Alright folks,

first new thread from me in a good while, so I'm getting back into practice. I've finally got around to where I can work on my car again and do all the things I was putting off... Didn't know those lists got bigger if the car just sits. The first thing I'm doing is straightening out the frame underneath the car. Over the years, its been jacked up on these multiple times to the point where they are mangled and pushing humps up in the floor pan. I am going to attempt to straighten these back out as best as I can and overlay some v8roadsters miata frame rails, which should fit just fine. Photos attached show the degree of frame squish. The drivers side is probably the most squished. There are smashed locations on both sides where it looks like lift arms were put to pick it up. I'm hoping once I get these straightened out that the miata rails will give a good place to jack on and prevent further damage. The pinch welds on either side aren't in great shape, so I usually jack up under the subframes or control arms. My idea to straighten these out is to make a long sliver that I can shimmy up into the frame rail with holes tapped in it. I then plan on using some aluminum channel underneath to give a reference point to draw to, and then draw the rail down with bolts threading into the sliver. It looks like there is enough room to slip a 1/4" x 1 1/2" x 4' piece of bar stock into the rail from the rear of the car. Those rails are open to the rear. This will be my sliver that I use to draw it down. I'm probably just going to have to work it in a few hole spacings at a time and work down that material from the back to the front as I go.

Have any of you had any experience trying this, or using these reinforcement rails on your cars? I'm a bit hesitant to drill holes in the floor pan to fasten the reinforcement rails. I'm concerned about rust and water ingress, as well as having little lumps in the floor. Hopefully the rails straighten up in a fairly straightforward manner. Let me know your thoughts, I welcome your input. Also, I have a few other projects lined up that I should be posting here soon that you guys might be interested in.


that ain't straight

neither's this

Passenger rear

Passenger Front

Drivers rear

Drivers front

v8roadsters rail reinforcements

steel barstock and aluminum channel for straightening

 

ive been trying to think of a good way to do that too. the rails are really soft, i wonder about shoving a piece of wood in there or something.
or you could go nuts, and just remove them like this guy,

 

I've seen that guy's stuff. It's good work, but I don't think I'll be getting that carried away. Just finished drilling and tapping threads in the steel bars and I think my arms are about to fall off...

 

So some good news, looks like the rail clamp thing mostly works. The passenger frame rail is definitely straighter than it was. I didn't have enough bolts to completely do both sides so I need to get more. If you wanted a nice finish, im sure you could have a bolt-together die made to press all the details back after the first efforts I did. I couldn't get everything to line up, I drilled the jig on 1" centers. 20mm spacing might work better. I could get enough holes through the rail, but some were just half a hole off.

Bad news, found some holes in my floor pans behind the seats. Anybody got experience with floor pan repairs?