Body panel gauge

[RickM]

A search turned up nothing. I'm curious as to what the gauge is for the steel panels. Do they vary?

As bonus info, what gauge does K&K utilize? It's been mentioned they produce from thicker sheet.

Thanks.

[Benz Dr.]

They use 18 gage for most of their repro stuff like floor pans which is a lot thicker than factory parts. 113's never had floor pans as a replacement part.
 Rails could be 12 to 14 gage.  Parts made in Poland may be done to a different spec but are generally for body repair . Most original body panels are right around 19 gage.

 Having been a K&K dealer for over 20 years I know their product fairly well. They also make a lot of parts for 356 and other batch runs for anyone who contracts ith them.

[RickM]

Great info, thanks!

[ja17]

Hello,  

Yes Dan is correct on this.  I can expand on the subject a bit since I have been in a sheet metal related business most of my life.......

First of all remember that sheet metal gauge is a rough indication of thickness. 18 ga. sheetmetal averages around "047" thick, but it can vary around  .004" up or down in thickness and still be 18 ga.  I am not saying that your sheetmetal will vary this amount on a single part.  When the steel mills produce the metal the entire batches will be produced at a thickness and will fall into the specs for that  gauge. Also realize that the gauge number goes higher as the metal thickness becomes lower.   So a 22 gauge sheet metal would alverage around .029" thick. The Sheet metal in the body panels and non critical areas of the floor pans on these cars is around 19 ga. as indicated by Dan which is usually around .0418" .  Also as stated much thicker sheet metal is often used in structurally critical areas of the chassis.  

Also realize that the alloy and the temper of the steel can vary widley, depending on the manufacturing specs, this will also cause the strength and character of the steel to vary greatly.   With this in mind it is always better to go slightly higher in thickness than thinner, when doing repairs or fabricating panels. So as Dan has related, repairs with  18 ga steel  is slightly thicker than the original 19 ga metal.

One great advantage  of the K&K repair panels is, unlike originals, they are zinc coated (galveneal), which greatly improve resistance to rust in the future. The zinc coating does make welding a bit more difficult, but it is well worth the trade off.


The Aluminum body panels on the cars is around "063".   At edges (trunk , hood etc) the aluminum iis two layers thick,  as inner and outer panels come together to form an nice ridgid edge nearly  .125" thick.

[RickM]

Thank you for the clarification.

Speaking of K&K, how accurate are their fenders? It looks to be a relatively complex part to replicate.

[Benz Dr.]

Repair panels are most likely the same thickness and made to the same standards. You should call them and ask Tim who can clarify these questions.

The floor pans, firewalls, trunk floor side panels, fender patch panels, frame rails, nose reinforcements and possibly other parts are made right in Grand Rapids MI. Some of the other parts are made in Poland while mostly all of the body panels are original MB parts.
 Tim told me that he will look at any part which is NLA or priced so high it makes sense to make it. Since that's just about any part today, they're always looking ahead to expand their product line. All of these ventures are self financed as far as I know.

  Even if you never buy from them you have probably bought one or more of their products from someone. Even MB sells their parts - with MB stickers on them. If it wasn't for Tim a lot of these old cars would be razor blades by now.