Ok, So I was working on my rx7, had just finished filling and sanding dents on the front end and figured that it was time to move to the front wheel wells. When I was carefully removing paint, I ran into some existing bondo underneath the paint. As it turns out, the last owner had tried to do their own "bodywork" and decided to get rid of the rust by simply bondoing over the existing rust and paint. As you can imagine, the body kept rusting, and the bondo only made the problem worse.

So in an attempt to fix it, I took off the inner wheel well covering so I could get to the back of the fender as well as the bondo, and with a slight tap, chunks fell out. Now I'm left with bare metal and some questions about the easiest way to fix this mess. Should I bondo over it again, making sure to remove ALL rust, or should I "reconstruct" the fender with fiberglass? Cutting and replacing the damaged metal could also work, but I don't have a welder, and rivets may cause more of a problem then they're worth.

Any additional ideas / help would be greatly appreciated.
Aaron
Anchorage, AK
1980 Mazda RX-7

 

Get a new fender

 

Ditto- unless your a body-man, it will be far less time and $$ to get a decent set of fenders and bolt em on. Man! I have never seen rust like that on _front_ fenders. Makes my cringe to think what the _back_ ones might be like, where these cars typically show real rust issues...
Stu Aull
80GS
Alaska

 

Agreed, there is no point going crazy trying to repair a bolt on panel if its that bad, just replace it.

 

Word, you can buy new fenders from black dragon for i think ~100 bucks. Of course shipping would possibly suck but its gonna end up costing close to that in filler/glass, primer, etc to fix it and it would also take LOTS of time (where the actual money is spent).

 

One cheap method of fixing this would be to get some thin sheet metal and pop-rivet it to the inside of the fender after removing the rust. Then put bondo over the top. I only recommend this method if you want a cheap fix. If you’re going to put a nice paint job on the car then do not use this method. This type of repair will not last more then a couple of years. An easier, quicker, and better way would be to get a used fender. You can get a used one for $50 or less.

 

Luckily, the back ones are fine. I don't know why the front ones are so bad, but it's odd that everything else is fine. I've looked at the metal under the car and under all the carpet and in the back, and it looks good. I think I just might go for new fenders.

 

Ok, so I looked on google as well as blackdragon, and all I could find was a bunch of requests for used fenders and some from blackdragon for 269.95 apiece. For both fenders, that would be $540 + shipping. Does anybody know where to get some used ones for a decent price? Sorry for the basic question, but I haven't done this before. Thanks!