129 replies to this topic

[mk1leg]

What a great project......keep the pics comming.......

[Equinox_Monty]

I think I may be tapping your dad for help regarding our new addition as well as DJing with him this New Year!

[asahartz]

I think I may be tapping your dad for help regarding our new addition as well as DJing with him this New Year!

Hmm, you obviously know us... who are you? John?

Anyway, you're welcome to come round and visit the garage! And I may be able to point you to some useful people...

Edited by asahartz, 03 August 2012 - 12:21 AM.

[HollyBaby]

That is fairly intriguing.... reveal yourself haha!! But as dad said let us know.

(Also... 100th post dance. After nearly 5 years of being a tmf member haha oops..)

Paint arrived yesterday, surf blue (bu35) and ford gentian blue. Excited!! Currently reskinning the front doors and fixing the rear doors. Then fingers crossed it can be cleaned down and prepped for paint!!

[asahartz]

And some more work done in the last couple of days.

I completed the first of the closers, which I'd left to last as they were not standard size due to the pattern wheelarches (and the two turned out to be different too!)



Then I started on the valance corner. This proved to be a challenge, as the first trial fit left huge gaps. I needed to make the inner floor meet the outer wing first:



The use of a large hammer on my fabricated valance closer can be seen!



The whole lower corner has been guesswork all along, with little to reference it, and it's ended up slightly inaccurate, partly due to the inevitable use of pattern parts and self-fabricated parts. I worked from dimensions I had previously measured on a friend's CE, so the doors do fit, but the final corner is a little out of shape. It will be disguised by the rear bumper!



Holly cleaned up the rear radius arms and the steering rack and gave them a coat of paint.



We flipped the car over again and I started on the other corner and closer while Holly began to reskin a door with my guidance. Here's the inner floor extension as fabricated, needing to make this meet the outer wing again:





Trial fit of the corner revealed a huge gap again, and once again some creative engineering was needed to get all the edges to meet!



But meet they eventually did...



On then to complete the last closer.



More to follow...

Edited by asahartz, 03 August 2012 - 10:16 PM.

[asahartz]

Next I turned my attention to the rear doors. One of the doors we had recently collected needed a repair in the bottom of one of the windows. The easiest was to do this was to cut a repair section of of another door, and luckily this proved to be one of the few decent bits left on Shrek's rear end!

The doors to begin with:






I started by chopping the rusty section out of the new door, and a matching slightly larger section out of Shrek's door.



Then carefully trimmed the new section with the grinder to get an exact fit:



Tacked it along each side:



Then seamed up between the tacks.



The curve in the pinstripe shows how, despite care, there is some heat distortion. This is why it's near-impossible to weld repairs to a door skin! I pulled out the majority of this by welding bits of wire to the surface them pulling them away - the three spots can be seen below. The repair will need a skim of filler after grinding anyway.





The reinforcing swages of the inside make it less prone to distortion.

Last job for the day was to attend to the front damper mounting. Having done the other side, I knew this one would need attention. I wasn't disappointed:



It was better than the other side - at least the bracket was good. Well just a small hole...

The repaired parts:



Yes, there's two layers of welding in there!

Edited by asahartz, 03 August 2012 - 10:37 PM.

[Minidarren83]

Wow epic update some really good work there

[HollyBaby]

On the way back from VRS paint shop in Derby due to not being happy with my original paint order from another company. Cannot speak highly enough of VRS.. they were so helpful and made sure we were at ease. Very happy with my new paint choices so fingers crossed!!

Plus original paint is going to be put to use elsewhere so no wastage!!

[asahartz]

Today's work has had a few setbacks, but there's progress!

First I set to fitting the rear subframe. Well before that, I ran in some fuel lines - feed and return - in 8mm copper.

The subframe proved troublesome, even though I had trial-fitted it previously. The problem of course is that all four mountings have been replaced, so there is a lot of scope for inaccuracy.
The last pair of bolts, which were at the bottom rear, cross-threaded, so the subby had to come off to re-tap the threads.

Next attempt, I did the bottom rear pair first, but the bottom front - the last bolt - stripped a thread. Damn! All off again to install a new nut. This can serve as a "How-to" in replacing a subframe thread!

First, find a new 5/16" nut. Assuming it fits a 1/2" spanner, drill the hole out to about 12mm or 15/32".



Grind the nut into a cone shape.



Use an old bolt to tap the nut into the hole until it is flush - don't overdo it and knock it right in!





Weld the edges of the nut to the heelboard.



Grind it flush. It's always a good idea to clean out the thread after welding, which can distort or leave spatter.



Finally the subby went on with no issues!



After this I fitted the steering rack, and the load compensator on the brake line on the subframe, before starting on stripping the front subby ready to modify. This still had its original cones with the imperial thread, which was so rusty I had to get a tap in to clean the thread before I could get the cone compressor to screw in!

[grahama]

Nice work. Great idea for replacing the subframe mount nut !!

[asahartz]

Nice work. Great idea for replacing the subframe mount nut !!

Done that many times before; thought I'd do a photo-guide as it's quite an FAQ.

[HollyBaby]

Shiny things came in the post! YES!!!



Getting a few more bits tomorrow courtesy of Daps (SurfBlue Garage) so fingers crossed we can get down to the bits that really waiting to be finished!
Hoping it will move quickly now the bodywork has come together.

[asahartz]

Limited progress this week as I'm awaiting some steel for the subframe and window profiles. But there's not much to buy now; Holly has the DAB radio ready, just need suspension and then we'll be working on getting the engine fitted.

And we have paint! At the second attempt; Holly wasn't happy with the first colour so went to VRS in Derby to pick the colours she wanted. The lighter one is the main colour, with the darker panels on the sides.

[asahartz]

Another change of plan. Holly's been talking to people about the engine and she wants more power. I helped Adam fetch a Rover 200vi yesterday for his pickup (1.8vvc K-series), and Holly's driven it - she's now lined up a 1.8 K-series. Anyone want a scrap Micra?

I'm waiting on some steel profiles for the rear windows before I can prep for paint!

[asahartz]

OK, so today the steel came for the window channels and stuff for the subframe (though that's different now so I'll probably need more!)

These are the channels I had fabbed up:



I tacked them up into one of the window frames:



Then finished the seam and dressed back the weld. This is where the one-piece window glass will be bonded in, after I've smoothed off the surfaces with a smidge of filler.




Same job done on the other side today, then started on the filler. I'm going to get the shell painted while I can (hopefully!) still get some warm weather.