1956 Chevrolet BelAir Car Restoration Project - Part 9

The trunk floor looked good when we first glanced at it. When we started really looking closer we found that it had been repaired before. The Tri-five cars are known to rust around the tail pan area and this car turned out to be no different. The spare tire well was rusty and after closer inspection the rear body brace, tail pan and rear trunk floor also needed replaced.

This is the rear trunk panel and spare tire well that we purchased from Danchuks. You can see in the picture that the tail panel and trunk floor look good from a distance.

When we started trimming away the old tail panel the older repairs really started showing up. You can also see how rusty the very rear of the trunk floor is.

Here we have the spare tire well welded in and a small area repaired to the right of it. We also have the rear brace and most of the tail removed. Notice the old rust repairs that were brazed in on the tail panel.

We have the trunk floor trimmed for the new panel and the rear body brace installed. The rear brace is sitting on new body cushions so it is sitting at the proper height. The inside of the brace has been coated with black Zero-Rust to prevent it from rusting in the future.

The rear floor is trimmed to fit and ready to weld in. Take your time when fitting the replacement metal so you don't trim off too much. When fitting the panel to the body we marked the areas where it needs to be welded to the rear brace. We then drilled holes in the panel so we can plug weld it to the rear brace. We use a MIG welder for our plug welds.