Small patch repair - Any tips?

A couple of months ago, I performed some rust prevention to the area behind the front bumper and lights of my Jimny. It turns out I didn't do as thorough a job as I first thought. I had to remove the lights again this week to apply some touch up paint. Noticed a bit of rust coming through on the freshly painted wheel arches. I was able to make a hole a bout 2cm in diameter in the wheel arch where it had completely rusted through.

I'd love to do a proper job and weld a few patches of sheet metal but I only have an arch welder and my welding skills are terrible. It'll only end in disaster. I'm considering using some fiberglass filler and some aluminium mesh. I recon that should be strong enough.

Any words of wisdom welcome before I make a right pigs ear of it.

Ta, MilkyRon.

The arc welder (stick I presume) is probably just going to burn holes in the steel because it is so thin. Gas MIG is better and more controllable.

I would take it to a local garage and ask them. Probably not that expensive to patch a couple of holes.

Then get onto buzzweld.co.uk and buy some decent rust encapsulating paint for it. Important to clean off the old underseal first, otherwise its just sealing in rot.

I learned stick at around 10yrs old.

Moved to gas welding soon after....strangely enough I used to stick weld cars for pocket money......can't recommend it if you're new to welding.....I remember when the first Mig came in the shop....I was all over it like a rash.

Found Tig to be quite soothing.....easy to learn if you've been gas welding 20 years.

As riccy says....get a mig....little 135A set will do,

Trouble with mig, in my opinion, is too many variables to get right and also welding outside is a pain with any sort of wind blowing as it interrupts the gas flow. I always stick weld as long as you use the correct size rod to match the steel. Don't expect to run the weld in one go as the metal is too thin. A series of spots and then fill the gaps allowing the steel to cool each time is best.

Might be too late of a reply but MIG welding is the fastest and IMO the easiest welding process.

MIG welding is also very forgiving and has more fine tuning ability than stick welding. I have learned on oxy/acet then arc (stick) and then MIG, I just love to MIG weld and 90% of all welding I do is with my Miller MIG welder. For rough and thicker steel I use the Stick Welder.
TIG is neater and cleaner too but mostly used for welding aluminum and stainless steel.

You can MIG weld with argo sheild mix (75% and 25% Co2) or you can use 100% Co2. Welding with a gas shield is the cleaner method with almost zero splatter as opposed to using flux core wire with no gas. The gas will last a very long time, 25 pounds of gas is quite a lot for a hobby welder.

MIG needs 2 settings basically, heat and wire feed both of which will be on a chart denoting material thickness. You will know when to turn up the gas as you will see the weld looking pitted, I use 10-15 CFM in wind and indoors around 6-8 CFM using 100% Co2.

The ideal thing to do is to get pieces of steel including that of the body panels and run some test welds. If needs be take notes of the settings when you see the welds looking perfect, noting material thickness, heat and feed settings. For body work you can use a .030 wire on 110V

MIG welding is easy as I said and the set up is not difficult at all, takes a bit of practice, once you get going on a MIG welder you wont want to leave it.

There are many tutorials on MIG welding online, here is one.

Cheers.

This is a good guy too, his tutorials are lengthy but very informative and in depth, I would look at them if I were you.
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Thanks for the replies all. Not had chance to attempt the work yet as the missus booked a very last minute holiday.

First course of action when I get back will probably be taking it to the local body shop for a quick quote

Will get some sheet metal and practice the stitch technique with the arc welder and see how I go.

No doubt I'll end up buying a MIG welder as well.


Appreciate all the input. Most importantly, nobody seems to think that my fiberglass filler idea was the way to go so you've all saved me a lot of heart ache!

Good luck and have a great holiday. Are you going to the Caribbean by the way?