Belly Pan Dent

[2jmotorsports]

Is the belly pan covering the fuel pump supposed to have this huge dent in the top right corner? I did not see any parts under the car that looked like they require that feature for clearance. 83 SC.



Time to get a big hammer?

[911SauCy]

BFH (Rubber if you dont want to repaint)

[2jmotorsports]

Perfect. Thank you.

[cmonref]

Was that actually installed in that condition? It looks like the bending in the upper right is sufficient to actually move the right front bolt hole, and it should not fit. If it WAS installed in that condition, it suggests that the RF's matching bolt has been moved aft from its original condition. And that might be a serious problem.

[Bob Kontak]

Originally Posted by 911SauCy

BFH (Rubber if you dont want to repaint)

+1

Beat it flat as a tortilla. Tweak it here and there to make the bolt hole align. Spray with Rustoleum "professional" paint.

[drmac]

^^
This response gives me hope.

[bavaria911]

Here is mine sand blasted with fresh Rustoleum black paint.

[2jmotorsports]

Sexy. I beat mine flat but haven't painted yet. Still chasing fuel pump issues.

[TheSt|G]

Mine had some big dings in it, but nothing that interfered with its function. Just sand blasted and powdercoated it for another 30 years of use. It gets hit by rocks and junk all day, so I don't really care if it looks factory fresh.

[2jmotorsports]

To conclude the thread, I did have some bolt hole spacing issues after pounding out the dent. However a few taps with a ballpeen hammer and measuring the hole spacing with a tape measure did the trick.

Also for future reference the driver side sway bar bracket (which is also held down by one of the pan hex bolts) was difficult to line up by hand due to the tension of the swaybar (?). I very lightly compressed the swaybar just outside the left edge of the pan with a bottle jack and was able to get that bolt on. The rest bolted up with no issue.

Thanks again for the help!

[KTL]

Good job using the jack to counteract the sway bar's ability to create misalignment. I've seen a lot of people try to use the bolt to align things and 9 times out of 10 it ends up messing up the threaded bung in the chassis.