DOSE ANY BODY KNOW WHERE TO GET STRUT TOWER PATCH PANELS OTHER THAN USING A DONOR CAR, I CAN GET A NICE 82CADDY BUT THE STRUT TOWERS ARE GONE. I REPLACED FLOOR PANS,BED SECTIONS AND FULL REAR FENDERS SO TOWERS SHOULDN'T BE TO HARD ONCE YOU GET THE UNDERCOATING OUT OF THE WAY,MIGHT HAVE TO BEND MY OWN IF I CANT FIND PREMAID..AN HELP IS GREATLY APPRECIATED---KRAUT-CANNN
I used to work on the pickups when I was about 12-16 (back in about 1987-1990). Back then, rust wasn't an issue: even in New England.
But now, I live in the south, and have rediscovered the Rabbit Pickup. What I've found out is that the rust in the pass-front strut towers on these trucks is pretty standard for these trucks, regardless of age, mileage or where they spent their lives.
The problem stems from the fact that the engineers decided to reinforce the inner fenders with a secondary metal plates. Not a bad idea, but the rejects put a huge hole in the middle of the outer plates, to accomodate an emission expansion tank bracket (the tank was fitted on gas models only, but the bracket was fitted to all models). Since VW never seam-welded a single thing in their entire history, the inner reinforcement piece was coated in seam-sealer instead. Apparently, they didn't do such a hot job, since it tended to flake off. This led to sand and water building up between the two plates, leading to the eventual rust.
Strangely, this was only really a problem on the US-Made trucks, since the Cabriolet uses the same design, but the Cabriolets were thoroughly coated in seam-sealer/sound-deadener, and do not exhibit the same rust issues. This may also be due to the fact that the Cabriolets (after 1982) had plastic fenders liners. These help keep that sand/dust and water from even hitting the inner fenders. I think the pickups got the liners only in late 1983-84 (if they ever even saw them).
SOOOO,
If you're looking for replacement strut-towers, inner fenders, then your best bet may be to look for a donor car: in this case, a 1984-1987 Cabriolet. They have the same inner fender setup as the Rabbit Pickups did (reinforced plates), and they have the inserts in the inner fenders for the fender liners. So, after you've welded in your replacement strut towers, you can put some liners on the inside of the fenders to prevent future rusting.
The upside is clear, and finding a pigged out Cabriolet should be pretty easy. The downside (pending your prespective), is that the Cabriolet had round headlights, and a different radiator support. You'd have to either convert to round headlights, or do alot more cutting and welding to put the original Rabbit Pickup grill and rad support back on.
Topic: REPLACING RUSTED STRUT TOWERS (Read 6532 times)
