Body Work Tutorial

Ok lets try to tackle some of your dents. One thing I would suggest is to work them from behind in these area's. I like to do this for a few reasons. You can see what you are doing (gloss from the paint is still there) and more metal work can be done without adding heat to the panel (stud guns or other).

If you have some good strong pry bars, or rods you can start working the dents out from inside the panel. I like to push around the perimeter of the dent and tap from the outside. You can work your way towards the center of the dent slowly hammering down the high spots. Putting outward pressure on the dents will help relieve the stress and relax the dent. The outward high spots will just relax and go back to where they belong with a little tapping from your hammer... You should get a decent set of hammers and dollies if you don't already.

Once you are to the point of getting the dent out you can hammer and dolly the area flat. Remember that a hammer and dolly is actually stretching the metal because you are flattening it out like rolling dough on the counter top.

There are a two good techniques for hammer and dolly work. There is "hammer on dolly" this is where you have the dolly directly behind the hammer to flatten out spots, and "hammer off dolly" this is where you hammer on the metal, but have the dolly off to the side. This can help you hammer down a high spot without stretching the metal as much.

For area's that you cannot get to you can use your dent removal tools to pull the dents out, again work from the outside in while stress relieving the metal around the dents.

The "first in last out" method is a good way to work a dent. You first want to survey the dent, and see what direction the impact came from. This will give you an idea of what happened and how to reverse what happened.

The two damages that we mentioned before are "direct" damage and "indirect" damage. You want to start with the "indirect" damage first, and work your way towards the point of impact. This will help you control work hardening of the metal.

Remember when working the metal you want to ease it, without forcing anything, you want gentle pressure from behind, along with gentle force from outside. Take your time and do some practice.

OK, I'll give it a shot as soon as it warms up a bit. Thanks much.