I have just reconditioned the ‘shield protecting bottom hoses and water pipe’ on my 140, and am now wondering what the two circular holes in the vertical front face are for?
Maybe to mount a belly pan, or maybe tie downs of some sort? Maybe these two holes shouldn’t be there.
Here are after and and before pictures, the five oval holes in the horizontal flange are for attaching to bottom of the front chassis crossmember.
Thanks in advance for any information.
They are used in the die stamping process.
Typical when making a 3D part like that with holes on the bent flanges.
The initial flat piece is stamped out of sheet or strip in a die set including punching those two holes.
The two holes are used to align the flat piece on pins on the second die set that does the bending.
There may have been a third die set that did the oval holes.
Hi Rob,
Thank you for the explanation of the reason for the holes in the shield.
Straightening out this dented shield was pretty easy using an actual BFH and a hunk of railroad track for an anvil.
Ah, the ubiquitous rail track…at least 3 different radii to hammer against for varying bend requirements…don’t know where I got mine but love it.
As Rob explained, they are die registration holes: E Type floor pans have them, too.
I didn’t know you’d been in my garage. 
Mark V sun visors have registration holes too, but they are covered with cloth.
Even some of the pieces that went to make up our chassis frames have them.
