Notch in fender for more leg (belly) room

[IOPort51]

I am of the opinion that putting seats in a CJ of any other variety than what it came with is a major big PITA.

Seats from another vehicle most likely will need some sort of re engineered mount and will more than likely take up more of the room that was meant for you than is comfortable. They may look good but be of a material that may not be the best choice for an open vehicle and will sun fade and rot before you know it. If you do have the occasion to do some serious off road driving you may not find them capable of having your but dropped in them with considerable force and still having springs or passing. Worse yet you may find they do not cushion and support your favorite back side in a way that will allow you to walk normally for a day or two. Having a seat that will hold you in the proper position with out sliding around on off camber is a plus too.

I found some comfortable aftermarket seats in the master craft Nomad. coincidentally the least expensive seat Mastercraft sells.

now for the bad news, this seat like every other aftermarket seat that claims to "Bolt into your CJ" may, in fact bolt to the mounts but unless you are shorter than 5' 10" your head will stick above the roll bar and the stearing wheel may very possibly rub your stomach.

I made new seat mounts to drop the seat 3" and got my head out of the roof and back down where I can see out of the windshield rather than over it but it was still a bit cramped for and aft. With the seat in the full back position it is in contact with the rear wheel well and that is all there is.

unless you modify the body to gain more room which will mean stretching the body, I guess I should have bought a CJ7 but it a bit late to second guess that now or modifying the fender well. I think notching the wheel well will be much easier than stretching the whole body so that's the way to go.

I am quite proud of the fact that I have not cut,chopped or other wise changed the structural integrity of My CJ5 and to do this Modification required much thought and consideration and a plan to make this look sort of like this is the way it is supposed to be. You have heard the saying measure twice and cut once? well I measured, changed, thought through and measured again about 30 times before making a cut.

So, after this incredibly long winded, but hopefully entertaining, introduction I offer these pictures and captions.





Lines to be cut and 1 1/4" holes for the corners. I like the idea or round corners rather than square. they are stronger and they look a lot better.






This is the whole, more or less a case of connect the dots. Sawsall is not a precision tool and this required a bit of grinding to get everything in the right plane and tangent to the corners.



For those that have never seen/used one of these, this is a spot weld cutter. It cuts the part you want to remove and leaves the part you want to save. then you grind the weld that was left behind to smooth things up again.





this is the seat back in position to check the fit, no I have not covered the hole yet, I think it fits pretty well. the seat back angle is good and the seat slider clicks in just the right place and the seat slides back a whopping 2". Which is a pretty good ways when your talking about belly room.



some of you may be wondering why I only went back 2" and this is the answer. two inches is where the seat back hits the roll bar.

Now please watch for part two where I deal with a few small problems like braking and rolling 10ga galvanized sheet metal, yes that's right galvanized. I think I can do a passable spot weld on 10 ga but I have not tried to do it in a vertical position.

When all things are said and done this was the difficult part and the first cut was traumatic to be sure and so I am glad it is done.

 

[mstar]

So just curious what happened to the original seats? I see a lot of jeeps with different than original seats in them and always wander where are the stock seats it came with.There must be a jeep salvage yard with thousands of old seats somewhere. mike

 

[IOPort51]

still have them. the original were the same as you would find in a 70-80s chevy work van. low back buckets. I used to buy them from a van customizing shop for $50 a pair back in the day.




this is what they look like. Some new foam and springs with marine vinyl covers. My girl friend thought orange on red would look good with the yellow. What can I say, she is an professional artist.

and this is what I have now.

 

[mtnwhlr]

Looking at your last pic with the new seats and belts I take it you don't have the belts mounted yet?

 

[Torxhead]

I look forward to reading about a off-road test on that there IO.

 

[IOPort51]

Looking at your last pic with the new seats and belts I take it you don't have the belts mounted yet?

not the shoulder straps. Need a cross bar on the roll bar to mount those to, next project.

 

[Hedgehog]

If I were you I would have moved the Roll bar back, but I also see that you've added a front section to your cage. .... I still would have moved it back and added sections to the front cage.

 

[IOPort51]

If I were you I would have moved the Roll bar back, but I also see that you've added a front section to your cage. .... I still would have moved it back and added sections to the front cage.

Now you tel me this??

That is an interesting idea but a bit late for me. Actually the 2" with the drop and the tilt wheel is working quite well, i think I am going to like it.

 

[Hedgehog]

'75 Jeeps look much the same but are quite different in reality. Mine had a good 6" from the roll bar to the top angle going down the back of the seat. I cut to the back of the triangular corner easer. But come to think of it I didn't follow the angle down. The seats I was going to use had a very deep back. The bottom cut ended up similar to yours. My steering wheel and seats sit further out board than yours so I needed the area cut in front of the roll bar. Like I said, both Jeeps look much the same, but in reality are quite different.

 

[IOPort51]

spent some time tonight making round corners. A 20 ton press, some 1 1/2" amgle a little 3/8" plate and a section of 1" cold rolled makes a pretty nice 90 deg. roll that fits in a 5/8" radius corner quite nicely.



If I was going to do very much of this I would do something a bit different but this works pretty slick for a couple of feet of rolled edge.

 

[tarry99]

spent some time tonight making round corners. A 20 ton press, some 1 1/2" amgle a little 3/8" plate and a section of 1" cold rolled makes a pretty nice 90 deg. roll that fits in a 5/8" radius corner quite nicely.



If I was going to do very much of this I would do something a bit different but this works pretty slick for a couple of feet of rolled edge.

IO.......just my .002 cents 10 gauge is really hard to form, Your tub originally was made out of 18 gauge.........and galvanized is not something you want to weld since it throws off toxic gases and your welder will not like it anyway. Get some 16 gauge cold rolled sheet metal......and what I find works best is to attache a backing strip ( about 1" inch wide ) with a 1/2" exposed to the opening from the rear......can be attached with cleco's for now , gives you a platform and backing to butt weld your new piece to. Once tacked in place you can weld your new piece in from the top and then finish welding your backing in from underneath..........make sure all metal is ground clean with no paint or dirt on either side..........weld only an 1 inch or so then move over to the opposite side so as not to warp the metal , once done grind , finish and paint. A little undercoating underneath hides what you have done and also seals it off.............Have fun!

 

[IOPort51]

IO.......just my .002 cents 10 gauge is really hard to form, Your tub originally was made out of 18 gauge.........and galvanized is not something you want to weld since it throws off toxic gases and your welder will not like it anyway. Get some 16 gauge cold rolled sheet metal......and what I find works best is to attache a backing strip ( about 1" inch wide ) with a 1/2" exposed to the opening from the rear......can be attached with cleco's for now , gives you a platform and backing to butt weld your new piece to. Once tacked in place you can weld your new piece in from the top and then finish welding your backing in from underneath..........make sure all metal is ground clean with no paint or dirt on either side..........weld only an 1 inch or so then move over to the opposite side so as not to warp the metal , once done grind , finish and paint. A little undercoating underneath hides what you have done and also seals it off.............Have fun!

thanks for the look out Terry I do appreciate it.

the material in the picture is actually Stainless 10 ga. and was just something that was handy to play with. I will be using 18ga steel and it will be zink plated. If everything goes to plan there will be about 10" of seam to join and nome of it is anything close to a load position. so the seam will be brazed and the rest will be spot welded to look as much like the original design as possible. I think you will like what I have planned.

Having, over the years had to need to weld galvanized I am familiar with zink poisoning. the worst symptom I have experiences is a huge splitting headache. If anyone else finds themselves in a position where this kind of welding is absolutely necessary, and I do not encourage this, white milk will make the headache go away almost instantly although I will not claim that it will remove all the heavy metal from your body.

 

[IOPort51]

first off let me make a correction the last picture was 16ga. not 10 ga.
too many numbers floating around in my head.

next installment is the two brakes/rolls on the sheep metal.






we have discussed the roll and the broke 90 was just about all my HF sheet metal brake could do.

 

[IOPort51]

now it fits, sort of.



I could have done a couple of things different but all in all I like the way this is going. I could have cut down on the seam length considerably if I had extended the roll a bit but it would complicate the edge brake at two angles. If that does not make sense to you don't let it bother you I just barely understand it myself.

 

[IOPort51]

not as much to show as I would like but yard and house got in the way. Managed to get the top crease and a couple of the fiddly bits cut and fitted.

I like it so far



Would have been cool if I had planned well enough to eliminate most of the seams but, maybe next time, not enough of a problem to start over.

 

[IOPort51]

After the cut and paste phase this is pretty much what I was trying for, I really like the rounded corners and I have managed to save 99% of the galvanized coating. Next to make a couple of seam braze s and a few plug brazes before metal prep, primer and paint.

Showed it to Girl friend tonight and she said "that looks almost like it belongs there." just what I was shooting for.

The weather is so nice and I just can't drive the jeep with a huge hole in the fender, god I want this done!!

 

[mtnwhlr]

I'm with your girlfriend can't wait to see how it looks done and painted. I have seen others try and do this but you took it to another level

 

[Posi]

Well done!

 

[IOPort51]

Say hello to my little friend!!

This is a very cool pneumatic punch/edge forming tool that makes clean, fast little holes for plug welds, always the same exact distance from the edge. and it makes a very cool lap joint edge that allows for a lap joint that is level across the face. this is a great thing for patch panels, like floor boards and rocker panels.





There are little holes on all edges that will be welded something like these.



this is a shot of the forgotten view, inside the fender well.



Hopefully tomorrow night will be welding night.

 

[IOPort51]

tip for the day, do not use your finger to smooth "seam sealer". Acetone does not even touch this stuff.

totally ruined my manicure.