Yet another Frame repair thread

Hi everyone,
getting ready to start some frame repairs on my 95, that I should have done long ago. I had seen the spot on the passenger side years ago, and just watched it grow through the years.

I had jumped the gun several months ago & bought to patch pieces from Amazon, before I had thoroughly researched anything. These pieces I got are just pre-shaped 1/8" flat steel for the outside of the frame, and I'm now thinking I might should go w/ the SafeTcaps instead.

When I first pulled off the bed, I though wow, this frame is really bad, but after looking at some of these other threads, mine probably is in really good shape?!

I've uploaded some pics of the passenger side to see if anyone wants to offer any advice on how they might would repair these sections. I'd mainly like to fix the passenger side in the shock mount area to start, and will be doing the work myself (not a professional by any means!).

Any and all advice / opinions is greatly appreciated, thanks!

 

Here are some pics of the drivers side; it doesn't appear to be as bad as the passenger side...

 

Looks like you definitely have some compromised areas, but I suspect it’ll be fixable. Have you gone over it with a hammer? That’s usually a decent way to find other areas that are also compromised.


I made my own plates for certain areas, and then bought some of the pre made reinforcements for others. Pretty happy with it.

 

I mainly went with a hammer on all the spots I could see, and then started chipping away at the largest spot. I plan on going back over the rest of it w/ the hammer to make sure I don't miss any.

 

That doesn't look too bad. You've gone this far so I would drop the fuel tank to get access to the inside of that frame rail to make sure you don't miss anything there. It's pretty straight forward to get it out of the way. For repair, I would recommend cleaning up and patching the holes, then go back with reinforcing plates or SafeTCaps. This is how I did mine. Takes a little more time but is a more complete repair. You might be able to get by with homemade plates but the caps are a pretty good value and reinforce the entire section if it has been thinned out, which most of them have. Using a good needle scaling gun helps to clean up and find bad areas. Clean out all pockets behind gussets and open up and add bigger drain holes. Sent you a PM.

 

Keep an eye out for the parts inside the frame rail sections too. My shock mount on the pass side was full of sand, and rusty. There’s some other boxed in sections that tend to collect dirt as well.

 

You are correct your frame is in great shape compared to many.

Those safety caps are a very expensive option . if one is in a hurry or unable to fabricate repair pieces .

Without seeing your Amazon pieces Safety caps are about the same things prefab pieces to cover the existing frame plus Some fancy bells and whistles.

I only know a friend bought some .

Do yourself a favor do as much as possible at one time!! So easy to let things slide then find you waited to long!

Cut out the bad spots to good metal weld in new pieces.

Best of Luck!!

 

Yeah, they are somewhat more $$ than what the pieces I bought were (attached below is a pic of the ones I bought). The reason I was thinking of the safety caps as they look like they are a C shape , like the outside of the frame along with the top & bottom of the frame in one piece and they just slip on & weld.
If you look on the picture up above of the passenger side shock area, I think it has creeped into the bottom of that frame area in the very bottom left of the hole, plus the shock mount is pretty much starting to crumble from rust on the inside. The shock mount replacement from safety cap looks pretty much straight forward as a replacement, w/o having to fab something.

I'm thinking on the smaller areas that are bad, is just cut a square into the good metal around, and patch a new piece (flush) in, right?

 

Yep, my passenger side shock mount on the inside of the frame is actually starting to crumble. I plan on going over as much as I can and address it now. Underneath the cab & up front are looking really solid as of right now.

I'll hopefully be working on it some this afternoon & tomorrow, and probably take some pictures.

 

Here are a few more pics of the drivers side - not as bad as the passenger side, but still needs some work.
And the last pic is the only other place I can find on the passenger side - after going over the frame as good as I could, it looks like it's only limited to a few places...

 

When you go over the rest of the frame i would be surprised if more areas are not comprised.

You can tell the metal when tapped gives a dead thunk type sound. rather then a sharper ringing sound very easy to hear the difference.