Cutting Belly Pan?

[Jewel65]

So, I am digging into the restoration of our newly acquired 65 Caravel and want to take off the belly pan in order to expose the frame for rust removal and paint. I have taken all the rivets from down the middle and the street side. Now the front wraps into the skin. I really don't want to have to take all that front apart to get to the belly pan section under there if I don't have too. Will it hurt anything to cut the skin, and patch it back together when reinstalling? See photo. The red line is where I was thinking of cutting. What should I do?

[purman]

I cut mine in the middle to get it out. Just cut it on a cross piece of the frame to make it easier to patch back together.

[Jewel65]

Thanks! I'll take another look today and make sure it is on a crossmember.

[Eric H]

Do you mean that you have taken off the trim on most of it but you don't want to take off all of the belly pan?
Do you plan on reusing the belly pan? If so you can still cut it, but you'll want to get some additional aluminum to patch it up.


I would say that if you're under there already just take it all off so you can get to it all and do it right. It looks like that frame has at least a bit of rust on it so taking it all off would allow you to do it correctly. Also if you don't take off all the lower belt to redo it or at least re seal around it you may still have places that the water gets in.

[Jewel65]

No, I haven't taken any trim off and want to avoid it if I can, but the farther I go along I may decide to do that. It may depend on how much of the floor I end up replacing. I will either reuse the belly pan or get new aluminum and replace it, I haven't decided yet. There are some holes in the old one. I will patch if I reuse the old. I am thinking the banana wrap and extra aluminum that rolls under the body will be flexible enough that I can get behind it to do rust removal and POR 15. Maybe I am wrong, we'll see. Thanks for all the input.