16 replies to this topic

[Big_Adam]

goooooood morning Vietnam.

I have a slight conundrum in my life. To which the logical answer does not go well with the answer I would like.

The question relates to my El Gordo and asum of money (£2000) I shall receive soon. With this money I have two choices.

1) Rebuild El Gordo. Meaning rust removal, engine overhaul and respray.

2) Buy......another mini and bit farewell to El Gordo.

Thing is the cleaver logical choice is buy a new mini with less/no rust and use that. My choice would be rebuild El Gordo. Not too sure if I can do it for £2000 and loose my daily driver for X number of weeks. The main problem with the 1'st choice is that the number of parts I will need. I need;

2 x doors,
MIG welder,
full front end,
Paint (and all part in-between)
Compressor,
New interior,
new door hinges,

[attachment=28953:DSCN1500.JPG]

[attachment=28954:DSCN1501.JPG]

[attachment=28955:DSCN1502.JPG]

[attachment=28956:DSCN1504.JPG]

Skuttles is fairly rusty,

So I don't know. Anyone think it's do-able for £2000?

[minislapper]

Depends how much work you'd be doing yourself. If you're getting a garage to replace every rusty panel then I think you'll be pushing it to do it within your budget. If there is rust externally, odds are there'll be a lot more you can't see. If you're engine etc are fine, why not look out for an almost rust free non-runner?

[Bungle]

save a mini

just see what dog, mowog and jack have done

[Bass Man]

Buy a little runabout, any 1.0ltr car will sell on easily, then take your time and fix the Mini properly.

[Mini-Dave]

Well i bought my mini for 1000 pounds, which was a city e 998 in blue, all standard, and it was in pretty good cond, with not much rust showing externally. So you could properly get a reasonable one for 2k if u looked

Alternatively, Buy a mini for 1500 (which will have less rust than that) then use 500 on tarting the new one up a bit.

depends how much you've modified el gordo? if not alot, id go for a new mini, that rust looks pretty bad!

Dave

[cowboy]

spend the money on el you know she will love you for it in the long run

[black jack1275]

Repair it spend the money on el gordo. And have a car you can say you rebuilt. SAVE THE MINI

[Xiao_Bin]

like I've always read on this forum, best to keep the mini you know perfectly well, rather than buy another one, that could be full of nasty surprises

[Retro_10s]

El Gordo is a ledgend of TMF, keep him/her going! never give up! everything's repairable!

[Big_Adam]

Ah bugger it, I shall keep El Gordo.

Althought does mean for one I have to....pa....paaa.........PAY people to do stuff for me. Damn my lack of a full automotive machine shop. Damn it to all hell and back!

[Pocket-Rocket]

Ah bugger it, I shall keep El Gordo.

Althought does mean for one I have to....pa....paaa.........PAY people to do stuff for me. Damn my lack of a full automotive machine shop. Damn it to all hell and back!

Hey dude

Me and me dad are rebuilding his mini at the momet. You could do alot of that body work at home with just drill wire bit, new parts, body filler, welder ect
Ill try and find some photo of how bad me dads mini was... and i mean bad you could put your finger thourgh some of the rust it was that bad lol.

Save her go on she will love you long time for it.
lol

[Big_Adam]

I've only got £2000 man, I am planning to do all the body work myself. Just I do not own the equipment to hone bore blocks or change/press in new cam bearings.

[1984mini25]

If you’re extremely careful with the budget then There’s no resion why you can’t fix up El Gordo for £2000, I’ve probably only spent around £500 on everything I’ve done to my 25, doing all the work myself.

As for the bodywork you can pick up a decent welder for £130, as you don’t need an all singing and dancing high-powered welder for a mini, well that’s unless you want to blowholes all day long.

And to keep the costs down, for the smaller repairs you can make them your self with a few basic tools. I only have a selection of hammers, some wood and a few clamps, made out of a few old rot free mini panels. A mini roof would be ideal and shouldn’t be that much from a breakers.
I’ve been using my old rotten doors for some of the patches, so in a way I’m repairing the with the car, so at least the patches are original to.

And don’t buy the first things you see, shop around and you might get lucky like I did with my new doors for only £20 the pair, as the car they came off was being scraped and the bloke was moving house so wanted them shifted ASAP.

Edited by 1984mini25, 12 March 2007 - 07:43 PM.

[blakie]

Cant everyone chip together with what skills they have to give/teach to "SAVE A MINI"? This will keep the costs down im sure!

It could be a TMF SAVE A MINI CAMPAIGN.

If theres anything i can do let me know (lend tools help with stuff etc) though i dont know how far away i am.

If old El is such a TMF legend it would be a shame to see it go!

blakie

[Big_Adam]

.......wouldn't do the "save a mini" thing.

I don't do charity. I'll borrow tools but I will not take money (fear me and my morels!)

Ta tho everyone. Just got to get round to a few places to get prices. Should be fun. Going to see if renting a welder is cheaper as I have some of the clobber to go with it.