How to Repair Quarter - Panels On Any Car

The new Year One quarter-panel reproductions are actually made for a hardtop. To make them fit the convertible, Toby Ramsey of Ramsey Auto Body measured 6 inches from the top of the wheelwell opening, marked the panel front to back with a felt-tip pen and a straightedge, and cut it with a body ripper.

Next, Ramsey held the new panel to the car and marked the car with a felt-tip pen. It is important to trim the car to the new panel and not the other way around.

The old panel was removed by drilling all the factory spot welds with a spot-weld cutter. Available from any paint-supply shop, these bits cut the outer skin, leaving the inner panel intact.

Ramsey again utilized the body ripper to cut the top and front edge of the old quarter-panel. Note the 11/44-inch notation on the panel; this is done so the old panel will overlap the new panel, making for a stronger repair than a butt-joint seam.

Unfortunately, the outer wheelhouses were worse than the quarters. The entire outer lip was gone and had previously been repaired with filler. This created a challenge, as reproduction outer wheelhouses are not available for these cars.

Our solution was to use a set of Year One's '70-'72 Chevelle outer wheelhouses and modify them to fit the GS. Ramsey first used the body ripper to remove the outer lip we needed for the car, then the new lip was held up to the car and the old panel was marked for cutting.

The new lip was welded to the old outer wheelhouse. Note the bottom rear of the panel is much larger, replacing the entire lower portion of the wheelhouse where it was rusted out.

Before the inside of the car was once again sealed up, a wire brush on a right-angle die grinder was used to clean up the surface rust on the original sheetmetal. An ounce prevention is worth more than a pound of cure in this case.

Ramsey sprayed the outer lips of the car and the new panel with some weld-through primer. This high-zinc primer keeps the welds from rusting on the backside of the panel where they can't be reached to paint. The rest of the inner sheetmetal was sprayed with some 3M undercoating to further prevent rust. Note that the window regulator and the body line are taped and covered so they don't get sprayed.