313 replies to this topic

[JDImini]

 

What keeps the water out of here?

 

 

A rubber bung.

 

Cheers

 

Ben

 

but not this bung

[JDImini]

more great work

[Ben_O]

I spent this afternoon working on the Midget but i'm a bit picture light as i stupidly left the memory card in the car slot of my computer at home and the internal memory only holds 5 photos....

 

I re-skinned one of the doors which first involved repairing the frame. I have photographed some of the steps and ill explain the rest. Ill do a full report when i re-skin the other door.

 

First off, I used a straight edge to clamp to the bottom of the frame as i was convinced that it had distorted due to loosing it's strength from rust.

 

I wasn't wrong and it was fairly bowed but pulled easily into shape when prompted. I could see the rusty sections flexing back into shape.

 

I started by cutting out the infected metal and cleaning up the immediate area to check for any hidden nasties

 

 

I then made up a new piece. Fairly straightforward standard stuff.

Here it is clamped into place along with my straight edge from earlier to keep everything straight.

 

 

I used another straight edge to check the frame above the join as i tacked the new metal in to make sure everything stayed true.

 

And once it was fully welded in, the straight edge came off and the welds were linished back

 

 

 

Next, the skin was trial fitted onto the frame to make sure that it fitted which it did so i removed it to finish prepping the frame and skin and then sprayed zinc onto the newly created bare metal areas around the frame and skin.

 

Next, the skin was refitted, I folded the bottom corners over to hold it snug and then hung it on the car to check the gaps.

It all gapped up lovely so I spot welded the skin to the frame at 4 points around the edges as it was before.

 

Once that was done, more zinc was applied under where the new skin would be folded to the frame and then the skin was folded.

 

It's a bugger trying to explain this without pictures. i think ill keep a spare memory card at work or get myself a new memory 

 

Anyhoos, more tomorrow#

 

Ben

[JDImini]

yet more great work!

 

Off to soft top Sunday at Goodwood this weekend shame the Midget won't be with me - looking forward to taking it to the revival  

[Ben_O]

Not a huge amount to report today. I had to do some paintwork on a Dodge Ram which took up most of my small workshop leaving little room for using grinders etc.

 

Here is a couple of shots of the finished left hand door

 

 

 

 

A pallet of goodies turned up this morning

 

 

Which contained a roll bar for the Midget as well as some brake and suspension upgrades.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I've tucked it all away for now until re-assembly.

 

After I finished painting the Dodge and the paint was hard enough for me to continue, I set about stripping the other door

 

This one is not as bad as the other with only minor bubbling across the bottom

 

 

 

 

Once stripped, I removed the skin to see the extent of the frame damage

 

 

 

 

Fortunately, Smart repair grinder mk2 turned up. 

 

 

I don't know how i managed without it, by far one of the best tools in my box

 

To be fair, most of the crust along the bottom of the frame is from the folded lip of the skin and brushes off. It could well go again after a clean up but I shall just go ahead and replace the bottom of the frame as before.

 

That will be my job for tomorrow. Then ill have a pair of re-skinned doors ready to go leaving just minor body work to complete before the paint operations can begin.

[JDImini]

Looks like Christmas came early for both of us as you got a new toy as well 

 

Door's looking good

[JDImini]

is the colour on the inside of the door the same as the outside, as it looks metallic blue in the photo? 

[Ben_O]

is the colour on the inside of the door the same as the outside, as it looks metallic blue in the photo? 

It's the same but just very thin. You can see the primer through it which makes it look much lighter

[Ben_O]

Hi all.

 

Continuing on with the door frame repairs, I made up a repair section for the bottom of the frame 

 

 

 

And then cut out the infected steel

 

 

Once i had fine tuned the repair section, I clamped it into place adding a few welds to the edges to hold the frame together in the correct position

 

 

And then tweaked the frame square adding a few tack welds

 

 

Once i was happy with the fit, I seam welded the repair section into place

 

 

 

I then ground up the welds and trimmed the bottom flange to match the original

 

 

 

Before cleaning up the rest of the frame and spraying on some zinc

 

 

I removed some paint from the new skin in preparation for spot welding

 

 

And then trial fitted the skin on the frame

 

 

 

Unfortunately, I had to close at lunchtime to attend an appointment which was last minute so I didn't get the door finished but it's close now. Just some folding and a few spot welds will see it done.

 

Thanks for looking

 

Ben

[JDImini]

 

Lovely Jubbly!

[Ben_O]

Continuing on with the door skin, I spot welded it to the frame.

First, the paint needed to be cleaned back from the areas to be spot welded

 

 

Followed by the spot welds

 

 

And more

 

 

With those done, I could fold the skin to the frame

 

 

 

And then do the final few spot welds on top

 

 

There is a small split there in the frame which i shall weld up.

 

And the finished article

 

 

Which goes here 

 

 

It will need some final tweaking when it comes to paint prep.

 

With the doors out of the way, I decided that I would fit the panhard rod next. Simply because mounting holes need to be drilled into the bodywork and it was a welcome change from weld grind weld.

I've never fitted one before and the instructions couldn't have been any worse. I think they were written to only be understood by the person that wrote them.....

 

Here is the kit

 

 

It was clear that the fuel tank and Axle needed to be in place before installing the rod so I began there

 

 

 

 

The only photograph I could find on Google of this particular rod fitted was this one

 

 

Which clearly shows that the two forward mounts of the tubular tripod sit hard up against the ribs in the floor like this

 

 

So I marked and drilled the mounting holes in this position and bolted everything up

 

 

[Ben_O]

The next step was to weld a piece of tube to the lower damper mount for the rose jointed rod to bolt to but this immediately showed up a big problem

 

 

I would the rose joints out as far as possible and it was still not enough....

 

So I had another look  and found that I could squeeze the tubular tripod under the edge of the tank giving me much needed inches.

 

 

 

As you can see, there are now too many surplus holes in the boot floor now it's moved so they will need to be welded up.

No matter, we have a result

 

 

It reaches 

 

As this car will be converted from the old Morris Minor type dampers to proper shock absorbers, I had to fit the new mounting plate for that so the final piece of the panhard rod kit can be welded to it

 

 

And here is the tube clamped to the mounting

 

 

And then after tacking it into place, I removed the plate and fully welded it into place

 

 

 

And then I could finally bolt everything back and admire the finished job

 

 

 

 

With that complete, I removed the rod kit and the axle

 

 

 

Next, I placed the roll cage in place just to see how and where that mounted

 

 

That will be straightforward so that can be done during prep.

 

With just the final few bits of body work remaining, I thought I would do the quarter panel bottoms next.

 

Here is the N/S

 

 

I chopped that bit out to see what was behind

 

 

 

 

 

After a clean up, there were some holes so I cut the affected areas out, replaced them with fresh steel and then zinc primed the cavity

 

 

And then used the piece I cut out as a template to make up a new piece to go in

 

 

 

 

Here it is tacked in

 

 

 

I removed the heads from the tacks to enable me to have a good feel of the panel with my hand before stitching it in to make sure everything was dandy.

 

The process of stitching it in without it all distorting is a long one so I didn't get it finished but am most of the way across.

I did short sections of welding and then ground it down as i went to keep a close eye on the profile

 

 

 

More on that tomorrow

 

Cheers

 

Ben

[Carlos W]

Your work is amazing Ben

[Ben_O]

Your work is amazing Ben

Thanks mate

[JDImini]

Your work is amazing Ben

I second that!