Pinch Welds... Cut or Bend?

[Mutant138]

Get yourself a can or two of this to spray the wheel wells with.

Way ahead of you lol. You can see the results above.

 

[ruff4runner]

Bfh

After a year and a half of rubbing at full lock and articulation, I decided to take the leap on my 4runner and do the "BFH Mod". I cut a bunch of sheet metal and plastic and did the big "SMASH!, SMASH!, SMASH!" on the pinch welds. I decided to bend the welds outward into the recess to maximize the space. I covered the entire bent over pinch weld with 3M seam sealer and then sprayed 3M rubberized undercoating. I gained a ton of space and can finally take advantage of my BMC. I feel like I can make the jump from my 195/70/R17 Toyo M/T's to 185/75/R17 without much issue. Time to test.

 

[NYC4runner556]

After a year and a half of rubbing at full lock and articulation, I decided to take the leap on my 4runner and do the "BFH Mod". I cut a bunch of sheet metal and plastic and did the big "SMASH!, SMASH!, SMASH!" on the pinch welds. I decided to bend the welds outward into the recess to maximize the space. I covered the entire bent over pinch weld with 3M seam sealer and then sprayed 3M rubberized undercoating. I gained a ton of space and can finally take advantage of my BMC. I feel like I can make the jump from my 195/70/R17 Toyo M/T's to 185/75/R17 without much issue. Time to test.

Very clean looking. Going to get on the 3M coating for the whole area!

 

[Fern]

After a year and a half of rubbing at full lock and articulation, I decided to take the leap on my 4runner and do the "BFH Mod". I cut a bunch of sheet metal and plastic and did the big "SMASH!, SMASH!, SMASH!" on the pinch welds. I decided to bend the welds outward into the recess to maximize the space. I covered the entire bent over pinch weld with 3M seam sealer and then sprayed 3M rubberized undercoating. I gained a ton of space and can finally take advantage of my BMC. I feel like I can make the jump from my 195/70/R17 Toyo M/T's to 185/75/R17 without much issue. Time to test.

For the seam sealer that you used. Was it brush on, or from a tube?

 

[TRDHULK]

I cut and folded mine, then covered in urethane, then painted.

 

[Inv4drZm]

To get 37's to fit my 4th gen I ground off the pinch weld, and bashed in the remaining firewall metal since it wasn't being supported by the pinch weld seam anymore. Maybe close to 1/2" gained.





Tacked a plate over top:



Sealed the seams:



Painted black:

 

[codyHTX]

piggybacking of what [MENTION=216416]Mutant138[/MENTION] did to remount the fender, but didn't want to drill into the body, as the main reason I'm here right now is to silicone pinch weld seams to mitigate a cabin leak due to my shoddy pinch weld work.

may be helpful to those needing to cut off their fender mounts. currently running 34's on -10 SCS wheels, but I imagine I could clear 35's now with minimal amount of work needed.