Can ya'll tell me what you think of this? The pictures are of the driver's said frame rail near the front of the car.

Is a frame rail hollow or solid?

I bought this car off a fellow forum member back in July and had it inspected by a shop in Berkeley, CA afterwards. Oddly enough, they did not find what I found when I changed my tranny fluid.

I asked the seller about it and this is what he had to say:

I looked at your email and i totally forgot that it was there..this was due to the car being towed..if you look at the other side there's a hole..on the s2k, there's a tow hook that needs to be installed in the front bumper before the car can be towed..apparently the first owner had his car towed by a tow truck person that didn't know the s2k was rear wheel drive..so if you put the hand brake up and try to pull it from that hole its going to rip. I sent these pictures over to my friend who owns a body shop and he insured me that it does nothing to the frame. The frame rail actually starts after that hole he said, so it wont affect anything but look ugly. If you want to fix it or have it fixed, he said that Honda doesn't sell that part of the rail so you'd have to cut that piece off of another s2k and weld it on. I totally forgot that was there because after i bought the car, i really didn't pay much attention to it and a lot of the work done on the car (i.e. suspension, etc) was done by my friends shop..out of sight out of mind. I'm sorry I didn't tell you before you bought it..i'm not the type that hides stuff about my car...hope you understand..thanks for keeping in touch..let me know if you have any more questions..talk to you later.

 

Well, the frame rail is hollow. You asked is it frame rail damage? Yes because thats damage to the frame rail. I think you should due something about the rust first. You don't want it spreading.l

So the previous owner said that damage happened by towing?

 

yea, that's what he told me. I guess it doesn't really matter if he's lying or not, because the car is with me now.

What's the best way to go about preventing additional rust?

I guess what I really want to know is how bad does this affect the car...

 

I doubt the damage to the frame rail will cause anything to be messed up in the car but the rust does need to be taken care of. If it were my car I would weld it up too.

 

I f the frame is not bent, there may be no immediate problem. However ,over time this could change. It would appear to me that this is a weak point and should be reinforced by adding a piece to replace the piece thats missing. I think a small job for a welding shop.l

 

Would you recommend:

1. replacing the piece by cutting it off of another S from a junkyward

2. just have the weld shop replace it with a piece of their own

3. or try and make the existing piece fit and welded back on?

 

Makes me want to get up under my car and see what it looks like without the damage. I will do that tonite. I would get someone to weld up the cracks and use a good paint with sealer and mabie undercoat it after it is all done. Dont cut the whole peice out you will get yourself into more hassle than it is worth.

 

Just a cut (to fit )piece of metal or two as reinforcement . Knowing that you had this done will give you some peace of mind.

 

right on...

Any good weld shops in the bay area?