I would have no problem trying my loosey-goosey welding skills on refilling the egg-shaped hinge pin holes for the front doors, and then drilling out fresh ones. The biggest problem I see with it is trying to determine where the original hole centers were (and new ones should be). Won't help to have new perfectly sized holes if they're a 1/16" off in different direction. I've searched off and on for months to see if there's some kind of printable template I could lay on top of the hinges to mark the new hole centers, but can't find anything.

Does anyone know how everyone else does it? Have you done it? Any tips or advice would be welcome.

 

Did you try making a copy of the opposite hinge with cardboard?

 

That's my current "plan B". But it means taking two doors off instead of the one, and the holes aren't exactly pristine on the passenger side either. I have an idea that would take a lot of time but get me good results I think. If it works, I'm going to make templates from that and then post them as a pdf or something.

 

Yeah, I'm surprised something like that does not exist already, considering how many bad hinges are out there. Im going to replace my indent on my passanger side one day and that hinge is pretty true I could make a sketch for you but it wont be till later in the summer.

 

You will have some parts of each hole that are still good and some that are worn out that you should be able to determine where the original center of each of the respective ears was to begin with. I believe that the original hole diameters where the bushings press in were roughly 13mm on the bigger bushing and 12mm on the smaller bushing which further complicates the task of reworking things, but don't quote me on that as I have yet to see a pristine hinge in all of the ones I have worked on.

Endurapin.com has some measurements listed for their tool steel replacement pin/bushing set which they offer in standard size as well as 0.020" and 0.060" oversize bushing sizes. In the little bit of reading, they seem to have some pretty good reviews even given their pretty steep pricing. There is also some good information there on what size drill bits to use to open up the holes for the larger bushings. I have never used them before so your mileage may vary. If you end up going this route, please let us know how it goes for you.

If you are going to go the route of using some kind of filler metal to build back up the inside of the bore that has worn away, I would lean away from welding it up unless you are going to use something that is going to be at least as soft as the original metal. Anything that makes it harder to work the repair is going to make it more difficult to hold center with your chosen method to reshape the hole. If welding, just be careful as the heat affected zone can become hardened to the point of pushing drill bits away and into the softer metal on the opposite side of the hole. If your intention is to shape it back to nearly round with a carbide burr, then touch it back up with a drill bit, then that would likely work also. My advice would be brazing the hole as a brass brazing rod will provide good support to the back side of the bushing, but still be easy to shape back to round. With brass, you can file it most of the way back to shape and just touch it up with at drill bit to make it truly round. Welding is often easier than brazing though. You can find different welding wires though that will make the resulting weld softer and more easily shaped than the standard ER70S6 mig wire, like ER70S3 which has a lower silicon content, but needs perfectly clean metal which is a downside...