74 replies to this topic

[sonikk4]

keep up the good work...

reading your threads makes me want to either spend money on more panels or get out in the garage and get on with it!

Whilst im posting this, to save making a topic -

Some goon has attempted to take door hinges off, and rounded every single screw bar one!

Whats the best whay to remove them?

Sorry for spamming you thread

Thanks

You have a couple of options here,

1: Easi out but not recommended
2: Drill the heads off then once the hinges are off use a pair of mole grips to remove the stub.

Hope that helps.

[paul1275s]

Thanks Neil for setting this thread up, and thanks for the motivation and help so far... Here is a bit of Red's History for everyone...

I bought the car from Ebay back in Jan 2007 for the princely sum of £850, it was Mot'd and Taxed and a good little running Mini. It had spent all of it's life in Bournemouth with two owners, the first for 15 years and the second for for the 2 years before I bought it, it was showing 90,000 miles on the clock and the documentation i got with it seems to confirm that. It had been regularly serviced and had had very little welding done to it despite living by the sea all it's life, the only panel I could find that had been replaced was the drivers side front wing and the rear quarter had taken a whack at some point in it's life too. I thrashed it around until the Mot ran out then it had to come off the road as the rear subby needed attention. The rear subby was replaced along with the rear edge of the boot floor and also the lower rear panel, the car was Mot'd the day before the IMM in Holland and was driven faultlessly to and from that great event! For the next couple of years it was just driven around and also used in Autotests, Car trials and 12 Car Rallies. It was at a Car Trial that I blew the diff and the car has been off the road since, I had already been planning a front end rebuild so this was the time! It has been going pretty slowly due to a lot of other stuff happening in the last couple of years so It's been great for me to have Neil now sharing the workshop with me and also his enthusiasm and skills. Heres some piccies...

[rich2]

Awesome!

PS. The neatness of your welding makes me sick. ;)

[sonikk4]

Awesome!

PS. The neatness of your welding makes me sick. ;)

Behave yourself Rich yours is not shabby at all.

[sonikk4]

Red has now got his wheel arch installed so no more rot there
Ready to go in

The arch was short at the back so new section installed so it could be trimmed to size

Welded in place

and the stiffener installed

hopefully tomorrow the closeout and inner sill stiffener will be installed and maybe the quarter panel.

[Artful Dodger]

nice, solid work:) that is going to be one nice mini when you finish it!


congratulations on the diff failure!!! if you are to go out, go out in style i say!!

[Minidarren83]

Forget the Haynes restoration manual you should bring out your own the "mini restoration guide perfected by neil" superb work as ever should be rot free for years to come. Is it possible to leave the bump stop bracket in place or was destroying it unavoidable? It's one of my next tasks
Cheers Darren

[joezone2001]

Some beautiful work going on here.. I want/need your skills haha! Keep up the cracking work. Joe

[sonikk4]

Forget the Haynes restoration manual you should bring out your own the "mini restoration guide perfected by neil" superb work as ever should be rot free for years to come. Is it possible to leave the bump stop bracket in place or was destroying it unavoidable? It's one of my next tasks
Cheers Darren

You can leave it in place Darren as its a pain to refit properly. I could have left this one in place but i was on a mission so to speak so in the end it was quicker to replace it.

[sonikk4]

Pattern quarter panels suck and this one will need a lotof work to fit well

The back fits ok though

Fabricated a new inner sill stiffener using my shrinker and stretcher

Fitted along with the arch closeout panel

Cleaned up and a flash of Zinc rich primer.


I will deal with the quarter panel on monday.

[sonikk4]

In between waiting for paint to dry on the door i'm reskinning i though i would sort the quarter panel out on Red.

The Pillar section was a very poor fit


so it needed to be sectioned to get it to fit correctly

and followed by a spot of welding and grinding it ended up like this



so now it fits like it should

So with some final cleaning up. sealing and paint its ready for fitting. Oh and drilling a load of 1/4" holes for plug welding.

[brum,brum,mike]

Don't suppose you have any pics of the penetration when plug welding?

Looking great by the way...

Thanks alot

Mike

[sonikk4]

Not on this one Mike but i did a little piece yesterday to explain things with regards to wire speed power etc and its the weld at the top
top side

and the penetration, its the one at the bottom


and this is the same power setting that i used for the work on the quarter panel.

[hughJ]

Neil your at it again - this majorly perfect work. Just remember - you inspire. My rear quarter, I just made do. I wish I had seen this before I did mine. Never mind. Thanks again.

Hugh

[sonikk4]

Cheers Hugh, your work is not shabby at all and the one thing doing this proves that a pattern panel can be made to fit well.