202 replies to this topic

[apbellamy]

Looks like my measurements where right.





Should look pretty good with the grille finished and refurbed.

[Mini Basher]

Interesting and unique look your going for there, I like it !!!

Cheers

Andy

[apbellamy]

[apbellamy]

Got a bit more done with the front.

Chopped the rest of and fitted the head light panels and the slam panel.



Then I got on with adapting the valance to take a fiat radiator.







Looks OK with the valance offered up to the car. Going to try and drop the rad a little more at the passenger side and make a permanent top bracket, but on the whole I'm happy with it.



All fits in rather nicely, and if my engine plans ever change there is still room for some more goodies



I've also thinned the number plate mounting brackets down, but looking at it I might remove them all together and make some thing below the lower opening. Can have more go faster holes then

[apbellamy]

Sticking to my theme of doing one job at a time and getting the shell finished, I've bought an MPi block and sent it of to Fast Carl for some work doing.








The rather long list of work:

Supply and fit centre main strap.
Drill/Tap oil galleries for threaded plugs.
Oil fed thrust conversion.
Drill/Tap head and block for 11 head studs.
Drill/Tap for BMW under crown oil jets (they are quite sexual as far as little squirters go!)
Supply and fit dry deck ports.
Turn up and fit a cylinder head thermostat bypass port.
Turn up a blank for the crank sensor hole.

Top work as always Carl, thank you.

I'm going to have a go at dry decking the block and head myself, shouldn't be a problem

Dry decking, oil jets, a metro thermostat sandwich plate plumbed back to the heater take off on the bottom hose with this in line should help keep everything nice and cool:



It will be wired with a timed relay so that it will run on a little after the ignition goes of, hopefully avoiding heat soak.

[apbellamy]

Got the radiator alignment sorted, fitted a proper top bracket for it and and a panel to force the air up through the rad. Then stuck it to the car.

[apbellamy]

More progress. I've made up some brackets to hang the number plates at the bottom of the valance, added some more air holes for the radiator, enlarged and swagged the wiring holes for the side lights, cleaned up all the welds and put it back on it's wheels.



It's only taken me 6 months to swap the front. At this rate, I'll have it finished for Avon 2020

I think it needs more speed holes in the lower part of the valance, behind the number plate.

[apbellamy]

Got the drivers foot well sorted.

[apbellamy]

Got some period bucket seats from ebay.





The body is fibreglass, so they are fairly light at 7.3KG each. Not sure how much a standard seat ways. Quite snug, but fairly comfy.

[apbellamy]

They seem to sit me in the right place to get a good view of all the gauges.



Obviously everything is just slung in place to give me an idea, but with a bit of fettle it should be OK. Going to put another gauge pod on the left of the main binnacle (shamelessly copied from Robert's car). Boost and AFR on the column and temp's/pressure on the left.

[MarkGTT]

nice progress mate

[apbellamy]

Getting there. Would like to have teh shell finished by the new year. Famous last words...

[apbellamy]

For once Wifey listened to me and came up with some nice MED goodies for my birthday




Also spent a couple of hours in the garage making a nice big hole in the mini...



Had a look at the rear subframe while I was there. I built it up about 2 years ago with pretty much new everything. It's done about 30 miles being towed and all the rubber bits are perished and split.

[apbellamy]

During the week I got a bit more done on the rear arch and boot floor.





I decided to change the front of arch closing panel while I was at it, so added to my mini spares order first thing Tuesday morning. Unfortunately they didn't bother to dispatch it until Friday, so I had to find something else to do today.

So I chopped of the driver's side A panel to get a repair I had done poorly in the past, and guess what I found...



So I sorted that out and tidied up the repair on the A post.



I had hoped to get the original repair done, patch up the bottom of the inner wing where it meets the floor and fit the A panel again, but my virtually brand new grinder's motor burnt out. Typically, Wifey has thrown the receipt away. In B&Poo's favour they took my bank statement and searched on their computer until they found my receipt, then arranged for the grinder to be repaired. That's going to take 2 weeks, so I've had to buy the cheapest grinder they had. Safe to say I now have vibration white finger/arm/elbow...

That just left me time for one final patch.

[apbellamy]

During the week I did the repair I'd actually taken the A Panel of to do and stuck another new A Panel on.





Today I've cracked on and got the new rear arch fitted.







Think I need to work on the panel gap with the rear quarter