This spring I pulled the carpeting and padding from my 244. My shock was as bad as yours. I estimate that 20% of my floorboard that encloses the passenger area is gone.
Since I don't have welding equipment and don't trust myself with it, I am patching my holes with POR-15. I don't mean to sound like a web-ad for the company, but my limited experience with it - in the short-term anyway - has been positive. I've read many reports of people using it and haven't heard a bad thing about it (except that it takes weeks for the stuff to come off of your skin).
In case you aren't familiar, POR-15 is a line of products designed to stop existing rust and patch holes and gaps left by rust. They also sell body-fillers similar to Bondo, but much stronger than Bondo, that you can use to cover holes by draping a fiberglass mesh across the hole, painting POR-15 to give it some strength, then adding body-filler. I use aluminum sheets (sold as rooftop flashing in hardware stores) to bridge large holes since the mesh may sag. I then strengthen the aluminum with POR-15's paint and fillers.
The stuff is expensive and very picky - you must follow the directions exactly or else it won't work - but it beats spending tons of money at a body shop only to have the rust return in a few years.
Check out their Web site for more info:
www.por15.com
Let me know if you want more info...and I swear that I'm not a reseller!
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Mike F - 1984 244 DL - 237,000 miles - Undergoing reconstructive surgery with POR-15
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