Suburban Upper Hatch Disassembly
 

Spent what time I had this weekend trying to separate the two halves of the spare upper rear hatch I have. No-Go!!
I have the outer fold-over peeled back all the way around, but the two halves are still stuck hard and fast together.

Does anyone one have a thread/experience on disassembling one of these??

Thanks in advance!

Re: Suburban Upper Hatch Disassembly
 

YES!

Not only is the outside folded over the inside but it is spot welded also. The spot welds tend to be small and hard to see if there is any scale rust. I'll try to take a picture when I have a chance.

Re: Suburban Upper Hatch Disassembly
 

Awesome!
Pictures would be great - or I could bring it up to you for a personal tour of the spot welds!

Re: Suburban Upper Hatch Disassembly
 

It is spot welded in the window area, where the seal holds on to the metal. you will have to figure out where they are located though, it won't be exactly the same on each one since back in the day it was a guy with a spot welder putting them together. They had to do a certain amount, but not a precise location.

Re: Suburban Upper Hatch Disassembly
 

Mitch did get his hatch apart and sand blasted. He sent me a few pics. Fixing the rusted out areas is a chore.

Here's mine. You can see the spot welds are in the window area and also under the crimped flange.

Re: Suburban Upper Hatch Disassembly
 

Dave,
Thanks again for the pics...they helped big time! Notchback is right, the spot welds are not evenly spaced and with the amount of surface rust I had to deal with I missed a few spots and drilled several holes in one location.
After getting the two pieces apart and blasted it turned out this replacement hatch had serious rust issues, but not nearly as much as the one on my Burn right now. But I did send out a WTB - serviceable hatch, in the parts thread, for a hatch that might have good corners I could use. No reply on that front yet. So, I got a good coat of 2k epoxy primer on them and happened to hear about a good restoration shop out 290 at the Beltway. Called them up and ran the pieces out there for a look. They are going to cut out all the rust areas and replace them with patch panels...and weld up all the pin holes as well. Hoping to have a solid shell in about a month!

Re: Suburban Upper Hatch Disassembly
 

I didn't realize there were spot welds under the skin flange. Doesn't make sense that there are, and they are not visible from outside, which is strange since you can usually see the spot on both sides of the panel.