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95 Sprite Rebuild & 16V Conversion


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#151 alchall

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Posted 11 October 2015 - 10:07 PM

I took Friday off and have spent a good three days working on the mini, also got tomorrow off so more to be done yet, however, here's progress so far....

 

After cutting out the bracing the big job was to grind down the many welds that hold the floor in, quite a mammoth task but they are all done, cleaned up and zinc primed, looking good....

 

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I decided that undertaking the repair to the bottom edge of the rear panel was probably the best thing to do next so I have something at the rear to attach the boot floor to, this was a bit of a fiddly job and along side making a start at rust removal on the rear screen frame this took me an entire day to complete.

 

First up cutting out the rot, I knew this was a mess, here's an old before picture (I didn't think to take one this weekend before starting)....

 

​don't know what picture this was, lost to photo bucket

 

And here's the gap left behind....

 

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There you can see a load of filler on the boot floor, quite thick in places, hiding some poor patching and welding for MOT purposes I think! and there's nothing at all left of the boot floor edge at this side, it had rotted away completely between the rear panel and valance.

 

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Now despite my careful measuring before starting this I managed to cut the right hand side slightly too far up, only by about 1mm but it's enough that I had a large gap to bridge to weld in the repair panel, so it was a bit of a job to weld that side but the panel itself was excellent, a perfect fit!

 

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Left side was much better...

 

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Ground down...

 

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And zinced...

 

 

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It's going to need a touch of filler to finish it off perfectly but it's not too bad, I need to do a little more grinding down inside the lip as this was tricky to do and I'd had enough of it for one day so I'll come back to that when I work my way round the car before it goes for paint tidying up loose ends.

 

And today's job was more de-rusting round the rear screen (still not quite finished, it was worse than I had anticipated!

 

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Whilst at the same time repairing the companion bins, first job cutting out damage....

 

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Then the tricky and time consuming job of welding in new steel, cleaning all the edges of paint and cleaning it up left me with this....

 

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Not too bad, still a little tidying up to do but probably a job for when they are installed, there's a little rust along the bottom edges so they're spending the night with deox gel and cling film to be cleaned up tomorrow when I'll also strip all the paint and give them a coat of zinc so they're ready to install.

 

I shall probably take the old boot floor out tomorrow, I'm anticipating this being a tricky job and taking quite some time to complete, especially looking at the various welds around the arches. I considered taking the arches out at the same time but this would then mean I couldn't use the jig and getting the thing upside down and on it's side is going to be a real bonus doing this job and its exactly what I bought it for.


Edited by alchall, 28 August 2017 - 07:27 PM.


#152 Ben_O

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Posted 12 October 2015 - 08:57 AM

Very nice indeed.

 

I love a nice clean job



#153 alchall

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Posted 12 October 2015 - 10:03 AM

Thanks Ben, I'm a big believer in if your going to do a job then do it properly, think I'm doing OK so far for a novice  :D



#154 alchall

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Posted 12 October 2015 - 09:12 PM

Didn't seem to make much progress today, been a longer job than I expected getting the rust off the rear screen surround and getting the boot floor out is proving to be at least as tricky as I first thought!

 

Took a few doses of Deox gel and much wire brushing but I finally got all the rust out leaving quite a bit of pitting in four area's....

 

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That last photo looks like there may be some small spots of rust left in the pits but it's just shadows, it's definitely clear now, anyway that's one job out of the way, coat of zinc to finish....

 

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Had some rust removal to do at the bottom of the companion bins so also have made progress with that and have stripped the paint off, no photo's though and there's still a bit of rust to sort. I've ordered a new tub of Deox C (my previous bath of this stuff was spent) so I can soak them in that to finish them off next weekend. I have trial fitted them back in and my repairs seem OK, they fit at least still :-)

 

Over to the boot floor; I drilled all the plug welds out from the bottom of the rear bulkhead, had to use an 8mm drill bit to get them off cleanly so have some large plug welds to come when the new one goes back in but I've managed to get it done with no damage, although there's some surface rust to deal with, along the bottom edge of the bulkhead.

 

I ended up then just cutting out the centre of the boot to be able to get access to some of the welds that I found pretty hard to get to, having messed around so much this is as far as I got today....

 

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I think I'm going to have to do this slightly differently having given some thought to it and having spent so much time just getting this far, I shall still leave the arches in but cut the bottoms off them to get the sides of the boot out, I should then just have to cut the welds from the bracket that supports the bulkhead followed by some work to get the arches out at each end (not sure how best to do this without inflicting damage to the bulkhead but I'm sure it'll work its self out.


Edited by alchall, 28 August 2017 - 07:30 PM.


#155 minimissions

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Posted 13 October 2015 - 08:26 AM

Wow you have cracked on with this its looking great that floor is looking ace and like a new car again. I feel your pain when it comes to around the screens it always takes longer than you think but it's well worth doing in the end :) keep the pics coming :)

#156 Hendred

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Posted 13 October 2015 - 08:52 AM

You're in the wrong job!!  Never too late for a change in career direction.



#157 alchall

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Posted 13 October 2015 - 08:53 AM

I'm pleased with the floor, this boot floor is going to take some time I think though!



#158 alchall

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Posted 13 October 2015 - 09:56 AM

You're in the wrong job!!  Never too late for a change in career direction.

 

Haha not sure I could make it pay enough, it's actually a good distraction from my day job though, good to have something that uses a different part of my brain away from work!



#159 Hendred

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Posted 13 October 2015 - 11:48 AM

 

You're in the wrong job!!  Never too late for a change in career direction.

 

Haha not sure I could make it pay enough, it's actually a good distraction from my day job though, good to have something that uses a different part of my brain away from work!

 

Yea I was the same, great escape from the world, I ended up loving working on the car so much I have gone back to college full time at 35 years old to study for motor vehicle  (mechanic) qualification.



#160 alchall

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Posted 13 October 2015 - 01:26 PM

 

 

You're in the wrong job!!  Never too late for a change in career direction.

 

Haha not sure I could make it pay enough, it's actually a good distraction from my day job though, good to have something that uses a different part of my brain away from work!

 

Yea I was the same, great escape from the world, I ended up loving working on the car so much I have gone back to college full time at 35 years old to study for motor vehicle  (mechanic) qualification.

 

 

Excellent, good for you! that's a bold step to make but I'm sure it's the right one, people I know who've made big career changes have not looked back!



#161 clubman91

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Posted 13 October 2015 - 01:34 PM

Well I'm nearly ready to get cracking again as my new floor has finally arrived!  :highfive:
 
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I've already pretty much done the prep work for the main floor to go in, holes and all, so just a load of holes, prep and painting inside the sills to do before the new one can go in, going to be a busy weekend  :D
 
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I've also cleaned up the companion bins, some work to do on these too, going to strip all the paint from the outside and from the inside where it needs tidying up, also clearly I have some repairs to do where I made a bit of a mess getting them out, one was much worse than the other but this shouldn't be a difficult repair to undertake. They are otherwise in really good condition with very little rust, even along the bottom edge which is surprising given the state of the floor in the rear corners.
 
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And also my main wiring loom that I had made up has arrived, not daunting at all! I'll hide that away for another month!
 
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Great work on this car fair play =)
Where did you order you wiring loom from?
Cheers,
Mark.

#162 alchall

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Posted 13 October 2015 - 03:37 PM

Great work on this car fair play =)
Where did you order you wiring loom from?
Cheers,
Mark.

 

 

Thanks Mark :)

 

I got the loom from South Lakes mini's, it wasn't cheap and it took a few weeks (about 6 I think) to arrive but they did have to have it made as these are no longer stock items, that said it looks to be of high quality and it's definitely exactly the right loom for my car (minus the "modifications" a previous owner had made!



#163 alchall

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Posted 18 October 2015 - 03:14 PM

Another post where I lost all the photo's due to photo bucket deleting them all for me and I seem to have lost track of the references.

 

A bit more progress this weekend....

 

Companion bins completed stripped of paint, all the rust removed having now been soaked for a day in the Deox C bath and zinc primed ready to install...

 

Boot completely cut out and taken to the tip...

 

Wasn't so tricky in the end, my thinking about how to do it over night did the trick!

 

Bottom edge of the bulkhead was somewhat rusty, although most was not so bad I have had to cut out a couple of sections and replaced with some fresh steel....

 

After which an overnight treatment of Deox Gel, some wire brushing and another brief coat of Deox gel and it's rust free and ready to go....

 

I also stripped the paint from the inside of the rear panel and as much as I good around the jig from the underside of the parcel shelf, I was concerned about rust under there but the rear panel was perfect and the parcel shelf only rusty where I originally thought it was. Reason I was concerned was when I got the boot floor out and could have a proper poke around I noticed a lot of what looked like tiny rust bubbles, turned out it was just blobs of paint!

 

I gave the bulkhead on the boot side a scrub, took off any loose paint and gave it a thorough clean followed by a coat of zinc primer to cover up the bits of bare metal that were exposed, will needed a quick finish up once off the jig but it looks pretty good in there now.

 

Finally I have done a quick test fit of the boot floor, went in pretty easily, just needs a slight tweak to the left to get it perfect but I'll probably fix up the parcel shelf rust before I fit it so I'm minimising the swarf in the seams once fitted.


Edited by alchall, 28 August 2017 - 07:40 PM.


#164 Ben_O

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Posted 18 October 2015 - 03:22 PM

good work matey.

 

glad you escaped the wrath of the cutting disc!

I had one recently where i was on my back under the car with the grinder and a fibre disc on it. The disc caught something, ripped the grinder out of my hand and across the garage. Once i had overcome the shock, the grinder was just sitting on it's back on the floor still going flat out.

 

Scary isn't it



#165 Covert

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Posted 18 October 2015 - 05:58 PM

How did i miss this ?
Awesome work so far matey in saving this mini , lots of new panels which i find much easier than cutting out and welding in bits and bobs , if my shell wasnt too far gone i would have done this with "tiny" instead im kinda building a new one lol.
May have missed it but what engine was in it and what are your plans for it ?
Good luck with the rest of the restoration .
All the best
Mark.




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