ATTN: Auto Body Repair Specialists - Frame Damage Repair

[deaz]

I have a question for all you auto body repair people... If anyone can suggest another forums to post this in, please tell so I can post in there too...

Now, I do have a feeling that my car is going to end up being totaled... So I figured I'd take the money for it and repair the car myself. I just wanted to know a few things...

My drivers side engine compartment is pushed in, and towards the passenger side. Now, is there any way I can pull the frame and rebend it myself? I assume I'd probably need some strong ratchet straps and a blow torch to heat up the metal.
Now, I know that as far as my accord is concerned, there are a lot of parts which seems to bolt onto everything else (Such as the main bar that holds the radiator) so I'm assuming I can just replace that part there after the frame is rebent, assuming that the bar isn't bent along with everything else.

Now, I'm assuming that I'll have to attach the straps at point A, B and C and pull in the direction posted in the photo.



As far as all the other problems with the vehicle, thats stuff I can figure out on my own(such as repairing/replacing the driveshafts and such, if needed) and I'm probably going to be needing to pull the engine apart anyway, since the car has been driven ever since the accident, and since the upper radiator hose is kinked, the engine is getting much fluid. So, the oil is burning up. I just did the oil maybe... 3 days before the accident, and its already looking burnt as hell. So, I know there has to be some things probably going in the engine because of the fact the car is being driven...

Anyway, if anyone has any help for me, or would suggest I just go to a body shop and have them do it, please then do suggest it... And if any of you have experience with auto body repair, and wouldn't mind giving a guestimation of how much the body repair(not including the fenders and hood and such, just to fix the engine compartment frame), please do help me out and tell me. If you would need more pictures just ask, and I'll upload them onto my website so you can check them out...

Thank you very much, all...

[jeffcoslacker]

First. You could pull it out enough to be driveable, if that's all you want to do. I fixed a few that way. Some much worse than yours. I simply used a chain, bolted to the parts I wanted to pull, and wrapped it around a post set in a parking lot and backed the car away, pulling a little at a time (sometimes it pulls out much easier than you expect, you gotta be gentle).

The biggest issue is safety. Once repaired in this manner, the car is no more structurally sound. It will fold like tissue paper if it gets hit again, and will not dissapate the energy of the impact as designed to. This can result in more serious injury to the occupants, so bear that in mind.

Anyway, if you are gonna do it, you are absolutely on the right track. I would carefully try to pull it back into shape, working with a small amount in a small area at a time. Trying to pull it all out at once will result in it being distorted in a new direction. Just pull a little, look at it very closely, reposition your chain to a new area, pull some more, etc.

Now, it appears that your core support (the front, where the radiator mounts) may be a bolt-on. If so, you are golden. After getting it pulled out back to close to original shape, you can replace it. There are many places where these parts can be had very cheap. My personal favorite is Certa-Fit. There is probably one in your area. I bought a core support, valance, grille, headlight bucket and fender for the Mazda I did recently all for under $200! Body parts for Jap cars are very cheap through them.

If you do it that way, then you will be able to see what small pulls you may have to do to make the new support fit. But by pulling with the original parts in place, there is a better chance of getting attached parts to "follow" back towards the original shape.

Your car really doesn't look that bad. I'm sure it can be made useable and relatively straight pretty easy and cheap.

[jeffcoslacker]

I forgot. Your car has what they call a sub-frame or engine cradle, depending on who you talk to. It is a sort of "H" shaped frame assembly that supports the driveline and lower front suspension. I doubt from the pictures that you have mashed the cradle, but it's possible. If the engine appears aligned in the compartment and the wheels track straight, you are probably OK. Even if not, it wouldn't be the end of the world. Subs are usually held to the unibody by 4-6 large bolts, and by supporting the engine/trans with a hoist and unbolting the lower suspension arms from it, it too can be replaced without too much difficulty. I don't think yours is that bad, though.

Anyway, the only other though I can think of right now is that by removing as much of the "clutter" in the area, it will be much simpler to see what needs to be done. Remove the headlight assemblies, grille, bumper impact bar, etc and it will be easier to work with. If you need a large area to pull out, use a very stout wood plank or block behind the part you are pulling, in between it and the chain or strap to spread the pull across the whole area, or else the metal will just kink up around the point you are pulling.

[jeffcoslacker]

PS. Can tell from the pics that the radiator is bent, it needs to be replaced for sure. Honda uses plastic tanks on the radiator, and that's where they mount to the core support. Any distortion in the support cracks the plastic, so even if it isn't leaking, it will, trust me. It's stressed. How's your A/C condensor look? If you're lucky, it didn't get whacked directly and can be reused.

Are the cooling fans pushed up against the motor where they can't turn? Need to make sure they aren't damaged before you start driving it, or you'll ruin the motor.

[deaz]

Actually, the radiator itself looked completely straight... And I'll betcha that if I took a straight edge to it, it'd be perfectly straight too, which surprised me.
It seems like the only thing thats weird with it is that it's shifted to the left a lot. As far as all the ac stuff is concerned, its perfectly fine. No leaks(yet), however, when the frame begins to get pulled, I think it will start leaking a bit, because it seems to be a bit distorted(hardly at all), And as far as the fans are concerned, they aren't pushed up at all towards the engine, the turn freely, and nothing in the car the engine compartment has been damaged really, cept the resonator that was on the opposite side of the impact, which had to be removed.

About the sub frame, the wheel alignment is off cause it pulls in the direction of the damaged front end, and the camber(or is it toe?, the one that makes the wheels tilt in/out) of the tires seems off too. Actually, it doesn't just seem it is majorly, lol.

So, would you suggest I just take it to an autobody shop, and have them fix it, and take care of all the mechanical stuff myself then?

[jeffcoslacker]

Well, did the wheel take any of the hit? It's hard to tell from the pics what exactly happened.

A few different things mighta happened. The sub could be damaged. A lower control arm or strut might have bent/twisted, the strut tower could be tweaked, or the tie rod mighta taken a whack.

You'd have to take some measurements from points in question to fixed points on straight parts of the unibody to know exactly what's bent.

Are you saying one wheel has a top to bottom tip (camber), or doesn't seem to be tracking straight relative to the other wheel (toe)?

[jeffcoslacker]

Was this a vehicle on vehicle deal, or some kind of off road excursion?

[deaz]

Vehicle on vehicle... I kinda sorta t-boned someone who ran a stop sign. It was mainly the front end(drivers side) of my vehicle that hit their front end-passenger side... I think my drivers side wheel took a bit of the jolt... And as I was talking about before... Since the bumper cover is off, I can easilly see both wheels... and the passenger wheel looks like this... / while the drivers side looks like |.
Best way to describe it.

However, there is NO vibration at any speed, so I'm sure the drivetrain of the vehicle is pretty much fine.
But, the motor mount for the engine HAS to be damaged, because when the car does it's normal rattling when you shift into too high of a gear for the speed, the whole car shakes like a mo-fo. And I know the engine had to shift a bit too, because after I got the car driving again, the idle on the car was extremely high because the throttle cable was leaving the throttle plate partially open. (There wasn't ANY play anymore with the throttle cable.)

[jeffcoslacker]

Originally Posted by deaz

Vehicle on vehicle... I kinda sorta t-boned someone who ran a stop sign. It was mainly the front end(drivers side) of my vehicle that hit their front end-passenger side... I think my drivers side wheel took a bit of the jolt... And as I was talking about before... Since the bumper cover is off, I can easilly see both wheels... and the passenger wheel looks like this... / while the drivers side looks like |.
Best way to describe it.

However, there is NO vibration at any speed, so I'm sure the drivetrain of the vehicle is pretty much fine.
But, the motor mount for the engine HAS to be damaged, because when the car does it's normal rattling when you shift into too high of a gear for the speed, the whole car shakes like a mo-fo. And I know the engine had to shift a bit too, because after I got the car driving again, the idle on the car was extremely high because the throttle cable was leaving the throttle plate partially open. (There wasn't ANY play anymore with the throttle cable.)

Well I wish I could see it myself, I could tell you with more certainty if it's worth fixing or not. The main thing in my mind would be to try to determine how square the subframe and unibody are currently. If one corner is packed in, that can be dealt with pretty easily. But if the whole thing is shortened or out of square in a diagonal way, the whole thing knocked sideways, it's gonna be nearly impossible to ever get things to line up with each other and a reasonably true wheel track without actual body shop work where they use the rack to apply force at certain points to achieve square measurements again before starting the body work.

I'm guessing you haven't had it estimated yet. That would be the best thing at this point. Estimates are free. Don't tell them you intend to try to tackle any of it yourself or they won't want to even look at it. But see what they come up with, they will give you a detailed list of everything involved, including parts and rack time, if any, and you'll have a better idea if it is superficial or serious. Make sure they know about the engine vibe and the throttle, that may lead them to hidden damage. I remember my brother wrecked my dad's Buick in a similar accident, and after getting it back, it had a real bad driveline clunk noise that turned out to be a broken transaxle mount that they missed, because they never drove it afterwards.

[jeffcoslacker]

One hint about estimates. Dealers will almost always replace rather than repair. That adds up to way more than the estimate that you'll get from a standard body shop.

In addition, it allows you to actually see what parts are involved, so like if the cradle is bent, you'd see on the estimate that it was damaged, and part # and cost, rather than just "Frame rack labor 3.5 hours@ $42.00/hr" or whatever.