Frame repair... Opinions?

[Tony Rio]

As par the course, the frame under the drivers side of my '87 wag is gone. Looking for opinions.

Pic....



Hard to see in the pic, but the frame had/has completely rotted away on the bottom, and there is a hole in the side. The rust is pretty bad (flakes), but there is some good metal under there (all the black is some satin/glosss paint a previos owner sprayed up there).

Looks like a previous owner patched it by running a plate along the bottom and bolting & welding it in place. It probably wasn't the owner before me as the patch plate is pretty rusted, but still solid.

The patch is between what's left of the underside of the frame and the skid plate and I beleive is just enough to "pitch" the skid into my drive shaft when there is a load in the Jeep (see my other thread).

I am thinking of dropping the tank and welding in a piece of 3/16" angle, and notching the angle around the body mount and the spring mounts (cutting the side of the angle away and bending it to match the curve of the frame up behind the wheels). This would eliminate the patch that is there, but may still give me what I suspect are skidplate v. driveshaft issues. I am also a little leary of jacking it up to do the drop as I am afraid the frame might try to fold when I remove the existing patch (the passenger rear door already closes a little crooked which I assume is a symptom of the frame tweaking a bit).

Thoughts? Good idea, bad idea, just leave it as is?

TIA.

[ARJeepman]

I just did mine. Had the wife's work cut me some 3/16 steel to my specs and welded it in. I cut the rust out and overlapped a flat piece on the inside of the rail and welded that.......then took a 2inx2in angle bracket and welded on the bottom. I notched out around the spring hanger and the body mouint to fit. They also made me a new bracket for the skidplate. Not a bad job really to do.........just time.