Early A floor pans

-
stretch

stretch

I cut my cars!
Joined
Jan 31, 2012
Messages
154
Reaction score
69
Location
michigan's U.P.
I knew the right side floor had issues when I bought my Valiant. Its not as bad as I expected but its not as good as I had hoped. So the plasma cutter will be coming out as will the welder and spot weld cutting drills.

Have any of you replaced floor pans in your early A? If so, who makes the best fitting pans? I see AMD does not offer them. I also see the pans that are available are not full length. Just front and rear sections that require leaving the portion under the front seat.

My car had a rubber mat. I always assumed that a rubber floor would be better on the floor because water cant soak through it. It would apear that the water can't evaporate out from under it either.

22555104_1939100992767540_6957865233871197552_n.jpg
 
I got mine from Auto Body Specialties. The seem to be the only company that makes them for the early A. I just put mine in a couple months ago and they fit great! I did have to patch in a section like you said between the front and rear pans but it was pretty simple!
 
ChrisRomello said:
I got mine from Auto Body Specialties. The seem to be the only company that makes them for the early A. I just put mine in a couple months ago and they fit great! I did have to patch in a section like you said between the front and rear pans but it was pretty simple!
Click to expand...


Did you by chance take any pictures?
 
stretch said:
Did you by chance take any pictures?
Click to expand...
I have both front pans and a trunk floor on the way from ABS, earlier I had bought a rear floor pan from them and was impressed with its quality. Some time ago I bought one from Rock Auto...it would probably work, but it was just flat lay-up with no bead stiffeners...I would only use it in a pinch.
 
ChrisRomello said:
This was before I welded in the patch piece between the front and rear. It wasn’t difficult to fab the pieces.
Click to expand...

i used the same on my 66, the rears fit OK, but you have to trim the back section off as they are made for a Plymouth. the front pans were not the best fit, and need some TLC to fit nice. if i could do it all over, i would look for a clean used OEM floor pan.
 
stretch said:
I knew the right side floor had issues when I bought my Valiant. Its not as bad as I expected but its not as good as I had hoped. So the plasma cutter will be coming out as will the welder and spot weld cutting drills.

Have any of you replaced floor pans in your early A? If so, who makes the best fitting pans? I see AMD does not offer them. I also see the pans that are available are not full length. Just front and rear sections that require leaving the portion under the front seat.

My car had a rubber mat. I always assumed that a rubber floor would be better on the floor because water cant soak through it. It would apear that the water can't evaporate out from under it either.

View attachment 1715102988
Click to expand...
X2 on autobody specialties floor pans. I bought the fronts and used a 1973 rear section for my 66 dart. fit was pretty good on the fronts and on my friends 65 barracude we did the rears. Some trimming was required but it was a bunch better than the "unformed and just bent a bit to look like floor pans" others we saw . I ended up making a trimming mark 1 inch down and butt welded the pan to the original hump section that I had left. these pictures were just before that and after some stitching, I did a full weld after stitching it in.
DSCF2091.JPG
DSCF2093.JPG
 
Most floors rot out since the carpet holds water. Convertibles are usually totally ruined since old tops leak. Of course, wouldn't happen if the car were garaged but most people push the old car out of the garage and let it sit under a tree collecting leaves. On my 65 Dart, I used the cheap rockauto floor pan on R side (~$55). Not exactly the right shape, but a rubber mallet made it work. If I did again, I would lap ~1/8". I butt-welded, which took much time to fit the cut hole and I got some burn-thrus w/ my cheap HF wire-welder, even trying to hold a copper spoon behind. I later covered the edges w/ fiberglass. While the inner frame rails and x-member were exposed, I wire-brushed, sand-blasted, and coated w/ Rust Destroyer, pulling a rag forward thru the rail. The driver's side just needed a small flat patch.

My 64 Valiant convertible had floor repairs, by a shop I understood. The gomers just welded flat panels over the rusted-out floors, leaving the old floors there. I'll have to rectify someday, perhaps when the tranny is out. I can't list all the things the "professionals" did wrong.
new floor pan.JPG
overall.JPG
floor repair - small.jpg
 
After seeing this post, I started looking closer at the rockauto floors and the ABS floors and you can clearly see the difference in quality. Just ordered front and rears today. Question, how to remove the pans? I have cutoff wheels and and sawzall. Both? Or is 1 better then the other? Or just do it and see what works best?
 
None2Slow said:
After seeing this post, I started looking closer at the rockauto floors and the ABS floors and you can clearly see the difference in quality. Just ordered front and rears today. Question, how to remove the pans? I have cutoff wheels and and sawzall. Both? Or is 1 better then the other? Or just do it and see what works best?
Click to expand...
Cut off wheels are the best. Place the new floor pans in over the old floor and draw a line on the outline. I found that trimming from the new floor pans where they don’t exactly fit flush to the existing floor made for a better fit. Cut out the floor about a half inch below the line you traced out on the transmission tunnel and on the outside edges grind the spot welds. This will help everything come out cleaner. Here’s a pic of my removed floor:
A5456F06-8774-4995-9BDF-4D8D54534F58.jpeg
 
ChrisRomello said:
Cut off wheels are the best. Place the new floor pans in over the old floor and draw a line on the outline. I found that trimming from the new floor pans where they don’t exactly fit flush to the existing floor made for a better fit. Cut out the floor about a half inch below the line you traced out on the transmission tunnel and on the outside edges grind the spot welds. This will help everything come out cleaner. Here’s a pic of my removed floor:View attachment 1715142056
Click to expand...


Thanks for the tip. Luckily mine aren't that bad. I can get just the 4 panels, and really, only 3 are all the way through, but I figured while in there might as well.
 
I see a few of you have used the A.P.C. floor pans from Australia and loved the fit. I checked their web sight and the pans they build are for the Australian Valiant and Charger. Are the Australian Charger and Valiants using the same floor pans as the domestic A-bodys? Are the Austrian cars A-bodys? I have never seen one.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
-

Back
Top