Anybody ever welded the unibody/control arm?

Hey

Bought a, what I thought, was a nice 93 metro with only 88k. Drove it a few months and started to notice it was getting kinda squirrelly after going over bumps like it had a broken strut. Anyway to make a long story short I found the unibody frame where it connects to the control arm is rusted thru . This car doesnt have hardly any rust on the body but is sure does on this area of the unibody. Its only on one side(passenger) the other side is Ok.

I hate to part this car out with low miles and am looking for any advice about fixing this. I dont currently own a welder but used to do alot of heavy welding and was going to buy a new welder anyway. Do you think I could slap some heavy 1/4 or 1/8 flat steel on the sides and weld it all back together? Or is it just to dangerous to trust a weld on this area. It looks like the whole wheel assembly would come off car if you hit a big bump and the weld broke. Appreciate any advice.

weld it before it breaks, or you'll never get the wheel alignment right. I would knock and grind out all the rust you can find, and see what's left. Weld some 1/8" plate in there, make sure the seam on the lower control arm mount is still solid(weld that too), and it should be fine. Install a brace between the 2 lower control arms too. It'll take a great deal of torsional load off of them, and preserve the car's structure.

Thanks for the info. But I do think it is already broken. As this is how I found it as I was working on it one day, I had jacked the car up and noticed in the area of the rust on the unibody, just a few inches above where it bolts to the control arm it had seperated about an inch. When i lowered the car back down and put weight on the wheel the gap closed.

I guess if the alignment is slightly off but it still drives reasonable I could live with some tire wear if I can get this welded back up and driveable again.

Thanks for the advice.

http://turbinetech.ca/
Get one of his underbody braces. They're designed to factory specs. If you put it on, then weld, your alignment should be almost dead on. If it's already cracked, it's not safe to drive. It will let go at any moment. Trust me, i've had that happen, and it's not fun. You completely lose control of the car. If it's still driveable, it's only cracked, and not completely broken, so you have a good chance of making a solid repair.