1498 replies to this topic

[Ben_O]

 

Sincerely hope you'll be ok Ben. Will keep fingers crossed for you.

 

Thanks mate.

[James_eaton_thewholething]

Hope things go alright and nothing happens

[Ben_O]

Hope things go alright and nothing happens

Cheers.

 

all quiet at the moment

[Carlos W]

 

Hopefully a false alarm!

I hope so but i doubt it by the way things have been plus severe local flooding less than a mile away

 

This is our problem

 

 

Its the run off from a nearby copse so gets blocked and overflows really easily and quickly. It's almost 6ft deep and goes from empty to full in around 40 mins if it's raining hard enough and of course, once it blocks and is not attended to, it overflows and floods.

 

That picture was taken this morning. less than an hour before it was clear and empty

 

 

There's about a 4 foot difference in level across those bars. 

 

Do they come out altogether? 

[Ben_O]

 

 

There's about a 4 foot difference in level across those bars. 

 

Do they come out altogether? 

 

It slides up on runners but there are bolts on the grate which stop it being lifted out altogether.

[Carlos W]

It's so obviously the issue

[ToM 2012]

Looking excellent Ben I hope you don't get flooded doing such a good job would be the worst time with all the bare metal work going on. Cheers Tom

[Ben_O]

Looking excellent Ben I hope you don't get flooded doing such a good job would be the worst time with all the bare metal work going on. Cheers Tom

Cheers Tom.

It's nice and dry at the moment so fingers crossed.

 

Ben

[JonnyAlpha]

Ben;

 

Just caught up with your project, again some really nice reapairs / welding and some very nice cleaning up. Oh and flooding in August, who'd have thought.

 

Keep at it

[Ben_O]

Only a tiny update today. I got all suited and booted to make a day of it but once i started, i couldn't get the enthusiasm. I think it's where i had those days away from it.

 

Anyway, first up today was cleaning back more welds

 

 

These are just penetration from the plug welds i did from above so just needed the burnt paint cleaning back as well as the slight surface rust that has started on them.

I took a flap disc to the ones along the bumper rail just to take the heads off. This will allow the rear valance to sit nice and tight to the floor.

 

 

I also cleaned the seam between the floor and the small fillet piece ready for seam welding

 

And these square dimples as i need to make and fit some harness tags there.

 

 

 

Again i just made up some simple tags like this

 

 

You can just about make out that there were tags there before by referring back to the old floor

 

 

And here they are welded on and cleaned back

 

 

 

As you can't get clamps in there to hold them in place, i just use either the end of the hammer shaft or the pecking end of my panel hammer to hold them tight to the floor during to plug welding

 

And then the whole area got a splash of zinc

 

 

Moving on, i decided i wanted to remove the passenger side outer sill. They have been on there since 2002 and had been done by a specialist so i had high hopes for the inner sills, they certainly look ok from the inside

 

 

I cut along the seam welds with a cutting disc to release the sill

 

 

 

That's not looking good so far.....

 

And off

 

 

Oh dear...

 

 

 

So the 'specialist' decided not to paint the inner sills then.....

 

It just goes to show that they can look solid from inside the car but be a different story on the outside.

 

I decided i would have a better look so i tipped the car up on it's side. I didn't do it on the pallet like i do when tipping it the other way because i don't want to damage the panel work i have done the other side.

so i used some strategically placed sandbags.

 

 

 

It certainly looks as though i am going to have to replace the entire inner sill this side. Something i thought i might get away with.

 

Unless.......

 

 

 

I was almost tempted..

 

I thought i may as well clean it all up a bit and see what's there

 

Nasty old chicken crap welds. Not something you would expect from a 'specialist'

 

 

 

Ground those away

 

 

I'm going to have to order up a complete inner sill but i think i would be cutting it too fine replacing it this side of the move so it might have to wait. I don't want to be moving the shell too far with no real strength in that side.

 

Plenty of other bits to go on with though. Ill do a bit more tomorrow.

 

Cheers

 

Ben

[ger]

Lovely work. I'm always impressed by your standard.

 

Ger

[James_eaton_thewholething]

I love these so called specialists that do crappy work and use loads of filler to hide that shoddy work. I mean look at my rear panel with all that filler it didn't need all of it but that was repaired by a professional (bodger). It will be sorted and will look a lot better when it's replace. Boot floor looks good though

[Steely]

Still going well :)

[Ben_O]

Still going well :)

Cheers.

 

It's starting to come together.

[Ben_O]

Got a fair amount done today.

It doesn't look like much in pictures but it was a lot of work and it needed to be after the days i lost last week. The deadline is drawing nearer.

 

Today's agenda was to replace the n/s arch tub. i though i would use the opportunity to show what a simple job it was in case anyone else is going to be tackling this. You just need to spend 5 minutes at the beginning to work out where it's welded, how it's welded and the best way to get the welds cut.

Then it's straight forward.

 

Here is the rusty tub.

 

 

Pretty rusty with some holes and lots of filler for some reason. It's got to go

 

The most obvious welds are inside the car and they hold the rear bulkhead and back of the companion bin to the front of the tub. Also notice, there is a seam weld between the companion bin and the tub. You can see it's penetration (just below the back edge of the chrome trim) as it's welded from the other side

 

 

Inside the boot, there are spot and seam welds holding the subframe mount reinforcer to the back edge of the arch.

There is also another reinforcer that is nestled towards the middle of the arch in front of the recess for the shock absorber. This is also spot welded and seam welded to the tub.

 

Aside from those, there is the spot welds holding the arch lip of the tub to the arch lip of the quarter panel and if you are lucky, there is another seam weld half way up the edge of the rear bulkhead holding it to the tub.

 

I want to cut the spot welds from up inside the arch but there is so much rust, it's impossible to see the dimples of the spot welds so working from inside the car, i drilled some small holes right through the middle of the spot welds

 

 

and then from the other side, you can see precisely where the welds are.

 

 

i could now have cut them with a spot weld drill but i decided to use a grinding stone as the tub is obviously scrap. I find it easier to get the whole of the spot weld this way to stop edges hanging on

 

 

Just grind them thin and that's enough to separate it.

 

 

You can also see in the above picture a long deep grind. this is the location of the seam weld between the tub and the rear bulkhead. I just ground it down from this side to save messing up the bulkhead.

 

And then the ones above

 

 

While is was under there, i took the stone to the under side of the arch lip and ground it away. It's a nightmare trying to find and locate spot welds on the arch lip so i find it easier to do that.

 

 

Once the lip is ground away, i started peeling the skins apart

 

 

From inside the boot, you can see the seam weld i mentioned before between the tub and bulkhead and The seam welds between the reinforcer and the tub. I also frilled some small holes just above the seam welds on the reinforcer to mark their position

 

 

and then back under the arch, i could simply use the drill holes to show the location of the seam welds the other side and grind the tub thin to separate it from the reinforcer

 

 

and here is a random shot of the front edge of the lip ground thin

 

 

Then once i was sure all welds were free, i smacked the tub from the inside a few times with a ball pein to break the welds

 

 

You can see below that the seam weld has now come away too

 

 

A few more strikes from inside the boot and this happened

 

 

So that went in the scrap bin and i put the new one in place right away to mark where it was to be welded

 

 

 

Once marked, i stripped back the paint in the appropriate places

 

 

and then zinc primed it. Whilst that was drying, i cleaned up the edges on the car ready for welding and zinc primed those too

 

 

Then clamped it back in

 

 

as the quarter is scrap anyway, i drilled a nice big hole in it to get some C clamps through to hold the edge of the rear bulkhead to the top of the tub

 

 

 

A bit of 'blue glue'

 

 

Followed by a tickle with the grinder

 

 

Then i plug welded the subframe mount reinforcer to the tub and cleaned that back too

 

 

Followed by some seam welds for extra strength

 

 

Then i prepped for plug welding along the bottom

 

 

And then plug welded

 

 

And cleaned up

 

 

The bluing is from where i added some seam welds inside the boot

 

 

Then i sprayed it all up

 

 

 

 

And that's the tub more or less finished. i still need to replace the reinforcer that goes forward of the shock tower beside the belt mount as the old one was crusty and add some more seam welds here and there.

 

Next i prepped the fuel tank strap bracket for fitting. i had some measurements to work from but i couldn't figure out the exact position so i dug out the tank and strap to have a play

 

 

 

 

 

 

It looks about right but i'm not certain so i decided not to weld it... What does everyone think about it's position?

 

Winding down a bit now, i added another loom strap in the corner

 

 

and chopped the bottom off of the quarter panel so i could remove the sharp and jagged fillet piece that extends the boot floor in front of the tub.

 

 

and that's it for today.

 

cheers

 

Ben