691 replies to this topic

[Ben_O]

I'm liking the look of that internal frame coating. I might look into that.

 

Was it very dear?

[alchall]

I'm liking the look of that internal frame coating. I might look into that.

 

Was it very dear?

 

It's pretty expensive - £19 for a can and I'm not sure how far it will go, got to be worth it for those cavities that you can't otherwise get to though I would say.

[alchall]

Big milestone today, one inner wing fitted!

 

First off, both sides clamped up, cleaned up and ready to go!

 

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I also had the dash tray to finish off so I clamped that up ready to weld up too....

 

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Plug welds a plenty! not done too badly here a couple blown and a small number of small gaps....

 

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So i fixed the holes....

 

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And cleaned it all up and primed.....

 

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Not actually 100% finished but it's in place; I have the underside to weld to the toe board, the A post boxing plate inside and the front edge of the bulkhead (the front edge I will do later as I need to take the subframe off to do it and I want to leave it in place until I've finished the whole front end.

 

Anyway, I'm pretty pleased with this, a few bits of tidy up to do but will finish the rest of the welds and get the other side done before I do that. Hope to get that done next weekend!

 

[alchall]

This weekend I welded in the drivers side inner wing and also welded both A post boxing plates to the inner wing inside, not taken many photo's of this as it's much the same as the other side but here's a couple...

 

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One thing I have noticed is I seem to have a crack (actually the second one) in the upper bulkhead extending from the roto dip hole, difficult to see in the photo as it is quite small but the red square shows where the first one was that I welded up and the red circle shows where the other one is that I've only just noticed....

 

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Question is, do I weld this one up or should I do a bigger repair peice using one of these? - http://www.minispare.../HMP441017.aspx

 

Small update today so that is all for now.

[alchall]

A big update today as I've had a couple of days of work so made some good progress, but I'll try not to ramble!

 

But before I get to that, this is my new favourite tool, can't use it everywhere but where I can it saves some time and effort....

 

Hole Punch!!

 

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Anyway, back to progress.

 

I fixed the crack in the bulkhead and welded up some holes where self tapping screws had been put in to hold various fuse boxes (some standard, some not), I'll end up drilling a couple of new ones but that's for a later date, I shall test fit things like the loom and drill any holes I need before priming.

 

I also filled in the small gaps between bulkhead and inner wing along the top edge and also welded the uprights to the top of the inner wings....

 

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Next up I fitted the front panel, that allowed me to drop the subframe out again so I could finish the welds at the front of the bulkhead where it meets the inner wing so that's all now complete....

 

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Then on to the scuttle, lots of holes punched rather than drilled and the paint stripped from around them ready for welding, then clamped up then welded.....

 

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Now the big job of getting the wings all lined up and ready to go before welding them up, I test fitted (for about the 5th time) first and got it very close, I did get it better than this before taking them off and punching / drilling holes but I didn't take any photo's unfortunately so you'll have to just wait to see how well it actually turns out when I get round to finally fitting them in a few weeks time. 

 

Anyway, here's where I did get to!

 

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Driver side pretty good, decent consistent gap all along the edge and down to the grill, I just needed to pull the scuttle end in by a mm or so to perfect this which I managed to do after taking these photo's with a bit of extra brute force....

 

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Passenger side doesn't look too bad from certain angles but it needs pulling in at the scuttle end my a couple of mm and the front top corner needs sort of twisting out slightly, I've pretty much managed to do this but will need to take care when welding not to let it pop out of shape, gonna be a slow process!

 

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From the top you can see better what I meant about the gaps needing to be closed up at the scuttle end.....

 

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Also the gap between rear edge and scuttle is slightly tighter on the drivers than passenger side but there's not a lot I can do to fix this and it hopefully won't be really noticeable when it seam sealed and painted up, I've tried measuring it and it seems to be less than 1mm difference.

 

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Anyway, I then took them off, punched / drilled holes and applied some weld thru primer ready for fitting.

 

The other thing I did was spray some of that internal frame paint into the bottom of the A frame, scuttle ends and the door hinge posts for extra protection, it all currently looks like this (plenty of runs of green paint from but I think that's a good sign as it's certainly seeped through all the gaps, even the very tight ones....

 

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[alchall]

Well I'm back from my holiday now and am looking forward to getting this front end something like finished!

 

I've spent an hour this afternoon doing a little more jiggling around of the panels and am getting quite close to being happy with it but there's a couple of oddities that I'm not sure are normal, problems or otherwise?

 

With the bonnet simply perched on top the shut lines are now looking pretty straight and reasonably tight (I don't think I could get them much tighter really). I've not fitted the hinges or brackets so it is literally placed on top and therefore a couple of mm lower than it would be in reality but I don't think that should matter for the purpose of getting it all looking straight!

 

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The front of the wings fit nicely to the front panel...

 

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And the back to the scuttle....

 

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So far so good.

 

There are basically two places (well 4 really, it's the same both sides) where things don't look 100% right, opinions would be greatly appreciated....

 

Firstly the wing and inner wing don't run completely parallel to each other, it's slightly out at the back whereas it's tight at the front...

 

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Now I'm guessing that since the bonnet lines up ok then this probably is no great problem, hopefully it shouldn't be too obvious in the end either when it's seam sealed and painted?

 

The other thing that concerns me is that there is a small gap between wing and inner wing towards the front, hopefully these pictures show it well enough....

 

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Now I can get these things to close up using clamps but I can't clamp up then pop the bonnet back in place, my worry bead is that if I clamp up and weld then come to put the bonnet back in place that it may not actually still be as nicely aligned any more!

 

If anybody has any views / thoughts on this then they would be very welcome!

 

Thanks....

[Ben_O]

I'm liking the looks of those gaps.

 

With regards to the front bit. you really ought to get the bonnet properly mounted first and ill tell you why..

with the hinges fitted, you may find that the natural position of the bonnet will change, especially along the front where the bonnet curves down with the wing.

If you get the bonnet mounted and the gaps nice, you can certainly pull the wing to the inner wing with clamps and pop a screw in to hold them tight and then check the bonnet again, If the wing then sits too far back, you can remove it and just carefully dress the inner wing flange out slightly to meet the natural position of the wing.

 

It might also pay to try the rubber seal on along the back before any final welding as this can often affect the height of the bonnet along the back and sides.

 

I'm sure everything will be lovely though.

 

Cheers

 

Ben

[alchall]

Thanks Ben!

 

I'll fit the bonnet properly and the rubber seal before progressing any further then, I understand the logic, makes perfect sense now you've said it, hopefully I'll get a bit of time this weekend to do that...

 

Cheers.

 

Al.

[alchall]

So I've installed the bonnet now but things still not quite right, wondering actually if the bonnet is the problem.....

 

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The bonnet seems to have a different shape and curvature to the scuttle, same thing with or without the rubber seal installed, if I push down in the middle of it the gaps at each side to the wings become closer to being parallel. 

 

Thinking about it the bonnet was a bit odd like this when I got the car so I'm wondering if the bonnet is possibly not original and maybe not a heritage replacement, it does look old though as it has some rust.

 

Not sure what to do here, I could buy a new bonnet to see if that's the issue but it seems a little extreme and expensive :-/

 

I shall re-post this in the help section of the forum....

[Ben_O]

I'm sure that is a genuine bonnet because the non-genuine ones tend to have a different profile to the raised 'bump that runs down the centre of the bonnet.

 

is there no way you can tweak the bonnet slightly to improve it?

 

Or perhaps you could bend the hinges out slightly and pop a washer between the hinges and the bonnet each side which might allow the centre of the bonnet to sit down more.

 

Another trick is to nip the nuts up just tight enough to hold but to allow some movement and then close the bonnet and try to move the bonnet into a better position and then carefully open it (or contort yourself up under the front into the engine bay with the bonnet closed) and tighten the nuts up.

 

They can be a pain to get 100% but well worth the effort in my opinion.

[alchall]

Thanks Ben, the washers idea could be a winner, I'll have another tinker tomorrow.

I was thinking of putting something heavy on the bonnet to push it flatter but not sure if I might end up doing more harm than good and simply distorting it.

I'm not necessarily expecting perfection being as its the first time I've done this but I certainly don't won't it looking wrong so definitely want to spend the time rather than rushing it.

[Ben_O]

carlos_w is using a couple of flywheels to settle his bonnet.

 

It seems to be working out

[alchall]

Perhaps not such a crazy idea then afterall!

[alchall]

Big milestone reached today, the wings are now welded on and I'm really pleased with the gaps now too after some help from Ben and Neil on here plus some words of encouragement from others!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Just a little re-profiling of the A panel on the passenger side to do....

 

 

That was the only thing I couldn't get right in the end but with everything else nicely lined up it's a happy compromise, the other side worked fine by the way...

 

 

Nothing much more to say really but I'm really pleased with this, great progress I think even if I do say so myself!!

 

Also getting confident with the plug welds, most of these came out nicely with very little to be fixed after it was cleaned up!

 

Edited by alchall, 28 August 2017 - 12:08 PM.

[alchall]

Not made any progress on the car itself recently but I have got a rollover jig which should help with the rest of the process enormously.....

 

I received it a couple of weeks ago but only yesterday got it completed and the car installed, partly because I wanted to paint it to keep things clean and to keep the rust at bay, seen lots of red and grey ones so I decided to do it differently and painted it yellow so I didn't trip over the legs in the garage   although frankly I wish I'd just gone with a coat of zinc primer as it consumed a lot of paint and could have consumed more if I'd wanted to do a very good job of it (it's not going to win any awards!).

 

So here it is..

 

 

 

It's great to have the castors to move it around the garage....

 

 

I've tried to keep it as low as possible to clear the garage door mechanism, but it is a balance between ease or rolling and height, I may notch it up slightly further yet but to go much higher will require the brackets turning the other way up and I'd be giving myself clearance problems, at the very least I need to be able to wheel it in and out of the garage to turn it over.

 

Anyway, getting it out has meant I've been able to give the garage a good clear out and clean and get the engine on it's stand and my engine crane out of the way into the shed, so now have more useable space.

 

Time to order the floor and get some bracing in the shell while I wait for it to arrive.

Edited by alchall, 28 August 2017 - 06:53 PM.