141 replies to this topic

[THedooBZ]

that looks great now its finished, hope your pleased with it!!!

any reason for doing the sills and arches later??
have u thought of doing a removable front end?
i mean while the cars in this state you could quite easily do it.

[stormduck]

cheers fellas.

yeah well pleased with it so far. I left the arches because at the time i was starting to paint them, i realised i hadn't cleaned the suspension top mount properly so didn't want to paint over dirt. I left the sills because whoever replaced them, painted them with something that's immensely difficult to remove and clogs up sanding discs really quickly, so it's going to take a long time to return it to bare metal....now bearing in mind i'm working outside, sanding them down one day, then leaving them till the next day or more with the current weather could be a waste of time.....the surface rust will start and i'd have to spend time with a wire brush, then rust treating before painting etc. So it's best to do it one section at time, plus i've run out of POR-15! Once it turns up in the post i'll set to removing it early morning, clean it, POR-15, wait 2 to 3 hours, 2nd coat of POR-15, then it's going to get a coating of Stonechip from the bodyshop when it goes in, so it can be painted with colour coat afterwards. Plus the priority was getting the underside done so that the car can be rolled over....the sills and arches can be done afterwards.

I haven't thought of a removable front end before, but it's going to be more cost involved, and with the money mounting, a fresh front can be fitted with no more cost as the panels are in the garage with the welder and wire. But nice idea though!

I'm looking forward to my engine possibility, but i'm not gona say anymore till i've got it in case it doesn't happen.

[Bungle]

1 or 2 patches i see you had to do

keep upthe good work

[THedooBZ]

I'm looking forward to my engine possibility, but i'm not gona say anymore till i've got it in case it doesn't happen.

now thats just teasing us, but then again could turn out to be a nice surprise

[stormduck]

bungle - unfortunately yes, the boot floor was the worst part of the car, a part from the front which just got chopped off. If the floor goes again (which hopefully it won't for a long long time) it'll be a full replacement.

thedoobz - Hopefully it will be a nice surprise Nothing that people haven't done before but it'll make me very happy

Right, the whole underside is going to be waxoyled before it gets turned over, so everything has to be completed. I got on the arches the other day, cleaned them and primed them:



Then chassis black:



They need another coat. The paint that I ordered turned up too so i can seam seal the final patch on the boot, then paint that and it'll be all finished.

I started on the front subframe yesterday. I removed the lower arms that i finally worked out how to wriggle out! And the rusty bumpstops, and some clips:



The condition of it is very good, i don't know if it's the original. But i got the sander on it and removed as much paint and rust as i could, it's only surface rust mainly on the welds. Then i saw how much grease was still left on it from degreasing last week, so i had another go with Silver Hook stuff, then got the pressure washer on it and it come up much better. Needs hand sanding, a little grind to remove some awkward rust and then painting can start:



I spent a few hours sorting out the garage too so that i can get the subframes in there one at a time to paint them:



and no, i don't have newspaper on the wall all the time!

The head on the left of the picture is the 12G295 that i bought for the 998, but as i'm not having a 998 anymore it's been sold on. I've certainly learnt my lesson not to buy things until i actually need them.

[THedooBZ]

its worth spending a few mins putting newspaper up rather than the walls getting covered.
i usually use cardboard sheets on the floor and then plastic sheeting which i hang from some hooks ihave installed at the top of the wall.

keeps the parents happy aswell.

[miniallsort]

wicked mate keep it up !!!!!!!!!!

[* Specialized *]

yup good work mate

[stormduck]

Many Thanks!

Here's the last patch sealed up:



I got to work on the front subframe and started grinding the rust and paint away - i decided that while i had it on in front of me, and some of the welds were a little rusty, that i would run seams of weld over the joins in the subframe. The David Vizard book states to do this for off-road work, and weld at every join. While i'm not going off-road and i don't have brilliant welding equipment to get a nice thick seam weld, i figured that some more weld is better than standard, and should, while being slight overkill for my uses of the mini, hold together better, just in case. Why not!?

So i hopped to it!



Tie bar bracket:




Tower's done, along with the piece that the mountings bolt to the lower bulkhead


Overall, very chuffed!


It's soaked in Metal Ready and dried off in the garage over night, now i have to set to painting it!

[THedooBZ]

is it the metal ready that produces the polished shine to the subframe???

like you say u may as well attack every part while the cars in bits.
keep up the good work.

[stormduck]

forgot to add that bit! The whole subframe, or where i could get to, i went over with a sanding disc on an angle grinder. It removes all the paint and rust quickly and takes it back to bare metal which is what you can see in the pics. Metal ready gives any rust a white finish which you can then paint over. I havn't posted up a picture of it covered in the stuff, but you just squirt it all over it. That way any rust you can't see will get treated too. I'll do the same to the rear subframe once the front is out of the garage. I'll be finishing the 998 rebuild at the weekend so i'll be putting it up for sale next week.

[OllyD]

I just read this all the way through and wanted to say THANK YOU! I've spent months searching for a blow-by blow account of a restoration that actually documents the work rather than just mentioning that it was done.

I bought a mini a couple of months back that i would like to perform a similar restoration to in the summer, and this will be the perfect guide.

Keep up the brilliant work!

[stormduck]

oh wow, well thanks! Glad i could be of help, hope it goes well!

It's been a while since i touched the min, been busy aquiring a job, which always helps!

anyway, done one the sills yesterday, well, reduced it to bare metal and was about to paint it but then the thunder started and it poured down! Still, i got out after work today, removed the surface rust from yesterdays rain, and gave it one coat of POR-15. Here's the first photo for a few months!



I also collected my new engine last week, thanks a member of this forum who had it rebuilt for racing, used it half a dozen times, then off'd the car and the engine has sat un-used for three years. I'll go through the parts when I strip it, but it's nicely modde'd and just what I wanted, so i'm well pleased so far. It's a 1293cc metro lump:

[bert998]

i wondered what had happened to this project, glad its back on track, its one top notch job your doing

[stormduck]

Wow, it's been 3 months since i touched the mini! I've well and truely settled into my job now, and i've even settled into a new home aswell! Fortunately the parents don't mind the mini being on their driveway, which is just aswell because i'm not moving it! Now that things have calmed down i can start spending time on it again.

I got Kenny round and we Waxoyled the underside, which i'm really pleased with as after 3 months of sitting under a pretty poor tarp there's no rust formed on the new underside paintwork. Then we flipped it the right way up and put a new tarp on it.

On tuesday i got back on it for the day, but i found a couple of nasties that weren't there before Firstly is this rotten metal in the boot floor, yet another hole in this area. You can just about see it above the fresh welding - that has also gone rusty because i left it stoopidly uncovered - big mistake.




The only way to get to this area is to remove the rear valance and corner pieces, which to be honest weren't in great condition.



Unfortunately again, the only feasible way to completely remove the valance metal from the main body is to flip it back on its side to get the angle grinder to it - trying to do it lying down is impossible! I'm thinking of looking into replacing the boot floor. It has a lot of patches, and what with me leaving the welding inside the boot uncovered i'm pretty sure that water has got underneath the fresh metal and will be rotting the old metal underneath.

Anyway, i welded up the corners of the front arches inside the car like so:




and a hole underneath the new hinge panel:



The other nasty i found was inside the car on the floor above the sill. A hole that when ground back a little revealed rust on the inside of the outer sill. I need to grind this back further and investigate, hopefully it's nothing major - fingers crossed, i don't want to have to replace the sill, but if needs must...

anyway, i need to order a new valance and corner pieces now, so it's off the have a look at boot floor diagrams!