That's the way forwards without a world of pain stripping out the interior . Good glue and be prepared to dive underneath and ensure its properly sealed ... Sent from my SM-G960F using Tapatalk
Its not structural, more waterproofing the old hole. Modern bodywork adhesive, metal to metal . Use screws to pull it temporarily together, then remove screws when adhesive sets and use some adhesive to fill the hole. Or SikaFlex / Tiger Seal PU adhesive (slower setting but not as strong maybe) . Then the biggest game is getting it lined up and squeezed down in time. Then go underneath, smear out excess glue to act as sealant, then paint and finish .. TBH I might even just do it with some lightweight expanded metal shaped to fit the ridges of the floor and then fibreglass it over, with mat from both sides . I did some holes in the corners of my floor that way 13 years ago, and made sure the underside was properly painted and sealed . That is not where the rust is today.
If you've got a repair section and you can get underneath, as above just glue the patch on with Sikabond or Tiger Seal. It's not structural, and it'll bung the hole up nicely (and you won't set your floor alight welding it).
Sadly, a rummage through my off cuts bin has yielded no bus floor sections I must have skipped any bits I had during the last workshop move. Maybe one of our other bus botherers can find a bit..
I have some from an prototype bay, I’m assuming the profile is the same. Just let me know how big a section you want and I’ll cut you out a bit. As said above, seam sealer or adhesive and possibly some self tappers to sort it. As for the ply section, I’d cut a piece of ply slightly larger than your ole then use it as a template then cut it out with a miniature skil saw set to the ply depth and finish the corners with a Stanley with a new blade in. If you have a floating floor then slide some plastic a bit bigger than the ole under it so it’s gone past the edges then glue in place with a gorilla adhesive that expands a tad as it cures, nice concrete block on top of plastic and to keep it all in place while it cures. Ozziedog,,,,,,,,don’t need welding, not for a ‘ole’
Thanks Ozzie! No idea if the profile is the same for an early as for a late, but I'd guess it would be. I'm sure @davidoft would know conclusively though. If you've got a bit to spare, that would be ace, and if you want some dosh for it just let me know how much. I'll measure me 'ole, but I'd guess its about 3" across, so I'd need enough squared to ensure the ridges lined up and it was still covered. There's probably a maths equation to work out how much that would be, but 6" should do ? Hopefully I can just cut enough ply out to glue in the metal, and then fit a bit of new ply in there (without the bellypan inspection hatch)
As someone mentioned earlier, I'd be tempted to bond a repair patch from underneath. Saves making your plywood hole any bigger, but then again, if you cut the plywood hole bigger, you would remove the six screw holes, which also means, the metal patch needs to be bigger to cover the six screw holes too, assuming they went through the ply into the metal
Just do the ply and worry about the metal bit later. It's safe under the belly pan for now (or forever).
What size piece do you need Sarah? Will you want it posting or can it wait till next techenders? I’ve found these in my stash
