Car repair shops in which body repairs are carried out always have a whole set of tools and equipment for repairing dents without painting and straightening metal. And although serious damage, and even over a large area without the use of slipways (powerful stands), cannot be fixed, it is quite possible to pull out dents in small areas with difficult access from the inside.
In this case, you need to use a special car tool - a reverse hammer, which is a handheld device, small in size, consisting of a metal bar and several weights freely mounted on it. Weights can be of the same or different mass. The return (body) hammer has a hook at one end, and a lock washer at the other, which prevents the weights from falling off the rod and thereby transfers the force of impact to the surface to be leveled. With the help of a reverse hammer, repair of arches, sills, pillars, that is, those places that are not accessible from the inside, is successfully carried out.
A modern tool for repairing dents without painting, as a rule, consists of several types of grips, which make it possible to use the same reverse hammer to align dents in different parts of the body.
Before using it, you need to clean the place to be pulled to metal, drill a small hole in it, or weld special repair washers. Then you can fix the hammer. Next, the operator can only gradually pull the metal, inflicting a series of light blows until the dent is completely eliminated. Of course, after such operations it is necessary to paint part of the body, but only with this method you can carry out high-quality repairs of some elements of the car. To eliminate elongated dents and edges, it is necessary to weld several washers by pushing a metal rod through the holes.
In addition to mechanical type reverse hammers, there is a vacuum equipment that allows you to remove dents without breaking the body coating and, accordingly, without the need for paintwork. Such a reverse hammer has a special suction cup for gripping equipment. With it, you can repair areas of a large area. During operation, the vacuum return hammer is connected to the compressor to create its pneumatic fixation to the surface using a compressed air supply.
Remember that you should not use a reverse hammer to align dents in large areas, such as the center of the roof, hood and trunk lid. Welding the washers can stretch the metal too much, the part will become worthless. On sale there are hammers not only with one, but also with several weights, usually two or three. Such designs allow you to adjust the impact force.
If there is no possibility or desire to purchase a ready-made reverse hammer, then you can create it yourself. To do this, you need to buy a stainless steel or steel bar 50 cm long and 2 cm in diameter, a steel weight (sleeve), an ebonite handle and a hook. You can also make a hook yourself using sheet metal 4 mm thick. If you want to make a vacuum reverse hammer, use a suction cup from the plunger instead of a hook.