out of 18 GA to connect the outer door skin and inner door skin. This goes under the wing window mount to sandwich the OEM metal and add strength. I used 16 GA and that was a bit thick. But hey it is an offroad rig so heavy duty is king. You must strip out the door and turn it upside down. The hard part is sanding the grooves clean. I had to place rags over the openings to not cut my arm up. The inner door skins are stamped and very sharp. Clean the grooves and vacuum out the dust. Then fabricate the small bridges and test fit till they sandwich perfectly. My doors had different gaps and these need to be custom fit. The idea is to fold the ends to nearly touch the welding rod that will be glued in. I clamped both doors here and I used wax paper so the clamp won't become a permanent part of the door. If you get epoxy on the clamp you will not be able to remove it unless you cut it out. 3M makes very good stuff and I promise the clamp will not come out any other way. So use wax paper.
I chose this 3M 420 epoxy because I was out of panel adhesive for my smaller dispenser gun. My bigger one would not fit inside the door. This epoxy was what I used for water jetted door panel metal stamps to glue the pattern to base metal. It tolerates repeat heat cycles from an oven I heat the stamps with. It has a tenacious grip and the only lesser drawback is body panel adhesive has corrosion inhibitors and this epoxy does not. I am painting all of the insides so I don't care about that. This door will last longer than I will.

Some pictures... These doors are civi conversions. It took way more work to make m715 doors that I figured. Mainly the mount found inside the inner upper skin hole. Those stand off mounts had to be made to secure the wing window. Anyway turn the door upside down and start sanding the inside and outside lips to get them clean.

First repair the cracks.



Then flip the door upside down.



The 3M epoxy is well suited. Vibration and impact resistant and tough as nails.



The welding rod the the lip behind it where it will live from now on. You can see the shorter filler rod goes under the inside lip.



Fabricate and fit the two bridges.





Glued and bridges clamped. Go easy on the epoxy so it does not over flow out the window wipe slots. Now wait for it to cure all the way up. All fixed and ready for the door slammers.

[Flingarrows]

Amazing skill Al

[Kaiserjeeps]

No real skill there George, just step by step with the long haul in mind. I put a whole can of eastwoods internal frame paint in each door. I had them left over from some other work so I used them. I have been sanding on the passenger door and removing seal glue someone put on with a 2 inch brush. I wish I was kidding. I have to work on the home cleaning for staging pictures. After thursday I can hopefully get some primer on these doors after a small amount of bondo work. I am so close.

[Flingarrows]

Very great attention to detail Al

[Kaiserjeeps]

My doors are shouting at me every time I walk by. Paint me! I have been getting the home ready for pictures to sell it. It has not been this clean for a long time..LOL I hope to be repairing dents and priming by Thursday this next week. The wing window new gaskets I am still waiting on. The filler strip showed up today and I believe it is too soft being more dense foam like verses firm rubber. I will have a look at McMaster Carr and get something else. The way the cookie crumbles sometimes.

[brute4c]

Al...you rock!!! Thats a great idea I would never have had.

Dont count yourself short...I know you have true humility but believe us...YOU have skills my friend!