does anyone have any recomendations on an easy and safe way to roll up the rear wheel-well inner fender lips

i know there is a tool for about $400 that will mount to the lug studs and will roll the lips perfectly; but i dont have that $


is ther any safer way other than a "baseball bat" to roll them? can i use a plastic hammer or dolly ?

technically? how will metal that is stamped to a curve, be able to strech enough to make another opposite curve upwards?

(i dont want this job to look hacked up, so if anyone has any advice or tech help please let me know)

 

Well since nobody gave you any ideas I'll tekk ya how I did it. Not the best way but works.

Then again I was mini tubbin and painting the car anyways.

I took a plasma cuter and made cuts every inch or so on the spot that was gonna get rolled. Then I took a dead blow hammer and tapped em all up and in. After that I planed to weld em and smooth anything out that way rough.

 

channel locks, ghetto style but it worked enough...you cant tell anyway you look at my car. I only had to go up some to stop the rear tires from hitting on big bumps.

 

ok cool, thanks guys! i figured that i could get away with doing it the un-profesional way; but i wanted to run it by some people on here to make sure i wasnt guna cause a problem.

since i am paitning the entiure car, nows the time for me to experiment here, thanks again for the advice

 

Ya, i didnt have any problems with paint chiping or the fender actually warping/bending.

 

i've done probably 30 cars with a baseball bat, the wood is softer than the metal, and it worked quite well.

 

yea, i was contimplating putting a couple cuts in the metal to help it bend/fold over easier, but then i was worried about it rusting, because even if i paint it ; it is a wheel well,a nd water will collect there; i might try the plastic hammer approach, or maybe (mayyybe) a bsaeball bat.. it jsut sounds insane to even type that.. that i might take a baseball bat to the metal on my car..

 

you don't swing the bat at the car, you put it in between the tire and the wheel well and push down on the bat with your body and it'll bend it quite easily.

 

Swinging the bat at your car is what you do after you messed up.

 

stevo, you're telling me u had to roll the fender lip for those wheel?? they look to be only 275-285 in width

 

LOL! that one had me laughing pretty good!

yes and no.

long story short:

I have 285s

285s = 26" tall
275s = 25.7" tall

That small difference was enough for my tires to buldge like crazy on my 17x9" rim.

I had lowered my car at the same time and didnt replace the shocks, well the car was bouncy so it would scrape the tire on large bumps(especally highway bridges).
I rolled the fenders before i put new shocks in and all was well. With the new shocks i cant say if it was still gonna rub or not. Just either way it was a good preventive measure.

 

ok, i have 285/40/17 that im planning on putting on a 17x9.5 wheel soon, so i was just wondering about that. thanks

 

I didn't roll mine. I took a cutoff wheel and removed about half the lip around the top part of the fender opening where it was hitting. Make sure you leave at least 2/3's of each spot weld intact and you will be fine. Spray a little touch up paint or rubber undercoating on the exposed metal lip and all done. You can do it for less then $20 if you have a cutoff wheel.

Just another option.

 

i took out a half an hour from wetsanding hte car down this weekend; and tried to roll up the fender lips; i tried the baseball bat idea; but it didnt seem right; so i took some vice grips, and tookt he wheel off; and jsut decided to bend the fender lip up about 20 degrees; so that if i do hit a major bump; i dont slice the tire up;

i might go at it again, and see if i can roll them up more; or i might try the cutoff wheel idea; cuz i have one at the shop; we will see ina week or so

thanks for the advice tho guys

 

so you used a metal object which most certainly screwed up the paint instead of a bat which typically doesn't hurt the paint at all? How is force placed on the thin guage steel any different and not seem "right" ?

 

the car is going in for new paint in a month

i have the Entire car sanded down; which is why i chose this time to experiment with the fender lips; because they will be painted soon witht eh rest of the car...

 

The biggest trick to not messing up the paint is to heat it a bit with a heat gun before you try to move any metal.

A wood bat or large hard wood round works best, and it’s really a 3 person job, one to guide the bat, one to roll the car forward and back (easiest to just drive slowely), and one to sit on the trunk to keep downward pressure.

In a pinch I’ve also used 16gage, 2.25 or 2.5” exhaust pipe and also a large, half inch drive socket (use a ratchet to turn it to climb the outside of the tire).

BTW, when you’re “guiding it” you want to sort of guide it at an angle, to not only push out but upwards to help it bend.

I’ve also seen someone do it with a hammer and a dolly (the dolly was wrapped in something soft not to mess up the paint on the outside of the fender), but I’ve never done it that way myself… I was actually very amazed that it looked like he did the fenders right in front of me like that without chipping any paint (at least on the outside f the fender).

On the “new” trans am I’m going to try something a little different, I borrowed one of these:
http://www.eastwoodco.com/shopping/p...&keyword=31158
from work, looks like you can even force a slight flair in to the wheel arches with it:
http://www.eastwoodco.com/jump.jsp?i...8&iSubCat=1248

in this case the rear quarters/fenders are all AFU anyway, so I figured I’d roll them first then get to work fixing them.

FWIW, you can rent those thigns in a number of places, I think tire rack, and online like here:
http://www.rollyourfender.com/

 

awesome post 83; thats the info i was looking for !