camaro 350

I have been working on this 89 camaro rs for about two weeks trying to get it safe to drive on the road and tonight I noticed that underneath the strut towers are pretty rotted.It's mushy in quite a few spots but from the topside everything seems fine.My question is how bad is too bad?And can it be fixed without paying an arm and a leg?If not a friend of mine said he would trade me straight up for a 78 trans am.Should I do it?It has no interior but the car is very solid.please let me know what you guys think.

igotta355z28

iTrader: (1)

where ya at? i have an 86 z28, u can trade ur car for the ta and ill give u my 86 for it....

camaro 350

I live near Traverse City Michigan.

igotta355z28

iTrader: (1)

wow nope, sorry never in texas when i need it....

Jeff91RS

iTrader: (1)

i had a friend who had a third gen that has 1/2 plate steel over both strut towers and it handled just fine, he didnt do it so i couldnt tell u how they went about it, but it can be done

userchemical

sounds to me like you're talking about a camber plate kit.

camaro 350

Thanks for the responses so far If anyone else has ANY info on the repair procedure for the strut towers or just thinks I should go for the trade let me know.As of right now I'm leaning toward the trade because I don't have much money right now and I have no idea how to fix the strut towers.Thanks

ezysk

Our Michigan weather seems to kill these strut towers. My daily has one in pretty bad shape that I have to fix up, when I finish my current project. On my current project trans-am I found a little rust starting on the underside of the strut tower, so I cut it out, just in inner steal, and welded in a replacement.
On my daily I need to tackle it differently. I hear the top piece of the strut tower is just spot welded in, and I can see where the spot welds are, so I plan to drill them out, remove the top piece, repair the sheet metal below, then get a thicker piece of metal to repair the top piece. I heard at one time that someone sold these top pieces, but I can’t seem to find them anywhere and the junkyards near me seem to be all out of 3rd gens.

camaro 350

Thanks for the reply ezysk.The top piece sees to be really solid still with no rust in sight but the inner fender well that is directly underneath it is soft and if I push on it pieces start falling off.Do you have any pics of the one you fixed?And does it ride like its supposed to?Thanks

ezysk

I may have taken some pictures, but not sure. If I have I will post them.
As for ride, mine rides exactly as it is supposed to because I put it back together exactly as it was originally.

If I had the time though, I would have drilled out the welds on the top piece and pulled it off completely. That way it would have been easier to fix the inner metal.
For some reason I find welding from the bottom harder than welding from the top.

In a couple of months I am going to begin working on my other car that has a real bad strut tower. If I don’t have any pictures of this last one, I will make sure to take some good pictures of this one.

camaro 350

Thanks,I appreciate it a lot.