how to get dents out of aluminum part of grille

[kwilson]

i have a 70 f100 and it has only one flaw...the dent ont ther driver side bottom corner. i am wondering how to pull out dents w/o damaging the metal. the dent is about the size of a golf ball n in the lower lip of the grill
thanks

[fordman]

this was posted twice but i'll reply to this one. i think you may be able to remove the grill and get on the backside of the grill with a metal working hammer and tap at it lightly while having some sort of support on the front side so as not to make it look like it has been hit a bunch of times. maybe a piece of steel or maybe a wooden block. thats how i was going to handle some of my minor dents in my grill.

[tsherry]

i have a 70 f100 and it has only one flaw...the dent ont ther driver side bottom corner. i am wondering how to pull out dents w/o damaging the metal. the dent is about the size of a golf ball n in the lower lip of the grill
thanks

I just did this on the lower part of my '67 Free F250, and it seemed to work OK. The top of the grille is shot any way, so I had nothing to lose.

I cobbled up a wooden form, both positive and negative, of the 'front' and 'back' side of the grille, I then placed a flour sack on the 'front' form, and used a shot-filled hammer on the 'back' wooden form, and these ended up pressing the dent out of the grille. Not perfect, but by spreading the force and using shapes that are similar to the grille itself, it was far easier and had better results than I'd expected.

The wood was soft, Doug Fir or something, cut from a couple of 2x4's and shaped and sanded.

[CJ,s 67 F100]

My body guy told me to take the grill off and lay it on a wood 4x4 piece were the dent is and use wooden tools/ chisel end/ punch end to lightly beat out the dents. I cut up a broom handle and gruond the ends into several shapes to fit each dent. he said by using wooden tools on the aluminum you could beat out most dents with out stressing the aluminum so much it showed afterwards. I only had 4 small places to repair and they came out fine IMO Good luck Charles

[binder56jd]

here's 2 good articles - jd
http://rodandcustommagazine.com/howto/86258/
http://moparmusclemagazine.com/projectbuild/5136/

[capeclassics]

Eastwood has everything you need for re-doing trim..........pricy but good stuff.

[DDfab]

i found out on the small dents and even little nicks if i remove the tip from my spring loaded center punch. it works great. sometimes i leave it in for the deep scratches to push material back out.

[Jerry1256]

hey capeclassics, who is this eastwoods/ Do they have a website i can browse?

thanks

[DDfab]

http://www.eastwoodco.com/

here you go.
dave