Bolts through top of frame okay to hold skid plate?

Jlittle84

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When I got my TJ it had no problems whatsoever except until I dropped the skid plate. The front and back of the frame, even around the control arms were rust free, it was just the middle around the skid plate and the nutserts . We’ve since got the frame welded by a guy we know who’s very good at it, but to hold the cross member up he drilled through the top of the frame and used grade 8 bolts and locker nuts with washers. I’m just wondering if that’s ok to hold the skid plate up. I do want to eventually get the right nutserts for it though, in the mean time I’m just going to Eastwood the inside real good.

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The center section of that frame near the bolts is stock and non-welded. What exactly was welded / repaired and in what fashion? Every quality frame patch / repair will come with nutserts already installed and ready to go.

Eastwooding the inside of an already rusted frame will do no good.
 
The frames are not as thick as you might think. I would watch to be sure you don’t over tighten and risk crushing the top of the frame.

When you are ready to fix it look here for a nutsert / bolt kit

Echoing this, unless there’s a crush sleeve in there (which seems unlikely with the location) I’d be a little concerned about how much you (Or previous owners have) torque the bolts.
 
The center section of that frame near the bolts is stock and non-welded. What exactly was welded / repaired and in what fashion? Every quality frame patch / repair will come with nutserts already installed and ready to go.

Eastwooding the inside of an already rusted frame will do no good.

Oh here I’ll show you the before and after, but yeah I see what you mean. I think he used his own steel, not the bought frame sections. So when I do the nutserts I’ll have to drill the holes wider to either use that tool or weld them.

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You would have to torque that bolt extremely tight to worry about collapsing the frame.

I’m a little confused on what work the welder performed even with the photos. Is the skid plate still attached in the same fashion? That form of securing the transfer case skid is more common than you might think, though I would not personally leave it that way for long.

Is the transfer case skid still mounted In the same fashion? Did the welder cut out the rust before welding that piece in or is it simply welded over the rust?
 
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You would have to torque that bolt extremely tight to worry about collapsing the frame.

You’d be surprised - the frame tie ins for rear bumpers can easily do this and it has more lateral support. Rokmen is the big one I’m aware of that shipped cross frame bolts (most that realize this just mount bolts to the outer frame wall).
 
You’d be surprised - the frame tie ins for rear bumpers can easily do this and it has more lateral support. Rokmen is the big one I’m aware of that shipped cross frame bolts (most that realize this just mount bolts to the outer frame wall).

Different application.
 
You would have to torque that bolt extremely tight to worry about collapsing the frame.

I’m a little confused on what work the welder performed even with the photos. Is the skid plate still attached in the same fashion? That form of securing the transfer case skid is more common than you might think, though I would not personally leave it that way for long.

Is the transfer case skid still mounted In the same fashion? Did the welder cut out the rust before welding that piece in or is it simply welded over the rust?

Yeah the bottom of that frame was basically rusted to the skid, but we got all of it off and cleaned the skid up beforehand. I think that he welded that piece just over it. I wire brushed and got most of the outside rust off before he welded, but there’s still the rust inside. Inside it’s mostly the bottom half, the top half is still factory coat. I do want to get the right nutserts and bolts, but I have a feeling there’s a frame swap in the future
 
Yeah the bottom of that frame was basically rusted to the skid, but we got all of it off and cleaned the skid up beforehand. I think that he welded that piece just over it. I wire brushed and got most of the outside rust off before he welded, but there’s still the rust inside. Inside it’s mostly the bottom half, the top half is still factory coat. I do want to get the right nutserts and bolts, but I have a feeling there’s a frame swap in the future

I'm a still little confused on how the transfer case skid is mounted after you've welded the "patches" in. Did you drill through those welded in sections to mount it in the same fashion as the original post? I will say that if those patches are simply welded over the existing rust, you have a bit of a hack job and should've instead used premade weld in pieces as those typically have good results.

How have you verified that the rest of the frame is rust free? Typically that amount of rot is not concentrated in one place. Your frame looks very bad.
 
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They’re both bolts through hollow space, so they behave very similar. How are they not the same?

The direction in which they go through the rectangular frame, the amount of fasteners, and the torque spec. Ideally there would be a sleeve in the frame, but for this application I do not believe that would be totally necessary. This is also a very temporary repair, though a surprising amount of people use it for the long term.
 
I'm a still little confused on how the transfer case skid is mounted after you've welded the "patches" in. Did you drill through those welded in sections to mount it in the same fashion as the original post? I will say that if those patches are simply welded over the existing rust, you have a bit of a hack job and should've instead used premade weld in pieces as those typically have good results.

How have you verified that the rest of the frame is rust free? Typically that amount of rot is not concentrated in one place. Your frame looks very bad.


yeah the bolts are all in the original places just up through the the top now. I prolly would have tried to use those, but me being 16 I just followed my dad saying he knows someone who can fix it. No doubt it’s a lot safer now than it was, but I still want to get it done right sometime. Yes I used an endoscope to look everywhere else and cleaned the rust flakes and dirt out. A mechanic friend also told us that this is sufficient enough, but it still kinda irks me
 
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The direction in which they go through the rectangular frame, the amount of fasteners, and the torque spec. Ideally there would be a sleeve in the frame, but for this application I do not believe that would be totally necessary. This is also a very temporary repair, though a surprising amount of people use it for the long term.


People are why I don’t expect this to be okay, but giving the benefit of the doubt, the lower torque values and the distance between - you may be right. However, on the end of the frame there are lateral supports (the crossmember) that would likely negate the differences.

The issue without any sleeve is that most torque values (especially across multiple bolts) won’t evenly apply and as we work to torque to spec - each bolt influences the other and similar to a rubber BL it’ll be hard to get “torque” consistent.
 
yeah the bolts are all in the original places just up through the the top now. I prolly would have tried to use those, but me being 16 I just followed my dad saying he knows someone who can fix it. No doubt it’s a lot safer now than it was, but I still want to get it done right sometime. Yes I used an endoscope to look everywhere else and cleaned the rust flakes and dirt out. A mechanic friend also told us that this is sufficient enough, but it still kinda irks me

Though your current repair may (maybe... possibly...) last a good amount of time, it is really a hack at best. Unfortunately, that additional repair has made it a fair bit harder to get good premade rust repair components in place. I would at the very least attempt to remount the transfer case skid with nutserts, as the way you currently have it mounted is not ideal. You mentioned a frame swap earlier which is the ultimate solution. If you want a project and can spare the expense and downtime, it is never a bad idea.
 
Though your current repair may (maybe... possibly...) last a good amount of time, it is really a hack at best. Unfortunately, that additional repair has made it a fair bit harder to get good premade rust repair components in place. I would at the very least attempt to remount the transfer case skid with nutserts, as the way you currently have it mounted is not ideal. You mentioned a frame swap earlier which is the ultimate solution. If you want a project and can spare the expense and downtime, it is never a bad idea.
Though your current repair may (maybe... possibly...) last a good amount of time, it is really a hack at best. Unfortunately, that additional repair has made it a fair bit harder to get good premade rust repair components in place. I would at the very least attempt to remount the transfer case skid with nutserts, as the way you currently have it mounted is not ideal. You mentioned a frame swap earlier which is the ultimate solution. If you want a project and can spare the expense and downtime, it is never a bad idea.
Though your current repair may (maybe... possibly...) last a good amount of time, it is really a hack at best. Unfortunately, that additional repair has made it a fair bit harder to get good premade rust repair components in place. I would at the very least attempt to remount the transfer case skid with nutserts, as the way you currently have it mounted is not ideal. You mentioned a frame swap earlier which is the ultimate solution. If you want a project and can spare the expense and downtime, it is never a bad idea.

Ok I want to get the right nutserts I just have to figure out the best way to put them in there. What would you suggest for coating inside the frame? I know the rust is already there, but isn’t there something that atleast slows it down. Anyways thanks for your time
 
Ok I want to get the right nutserts I just have to figure out the best way to put them in there. What would you suggest for coating inside the frame? I know the rust is already there, but isn’t there something that atleast slows it down. Anyways thanks for your time

Coating the inside of the frame isn't a terrible idea if it is rust free and you deal with salt regularly. Drain holes are more important so the frame does not become packed with mud or hold salt and water for an extended period of time. Coating the already rusted part of the frame won't do any good.

I don't have any experience installing nutserts of the size or use case you need so I'll let someone else chime in on that.
 
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