Advice on original welding

I’d be grateful for the opinion of anyone who has actually dismantled an XK140DHC body for restoration, including media blasting.
My car is a '55, reimported from California to the UK. It was generally in pretty good condition, with very little rust of note and had been given one respray some time ago. All panels reveal the original paint somewhere on them, and there is no evidence of accident damage. The chassis is straight and has required no welding at all.
However, on the front top rear inner wheelarch area (where the hood frame sits), there is an area of what looks like braze on both sides. There is no damage here - it almost looks as if the braze has been done to smooth the joint slightly. The same colour of joint shows in several areas of the car, always symmetrical (e.g. both lower right angle corners of the boot aperture). Can anyone shed on any light on
a) if this is indeed likely to be brazing, or gas welding or whatever
b) If this is likely to have been done at the factory or during construction

This ‘brazed’ appearance is on top of convential electric steel welding, and alongside factory spot welds. It has factory lead loaded repairs on top of it, which in turn still have the original factory colour over the top. None of the panels near show any evidence of accident damage.

Can anyone who has done major metal surgery on an XK enlighten me, please?


Thanks,
Roger

Just for info - I’ve heard back from a friend at one of the major UK Jag restorers, who tells me that any internal brazing is most likely original depending on who was on the production line that day. Some were trained in brazing, some weren’t, so both techniques are commonly seen and often together. That makes sense as I can’t believe my car would have had so much done as accident repair work, especially as there doesn’t seem to be any significant damage anywhere.

That’s what I was thinking. Also, as the body moved on, as an occasional need for a joint touch-up became evident it was probably cheaper to just post a gas torch and a few rods further down the line than a spot or arc welding outfit and a heavy electric drop to run it. When doing my second MGA I found some braise in an odd location, almost an afterthought.

The MGA was built with exactly 4 pop rivets. I can’t get over the number in this body outside of the doors of course.

Yes, brazing was done at the factory. I found small, brazed areas in both my XK120 and E-type bodies, neither related to accident repair.

Yep… seen many small areas that were oddly, but factory brazed, on various LBCs.

If yours is early in the production, you’ll also find more odd brazing, pop riveted pieces, extra holes, etc. as they figured out how to make things work.

Phil.

Invariably, where you find factory brazing in a body, it’s either to fix a sloppy panel join or is deliberately applied to fortify a join. I would think mostly the latter.

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I found a few brazes on my Mark V body. Upper corners of the doors for example. It appears to me that the panels were first put together with a few sheet metal screws or pop rivets, then the spot welder went around and completed the job. But where the spot welding tool wouldn’t fit or couldn’t be used, they brazed. I guess they didn’t have MIG welders in those days.

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there is often gas welds around the cowl and door tops of the 50s and 60s sedans usually very well done.

Thanks for the reports, chaps.
My car was built in March/April '55, so is earlyish I think.
Most of the construction is spot welded, but there are a lot of pop rivets and screw holes with small self-taps. There are also a large number of freehand welds, probably gas welds (but could be ‘stick’ welds), in the more complex places particularly around the front of the sills and in the angles where outer panels join the substructure. Some of these are reasonably well done, some are downright ugly. The fellows doing them were well skilled as many welds span considerable gaps of fresh air to tie panels together. Where there is brazing, it seems to be on top of welds, and is then covered by lead. Those were very different times.