Broken Air Box Fender Mount

Well, this is interesting. I tore my dash apart last night trying to chase down a squeak that was getting progressively louder. After striking out on anything under the dash, I moved under the hood and found a spot that he windshield cowling cover had some broken clips and was rubbing. Nope, that wasn't it either.

After poking around I eventually found the rear airbox mount to be making some noise. I removed the lower air box and found this little gem. Guess I sent her a little too hard at some point...





There was a suspicious new bolt in that rear air box mount which makes me think the installer botched it up when doing the SC install. Oh well. Guess I get to fix.

I ground it down to get a better look at it. A gentle tap with a hammer to flatten it out and oops, the crack propagated a bit. But I guess now I know where else it was weakened. Guess I better run to my shop in the morning and pull out the welder. Too bad I'm horrible at welding sheet metal. I'm thinking perhaps a washer for reinforcement might help. Any thoughts on that?

 

Model year of your truck would be helpful

 

What, you don't recognize a second gen 5.7?? 2013

 

Context clues lead me to believe it was either a 4.7 or a 5.7

 

I pulled out the welder yesterday evening and decided to give it a whirl. Remembered how bad I was at welding sheetmetal and location didn't do me any favors, either. Took me a try or two to get the welder dialed in. Also didn't help that my ground clamp was a little dirty.

First go round was a little hot and heavy and I blew a couple of holes in the sheetmetal. I promptly rectified the situation by grinding down my burnt spot welds and grinding through another few more spots. Second and third go around was much better; I just had to take my time as every second or third stitch weld would light the rubberized undercoating on fire.

Second try and I was getting good spot welds with a solid buzz tone, good penetration, and textbook build, glow and fade so I was able to build back most of the material that I incinerated. Well, at least that's how some of them welds started. Dunno how I lucked in to that. I was able to check for pinholes by shining a light in the engine bay and looking under the fender as the light was fading.



Third go and I filled in a couple of pinholes that I found. Then I ground everything back down as best as I could before my die grinder consumables exploded. There's one spot in the front that looks like a crack, but is actually the weld build up that I didn't grind down all the way. I wimped out and didn't want to grind through the fender with my 5" flappy wheel. I also had to tap the threads to clean them up; ended up going from the tire side of the fender up, which worked a treat. I finished it up with a spritzing of charcoal flavored rustloleum. I decided to top it off with a large washer to spread out the load to try and keep it from happening again. I didn't weld it on, though.

Anyways, that squeak was unbearable and now it's fixed! So mission accomplished.

 

Nice work.