Simple rear floor repair turning ugly!

[nd48463]

I began the tedious process of repairing a section of floor in the rear bedroom of my 1977 Excella today. Everything was going pretty well. I removed the lower rub rail, rear bumper, rear storage, belly pan and lower rear curved pieces. I started to center punch the bucked rivets to start drilling them out but on the roadside panel there was none! It looked kiind of strange so upon investigating I find out that a skin over skin repair was made at some point!
Now I am confused as what to do! I can't access the rivets to seperate the body from the frame! Good new is the frame is in pretty good shape. Only needs a few minor patches, then prime and paint.

I think I may have to now remove the lowere rear quarter panel! THis could get expensive!

Please advise!!

Nate

[HowieE]

How is that skin on skin repair held on? Did the they just rivet the vertical lines and do nothing around the bottom edge?

[nd48463]

Yep... Just vertical and upper horizontal row of rivets. THe only thing holding the lower on was with the rivets through the rub rail. I have since removed the interior components, and also the inner panels to see whats going on . Good part is that it does not appear that the floor rot was caused from water coming in from above. I believe that rot is from the seam around the lower rub rail. It had remnants of many different caulking materials, including silicone. There was also a scabbed in piece of plywood over one of the large holes.

So much to do, so little time! Next trip is not until April, but the Michigan weather does not allow for many days of exterior work!


nate

[LI Pets]

From the inside you can shear the rivets off that are in the C channel, that should drop it.

Then rivet it back as it should be.

I did my floor in the same spot.

[nd48463]

That will probably work! Only problem I see is that there appears to be a a slight gap between the original and overskin. Riveting back to the C channel could cause buckling of the panel when the gap is filled. We'll have to wait and see!

Nate

[nd48463]

Moving along on my floor repair and I am beginning to think that this may have been done once before! I noticed that all of the floor bolts are wafer head instead of the typical elevator bolts, and It appears that the floor is closer to 1/2 than to 3/4" . What size is typical for the floor? 19/32?? Thankfully the frame is in pretty good condition. There is just two small areas of corrosion at the rear of the frame. Easy fix.

Nate
1977 31' Excella 500


Nate

[87MH]

Originally Posted by nd48463

...It appears that the floor is closer to 1/2 than to 3/4" . What size is typical for the floor? 19/32??

It is exactly 1/2".

Below is a picture of what came out of my '78 Sovereign (top), and, on the bottom, a cross section of a 1/2" 7 ply finish plywood I found at Home Depot.



It sounds as if your "exploration" of your Excella is pretty well parallelling my experiences on the '78.
'78 31' Sovereign

I had to purchase a whole sheet of the finish plywood to match up to the existing thickness of the floor, but only ended up using less than half of it. Not to fear, though, there will be ample opportunity to use it later on as you "customize" the Excella.

[overlander63]

Strange. Our '74 has 3/4" plywood floor. Maybe another cost-and-weight saving measure in the mid '70's.

[malconium]

Originally Posted by nd48463

That will probably work! Only problem I see is that there appears to be a a slight gap between the original and overskin. Riveting back to the C channel could cause buckling of the panel when the gap is filled. We'll have to wait and see!

Nate

Possibly you could insert something thin to fill the slight gap before you re-rivit.

By the way my '73 also has 3/4". I knew that some models older than mine had thinner plywood but I had not heard that anything newer did.

Malcolm