120 replies to this topic

[vincent300]

yo, have been pretty busy lately, alas not with my mini. Was helping my dad redecorate, however I did get some stuff done.

After recieving my mig welder and after having some practice on a piece of scrap metal I manged to fix a rust hole that was behind the front shock L/H mount. First cut away the rusted areas, leaving me with a bigger hole. Behind the hole was fine but I did what I could to protect the area. Then cut out and welded on a couple of pieces of metal. After grinding down the hurendous welding I did it actually looked alright, pretty smooth and no holes. Not bad I'd say for my first time welding on this car, I still need lots more practice. (Probably should of taken a before picture aswell, I think you can see it in a previous picture tho)



Also gave the boot lid a spray with some red primer, for extra protection.





As I was walking past with my camera, I thought I would take a picture of my badass organisation skillz, booya (I know its terrible)



I got some great advice from sonikk4 (ty man) about how to deal with areas like below. Which I have been working on.

You could grind that back a bit as the cross member is quite thick steel but use a flap disc instead of a grinding disc.

Or to fill it you should first treat it with something like Krust and then (a trick i learnt from a bodyshop) cover the affected areas in fibreglass resin (just the resin, no fibreglass) Once dry sand back flush and then if required a quick skim of filler.

Job done.

(for those of you who have problamatic areas like this, I did the latter)

Thats it for now

[tedmcedd]

looking good!! the welding looks very neat all ground back, not bad for a first attempt at all!!

keep it up!!

Ed

[MigliaMayhem]

Just a heads up, when using any fillers don't use them direct onto mare metal if you can avoid it, makes sure the area is well keyed as filler is porous and there is nothing worse than a 4 month old paint job that has blistered filler (filler that has broken away from it's keyed surface below the paint).

Filler can be a god send and is sooo much easier to apply than Lead but for this reason it is often abused and used incorrectly.

By the way you are doing a stand up job for your 1st rebuild, also great to see loads of questions before commiting.

[vincent300]

thanks guys

[vincent300]

well it has been a while since I have worked on my car as I have been really busy but I did get this done.







I wanted to get it sandblasted and then powder coated but as my funds are running low I settled for going at it with a wire wheel, kurust then hammerite. I think it turned out pretty nice, just hope it will last.

[grahama]

Great job on the subby. Mine are goint the same way but not sure of colour yet, plenty of coats and should last fine.

Graham

[tedmcedd]

the subby should last with krust and hammerite on, looks great!

[vincent300]

thanks, I would have finished this sooner only, I had trouble removing the trumpets and stuff. At the moment it only has 1 coat, how many coats do you think would be optimum?

[tedmcedd]

errr.... would say a nice thick even covering, dont want any patchy bits.... :/

[vincent300]

yeah it looks good at the moment and i spent quite a bit of time making sure it was all even and that I didn't miss anywhere out. I might just give it another coat tho to make sure, probably will make the finish better as well.

Also pulled these out today and had a look at them.



They are in pretty good nick, all things considered. After a bit of tape here and there they came up reasonable. The bottom one is in great condiditon compared to the top one. I was thinking I could just recover them but that would be a shame because one of them is in good con and the other isn't. Maybe I should try and find an exact replacement.

[analogue_radio]

Looking good man! Just had a quick flick through the pages, will have a good read later

[tedmcedd]

whatever you do, DO NOT re-cover those door cards!!! that interior is so nice! personally I love it!! 70's mini interiors are hard to come by, and not often seen, so it would be great to keep your mini nice and 70's just how it should be, but thats just me! im currently trying to find 70's stuff for my mini that I am to one day re-build after the accident, i have found some door cards and i am after the rear seat, but the interiors that are not navy blue or black seem to of been binned, re-covered or vinyl painted over keep em, and if you see a drivers one at a show then you can replace it, it all ads pataina and character!

sorry for rambling on, but i do hate how the 70's minis are neglected! Mk3 is my favorite mk, to many people look after the ones and 2s to care about mk3's which seem to get caught up in the later 4, 5 and 6 mks...

lol

apologies again!

Ed

[shedonwheels]

Agree with Tedmcedd there. I don't think it really matters that the one doorcard isn't perfect it all adds a bit of character. Brown is the new black n all that

Maybe it seems a long way off but have you had much thought what colour you'll go for in the end? You sticking to a nice seventies shade?

Goodluck with this mini, I do love Mk3s!

[vincent300]

Ok I will leave them as is, thought it would be wrong to recover them . As for the colour, I am still undecided what to go with, but after working so much on the car the current colour has grown on me, wasn't too fond of it when I first got it.

Edited by vincent300, 01 July 2011 - 12:32 AM.

[vincent300]

managed to remove the lower windscreen surround today after doing some shenanigans.
gonna refurbish this panel as best I can, repair each corner with some repair panels which I got and remove the surface rust etc.



also did a bit of work on the bulk head



I was wondering if I need the two holes that are on each side, just below the lower windscreen surround corners. Not sure what the purpose of these are, I was thinking I could just cut them out then fill it in with some fresh pieces of metal. Anyways if someone could fill me in that would be great.





rust has really eaten away at some of these areas. Need to get some welding gas in and start repairing these areas. Looked quite daunting at first, but after reading some of your guyses threads I think I can do it.

Edited by vincent300, 12 July 2011 - 06:15 PM.