Replacing rocker panel

[triracer67]

How hard is it to replace a rocker panel, I have one dented pretty bad, and one rusted. The front, back, and interior structures are all very sound with no rust. I have two rock sliders to cover them up, but, wouldn't mind just replacing. Thoughts?

 

[WILDHORSES]

How hard is it to replace a rocker panel, I have one dented pretty bad, and one rusted. The front, back, and interior structures are all very sound with no rust. I have two rock sliders to cover them up, but, wouldn't mind just replacing. Thoughts?

I'm no body and paint pro but replacing the rocker panels alone is pretty straight forward. Drill out a bunch of spot welds, position the rocker and fill in the welds, seam seal, primer and paint. I'm sure I missed something but that's how I would do it.

Jim

 

[Rustytruck]

When I had a smashed rocker I replaced it with a factory type replacement rocker panel. But I didn't use the whole thing. I cut off the top piece of the new rocker and used the lower half. On the truck I cut off the lower half and left the top section in place since it wasn't damaged. I consider this a fairly easy repair as far as sheet metal repair goes. Since the top rocker piece was not replaced it all is in the right place in the door opening and looks the same way it did when the truck rolled out of the factory. The factory type rocker assembly is a nice piece and is much better than the cheaper replacement part. There is a subtle curve in the lower rocker and the factory type replacement has this so it looks all original. I did have to do a little massaging right at the junction of the front fender where the new lower rocker was about 1/16" too long. a few deft hammer blows moved the bend line right where it needed to be. With the rocker cut apart it was readily apparent the back plate of the rocker was galvanized but the outer rocker assembly was bare steel from the factory so I painted the inside of the rocker before I put it all back together and welded it up. I used Eastwoods inner frame coating on the rocker I didn't repair. Being this was a Southern California Bronco all its life I didn't have to deal with rust while I was in there. There was a large amount of desert silt inside the rocker though that never found its way out the drain slots.

 

[Lunar-tic]

I concur with Rusty, if you are just replacing the rocker, try to save as much of the original as you can and patch it with a replacement part. It will be much easier to do than completely removing the old one and trying to get the new one to line up.