How To Graft Wheel Wells - Fender Blender

Before welding, remember to bend back the 3/4-inch section on the reverse side. Working in short sections, this is what the butt jointed seam looked like from the rear. A little dressing back with a grinder, and it'll be easy to finish-work this fender with a hammer and dolly, something that couldn't be done with a lap joint.

As the F-1 fenders were longer, I'd cut through the swage line, the alignment of which needed attention. A cutoff wheel made short work of cutting 4 inches along the lower part of the swage line. The lower part of the panel was then pushed in to meet the old fender, and the now-tapered end to the swage line welded up.

I'd temporarily welded the two parts at the lower rear, and here's the discrepancy between the two panels at the lower edge. You can see the wire-rolled edge of the F-1 fender (arrow), which I chose to continue around the rear using another section of the F-1 fender. Good thing I didn't throw it away!

At first I planned to use the lower F-1 section right around to the lowest bolthole on the mounting flange, but the differing angles as the fender comes away from the pickup bed made me rethink. Note also the differing curvatures of the fenders.

Viewed from the backside, and with the mounting boltholes of the new and old fenders aligned, I chose to join them at this point, just above where the wire ends on the F-1 fender, marking and cutting accordingly.

Carefully removing the section on the right left me with 1/2 inch or so of the wire protruding from my patch panel (arrow), which will offer some extra strength when it's welded to the inside of the F-100 fender flange.

With the new section clamped in place and the wire-rolled lower edge aligned with the section already tacked to the fender, you can see the difference in curvatures. As it had a rolled edge it was possible to re-bend it to suit.

Re-bent and trimmed to fit, and with a couple of relief cuts to allow some movement, the patch followed the curvature of the F-100 fender, and was screwed in place, with a couple of tack welds at either end.

Following the same format as before, cutting along the join and removing the strip of old fender, some hammer and dolly work was required to align the sheetmetal prior to, and during, tack welding.

Once the seam was tack welded its entire length, I could go back and seam weld it, no more than 1/2-inch at a time, and moving around to various points on the seam to avoid heat build-up in any one spot. The entire seam was then ground smooth, and should require very little filler.

This is the view looking up inside the fender, with good weld penetration along the seam. The join in the wire-rolled edge (arrow) has yet to be welded; note that I beveled each edge to provide penetration. I don't want the edge splitting in the future.

Hmm, hadn't banked on all that Bondo in there. My $50 fenders were still a bargain, but will require some heat shrinking and straightening before they're ready for paint. We'll show you that next time.

With a quick shot of rattle can satin black to protect it for a couple of days before I tackled the metal straightening, here's the vastly improved appearance of the truck, with matching swage lines and rounded wheel openings. A day well spent methinks!

Compare the driver side to the as-yet untouched passenger side...

...The truck appears lower thanks to the dropped wheel opening and the lower rear edge to the fender, yet retains the angled forward appearance of the later fenders. Now I just have to make the other side match!