To The Scrap Heap

Well it’s the second week in succession I haven’t managed to get to my car and it feels very strange now. But things have not been allowed to stand still at Mustang Maniac, the guys have been turning bits of my car into scrap! Of course I knew what they were going to do it and why. The left side rear quarter panel which was in the worst condition and the outer wheel arch have been cut away to leave an exposed rear chassis. The full quarters have to be unleaded from the rear roof supports. Once that is done then the “B” pillar posts spot welds are drilled out along with the spots for the outer wheel arch. The panels were cut away in small easier to manage sections and thrown unceremoniously into the scrap bin.

Considering these were the original quarters then it’s hardly surprising they have gone rotten in the usual place around the arch itself.

To remove the quarters correctly the car should be bolted to a proper jig to stop any movement, if anybody offers to do it without a jig beware! The panel was removed then the outer wheel arch.

The lead has to be removed, cleaned up, preped ready for the full quarter to be re-fitted. In these pics you will see the lead being worked by Yogi.

I replaced the hinge pins a while ago (click here for the link) so there is no movement on the doors which is always a good idea when doing this type of work in order to avoid the door dropping on the hinge. You will also notice that the doors are still in place for a good reason, with the rear quarter removed from the car, the door is now the only constant to work from at this point, you will need as little movement as possible, hence the hinge pin replacement I completed a while ago because I knew this work was coming up. The full replacement quarter panel would need to do the same obviously but in reverse, matching up to the door now. Any misaligned panels at the rear will be multiplied considerably due to the length of the door and the fenders themselves. By the time you get to the stone bumper guard and the bumper itself, depending how bad the misalignment is, it could be enough to stop the panels being bolted back together again. The very common mistake is to take everything of the car and then weld the quarters on. The panel alignment should always be worked from the back going forward, the fenders and hood will have to line up correctly with the doors and hence the rear quarters. This is a very timely and tedious but critical part of the process, get it wrong and the car will look very odd. Or even worse, if this type of work is done without a purpose-built jig, beware!
Once the arch and the quarter were out-of-the-way, the old rotten section of the chassis rear left leg was to be cut away at the point where there is plenty of good metal.

A butt weld is not acceptable due to the stress on this part of the chassis so the guys make up a heavy plate which is to fit inside the original chassis leg and the new section of replaced chassis. The new section of rail was welded to the plate and the joint welded together to give the support for the welds and new rear rail.

With the chassis rail now in place the trunk cover panel section was placed over the rail and welded into place to offer more support and look a lot nicer in the trunk area.

I dare say I will have more red oxide painting to do when I am down at Mustang Maniac again to match it all up.

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Big Step Forward

Another week has gone, and this week for various reasons I haven’t been able to get down to the car, but Mustang Maniac guys have been busy. With the car being red oxided last week it was down to time and effort from the guys what they wanted to do to it. Yogi made a good job of welding up the remaining parts as ever for the rusty bits that needed cutting out and replacing with fresh metal, welding in and grinding down flat. With the welding done Yogi run over the car with seam sealer which you can see in white. This will stop water ingress under the car and cause outside in rust issues.

OK, you think it looks odd in relation to the red oxide. It’s true it does, however it was always my plan to cover the red oxide with stone chip after final painting of the bodywork metal. You will not see the sealer or the red oxide but I know the car will be protected to the worst the UK weather may throw at it. I hear you say that the original spec was red oxide only! True, it was, nothing else except the red oxide paint. As I will be using this car to enjoy it, I don’t want to panic if I get caught in a rain shower for some reason so a little more than red oxide was for me.

They guys wasted no time in taking my car of the spit and mounting the car on the jig, the automotive version of the rack. The car was bolted down and within minutes the guys were checking the often overlooked and critical part of the car, the cowl to see just how bad it was. When it rains the water gets in the cowl and should drain out. Obviously over time this will rust away and the any water will run inside the car and ruin the carpets, electrics and sound proof that may be there. To replace it will be a major upheaval once the car is put back together again, but the guys can do it without damaging the original paint job that is on the car for the 64 – 66 that were welded in place. The fact my car has to be repainted makes it a lot easier for them to work on so it was off in minutes, drilling the old welds out and separating the parts. You can see it on their own blog http://mustangmaniac.org where they show the process in stages.
Car is mounted on the jig.

The front plates to the engine bay were removed as they were going rotten and they also hold a crucial part of the car to stop twisting from the doors forward and should only be replaced while on a proper supporting jig. With these small critical plates removed the cowl was exposed to be removed. The spot welds were removed via a special spot weld removal bit for their drills. With all the spot welds removed they lifted of the upper section to expose the inside. As they suspected it was shot and need to be replaced. While you are at this stage it could be repaired, but it’s simpler to replace with fresh clean metal to be safe not sorry when another part of the cowl fails in a few years time. The cowl was offered up, adjusted, fitted and welded into place.

With the old section removed the new one would outlast me now.

The second day the guys decided that the battery inner wing was too much to save as there was massive amount of filler hidden under the plate. More than they suspected after original inspection. The front part of the radiator mount on the right hand side has a grill to allow the cool air onto the battery, on mine the inner very thin bar had broken away and was a little rusty around the edges at the bottom. Again the guys decided rather than repair the front with plates and there was no numbers on this section they would replace it to make a longer lasting job. This need to be aligned up with the rest of the body work and took a little fiddling around before Yogi went at it with the welder again.

All of a sudden things have started to happen. New metal going in moves the car on at such a rate. Me? I am delighted with the work as I knew I would be. Thanks Guys.

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A Spot Of Welding

Weekend came and I was ready to go on Friday night, the bag was packed with a change of clothes and my new angle grinder ready to rock. Saturday morning and with Mustang Maniac just over the hour away, the aircon was on, the shades were on and I was on my way. The trip was peaceful for a change and I seemed to go all the way there without stopping. I got out the car and the heat was getting hotter. Adam was being escorted by a couple of his dogs as usual, no sooner had he opened up the steady stream of customers arrived. I saw myself to my car and got straight to work. Yogi (Al) had been busy again welding up the last parts of the underside and the front right shock tower. He had again done some nice welding with the spot welds that I decided to keep them. The top of the shock tower needs to be flat ready for the export brace to be fitted so they were ground down, a little filler applied and painted.

welds ground down

cleaned up and red oxide

New spots

cleaned up and painted

The underside had been exposed since the day I removed everything I could of the under seal. There was a little surface rust still and the odd bit of under seal. I started rubbing down with the angle grinder and wire wheel to nice a bare metal ready for the red oxide primer.

Before final Clean up

cleaned up

This last little section was taking a lot longer due to the complex shapes for the rear shocks and suspension mounts. The tufts of wire wool ( if that is the technical term for it) was difficult to work with, trying to get in all the corners that the grinder wouldn’t fit. The manual work had made my fingers and wrists ache. But it was worth it. This time I took a part way picture.

With all the red oxide primer done for now the difference is amazing. I finished at the point where some of the thin metal will be removed and replaced at a later date. You will notice a couple of little spots haven’t been painted as they need a couple of spot welds. With a little luck and man power available, the car should be taken off the spit and clamped on the jig getting ready for some upper body work. Then I suspect there will be more under body painting before she goes to the proper paint shop.

Sunday was a day tidying up in the man cave, the localised tornado that hit my shed on Saturday while I was out just happened to have the same name as my wife! I also cleaned a little more on the steering rack, and the photos looked no different to the previous pictures unfortunately. So I didn’t post those ones for wanting to look like duplicates.

I am planning on doing a review of my new Makita GA4530KD if anybody is interested.

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Flaming Nice Surprise(s)

In the UK we moan about bad weather then we moan about hot weather. Me I love the hot weather and it makes a change to have a few days of nice weather. The only bit I’m not to keen on is when the multitude of bugs decide that my flesh is A la Carte on the menu, prime nose bag material. Everything that can bite has tried to take lumps out of me all weekend. Still at least it’s warm and not chucking it down with rain. Friday I had my bags packed and ready for the start to Mustang Maniac. Earlier in the week I had a cryptic message sent to me by Adam to say they had a surprise for me. Saturday and I was out the door in record time and everything was goin’ great guns until I was about six miles from Mustang Maniac. A country lane had a tree that had come down from the storm early in the mornings and partially blocked the road, note the word partially. The point is I pulled up to get by and the police car that was there had parked across the road so nobody could get past. Now, anybody with a little sense would have moved some of the branches out the way with a borrowed saw from one of the houses opposite, cut a few away, then traffic moves again, nope, not this clown. He just stood at the back of his car swirling his finger in the air like he was stirring a cup upside down with his finger. I think this was his Neanderthal attempt to signal me to turn around, I wouldn’t want him to walk or verbally communicate or anything. I sat there for a while and so this lunatic just stood there, the neighbours were now out in force and all looking at said tree and fine figure of authority who had all the gear, but no idea! When I say tree, I have seen bigger indoor Christmas trees if you get me? The plus point is was sitting comfortably in my airconditioned car and this herbert was standing in the heat with his hat on and high vis jacket. So, it was inevitable that I had to do a seventeen point turn in the road which included collecting some hedgerow in the rear bumper while I was at it. I had to go all the way back where I had just come from and go the long way round, it took me what seemed like an age to get to my final destination. I parked up at Mustang Maniac and was greeted by Adam who took me straight to my car, the surprise was obviously to do with my car. Adam showed me the work Al or Yogi as he is known, had done to my car. A lot of the holes had been welded up, the old rotten floor support brackets were taken off and the new ones put back on. The rear chassis leg was repaired and the hand brake bracket put back in place and the holes around it repaired. Yogi had done some brilliant spot welds that I liked so much I left them on there as a feature to be seen. The attention to detail is amazing, as I knew it would be. Yogi had taken some pics for me so thanks to him and Mustang Maniac for letting me use them.

old floor supports and pan

support removed

different angle

treated inside

welded up and re-ground

The bodywork on the inside of the supports was in good condition and needed no additional work. The area was carefully marked up and a single support was changed at a time. The guys were happy nothing moved and continued to fix the supports in place. Check out Yogi’s spot welds that were just to good to grind down or cover up, they were different and I wanted them to stay.

left side

right side

inside welds

Spot detail at the front of support

more inside

hand brake bracket

With the parts welded in place Yogi gave the floor and welds a generous helping of filler. which was soon to be rubbed down by me.

By the time the filler had been rubbed down I looked a little white should we say. The Dewalt sander had gone through my supply of 80grit discs and made light work of getting it down to almost smooth. I didn’t worry about the very fine grade as the slightly roughed up surface gave the red oxide a good key point. I used my angle grinder to then go over the pans one last time to remove any hint of surface rust. Here was where my second surprise got me, after about ten minutes the angle grinder suddenly got warm, ground to a halt and flames were licking out he front of it like a dragon with a bad cough. I was wearing welding gloves and goggles so I put it on the floor rather quickly and unplugged it, it was left to fizzle, crackle and smoke having its own little melt down, literally. What do you expect from a cheap angle grinder? I am surprised it lasted this long. Adam did say to me it wouldn’t last long, he was right.

hand brake bracket in correct position

note the build up of powder

right side rear chassi leg repaired

With everything wiped down, dusted and cleaned up with thinners I then started work with the red oxide to the point where I had got to with the angle grinder. I think you will agree it has made a huge difference. Once it has come back from paint the underside will be coated with some stone chip in black to protect it even more.

After the angle grinder had cooled down I tried to move it, all moving parts had welded themselves together by the feel of it. Guess what is going in Adams scrap pile?

Sunday was a day I usually do a bit in the man cave. Today I was asked to hang a garden gate, fix a fence panel and couple of other little jobs. So I didn’t manage to get stuff done that I wanted. The only thing I managed to do was clean up my sander and put it away. Oh, I did order a new angle grinder so hopefully it will be here by the time I go back next weekend.

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Retake

The weekend arrived and I was tired, dead to the world. There is no alarm set at the weekends just for the sake of it, we enjoy our time to wake up slow talk and work out the weekend plan of action. I normally leave the house by half eight to get to Mustang Maniac, but this time we didn’t wake until almost nine. All I can say is we both must have needed the sleep. I got up showed, dressed and left without breakfast. I got in the car and looked for to my trip down to see the guys. Unfortunately as I arrived near Duxford air museum the world and his mate was going the same direction as me. The roads were coned into a single lane in order to filter us down to the entrance. I must say well done to the brain surgeon that decided to send all traffic the same way even though I didn’t want to go there. Hardly the loudest bang in the firework box should we say! Unfortunately I have to go past the main entrance to get on the country roads to Mustang Maniac. The main problem I had was that there were people standing in front of my car trying to direct me into the airfield car park. When I asked them to get out of my way so I could get past, they got the hump with me for not wanting to go in there – get over it! Not everybody wants to see planes, just as not everybody wants to restore a car. I eventually turned up at almost eleven, this delay was cutting into some serious resto time. I was not a happy bunny. But as promised, the first thing I done was to take some more pictures of the car from last week and the work I have done this weekend. I painted the front of the car now except for the small parts that need a little mig welder work to fill the holes and the battery section of the inner wing. We will take the plate out and work out if we need to replace the whole inner fender or not. The other part that has not been painted on the front is the radiator cooling grill to the upper right side. The grill was patched up with filler previously and was very brittle, so we will now have to replace that little section too. So, rather than show a few similar looking pics, I have added the completed front end over the last couple of weeks and the end results. I think you can see more of change that has taken place this way. I even tried my hand at a little impromptu panel beating. The radiator opening at the front had a few wavy edges so I got a flat faced hammer and a sturdy flat block behind the metal and give it some therapy. Boy did that feel good, my mind wandered to other things that were bugging me over the last few days as I was doing that little bit.

Sunday was a day for cleaning of the steering mechanism. This was the usual remove grime, remove paint and remove rust. I have a link to all the pictures here or go to the Photo Menu – Steering – Steering Linkages Recondition for the full step by step pictures so far. This was a probably the most grimy job I have done to date. Now that the parts are cleaned up I will go over them with the wire wool and make sure they are ready for paint nearer the time. A little detail on them in black and some silver highlights sounds good to me. The cleaned up parts look a little shiny or wet as I have just coated them with Gibbs Brand in order to stop them rusting.

Just a couple of how it was:

finger tight fittings

ball bearing in place

How it is now:

idler joint before

idler joint cleaned up

ram pipes

removing paint

after paint stripper

coated with gibbs

polished pipes

cleaned fittings

In order to keep an eye on the parts and where they all go I have used some diagrams and my manuals of course. What I have done is I have compiled a selection of the most helpful Steering and Suspension Diagrams onto a single article that can be found here, just like my brake diagrams I compiled. I hope they are some help to you; As the parts are so integral to each other I decided to keep them together rather than split them up.

Quick Links:

Photo Menu – Steering – Steering Linkages Recondition or click here

Articles – Steering and Suspension Diagrams or click here

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Deleted!

You know the scenario by now, I go to Mustang Maniac for the day and work my arms off. (Yes, I did say arms, for those that think I may have said something different). It was raining and chucking it down and not the best of days to travel. Yet as I was getting close and closer to my own little paradise the sun was getting brighter. When I pulled up – full sun, what more can a man ask for? I was greeted by Adam who was just coming out of the refurbished workshop. I was given the tour of the new interior and it looks so much better and dare I say it – organised. The new racks, shelving, and inner panels made it look so much bigger. I was shown a few of the cars they had been working on as we walked to my car. I was shown what was needed to be done this weekend, the other side of engine bay and the inner fender all in red oxide. We rolled the car over and I got to work. I am getting quicker at this angle grinder clean up now and the amount of work to be done today was more than last week. Clean till it gleams, rub down and paint. Adam had removed the original welded shock tower bracket for me along with the botch job of a hand brake cable bracket in the tunnel, the bracket was only held in place by pop rivets. So I have pinched a few pics from Adam where he had done the work.

pilot holes

weakening the spot welds

the neat holes

bracket being drilled

original hole

The normal process is that I take the photo’s of the before, during and after of what ever I get up too. I get home and upload the pics to the PC and crop them and upload ready for the blog. In a moment of madness I clicked on “Delete” option instead of copy from the SD card. As the SD card has no recycle bin they were gone simple as that. Yes I have some special recover tools but it’s not worth the time and effort to retrieve them. However, the were a few choice words uttered under the breath, over the breath and out load. I was not a happy bunny at this point. The only good thing is that the batch of pics I deleted were the after pics of the red oxide and a couple during. I will be able to get some more when I am down there next week, so it’s not a problem just more annoying than anything as I can’t show you the results of hard days labour. I will load the new pics next week with the next post. Am I the only plum to do the delete thing?

Sunday I have started on project which one of the bigger ones, the steering section. I have started to clean it up and remove the tie rods and idler arm. I have started to clean up the valve end as that was really greased up bad. The pipe fittings were only finger tight which might explain the state it’s in. I will create a Steering Rack page this week with any luck and the step by step process.

finger tight fittings

tie rod

The idler arm has been completed today but it was seized up big time. A little Gibbs brand sorted that out though and was able to get it out, with the help of a brass hammer of course. The colour of the rust was so bright it almost looked like it had been heated up and was glowing orange.

Thanks Adam for letting use some more of your pics. 🙂

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Looking Good

A long week and the weekend couldn’t get here fast enough so I can get down to Mustang Maniac. I arrived with change of clothes and a packed lunch. The dogs were in high spirits and enjoying the sun running around the now spacious yard. Adam looked over the car with me and gave me my instructions for the day. Final clean up of the left side and remove the shock tower bracket that had been badly welded on. I wanted to replace the brakes with a nice smart export brace so they needed to come of anyway. I have seen some were the export brace sits over the top of the brackets and it looks a poor job. So while I was at this stage it was an ideal time to remove the first one. It was a case of the angle grinder to reduce the weld to as thin as possible then lever the old bracket off the shock tower. With the bracket off I was able to grind down the weld almost flat. I have become a lot better at using the angle grinder with finesse and can grind away quite accurately now with only the bits I want removed.

Bracket in place

Bracket removed to leave the old welds

Cleaning up the metal to make sure no rust was about and wire wool the tight spaces to leave a fresh bare surface.

With my ears still ringing from the whine of the angle grinder it was time for some peace and quiet and start the stipple of the red oxide. This was to continue to edges where I didn’t need welding and again stop about an inch in to allow welding to be done. Of course there will be some bits that I may have to go over again when the repair welds start, but that can’t be helped. I completed the complete left hand side inner fenders and the fire wall now. Adam came to give me a hand a little later so we could roll the car over ready for next week’s more of the same all be it on he other side. What a difference it makes to see the red oxide on there. The pictures here were taken as soon as I had finished, so it was a little wet in some places.

Sunday the wife wanted me to give her a hand with the garden as she wanted to get our lovely bamboos out the garden, as they were start in to go a bit mental. I came home Saturday evening to find the big bushes cut down but the stumps or shoots still in the ground. The ground was soaked by the rain in the morning so it wasn’t to bad to dig. What I wasn’t expecting was the shoots to travel as far sideways as they did. Under the loose laid patio in the corner, and to the fences. We lifted the slabs up to find a find a complex web of infiltration from the roots that was more complex than a cold war spy drama, it was everywhere. We eventually got it all up but it was a pain. Tip: Don’t plant bamboo in the ground unless you have a couple of giant pandas coming to stay to keep it under control.

In case you are wondering, I did manage to sneak a couple of hours in at the man cave while she was out. I started to clean up and strip down down the steering setup. But shoosh, don’t tell the wife! I will create a step by step process and add it soon. I can’t do a Sunday without a little tinkering on the car or car bits now can I?

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Blowing Hot & Cold

Weekend has arrived and with it a nice dose of sunshine, along with it came the pollen and misery. Hay fever is something I have learned to live with for years now. I love the countryside and the flowers, unfortunately they don’t love me. I had a nice trip to Mustang Maniac with the aircon on full blast trying to keep cool and giving myself the metal bubble sanctuary from the pollen. I arrived to see a fairly empty yard and Adam moving a couple of cars around. Holiday season for them and they still managed to finish a couple of cars. I have seen a car down there that was “restored” by another specialist Mustang restorer and it was being sorted out properly by guys. I got changed and Adam gave me my list of jobs to do on my little lady. It was a final tidy up and rust removal, then out with the paint brush for the Red Oxide again. I have left some spaces where there needs to be a little bit of welding to be done.

before

tunnel before

inner shock tower

all completed

tunnel painted

inner shock red oxide

front rad panel

There was also the issue of the body filler that was there from a couple of weeks ago too. I still had my Dewalt dual action sander (review here), with me and used that to take it down to flat and almost smooth with the 100grit disc. I left it a little rough on purpose in order to give the paint a good key to stick too. It looks pretty good around the tunnel area now I must say.

Sunday was lazy day as I was having feeling sorry for myself with the hay fever thing – did I mention that? Sympathy vote being looked for here by the way. Seriously I decided to clean the heater controls from the car that blow the hot and cold about the car and demist the screen. The chrome was pretty poor looking and the cables not working very well. I took the whole thing apart and cleaned it while sitting in the garden subjecting myself to more pollen. The lever mechanism was degreased and all the chrome was polished. The only thing there was an issue with was the grub screws that tiny that hold the knobs on the from of the levers that allow you to remove the chrome plate. All were fine except one that was tight and I didn’t want to round the grub screw off. I cleaned the grub out with a needle that allowed the Allen key to fit all the way in and it cracked free. The results are pretty good I must say. I have posted the full walk-through process here or click on the quick link at the bottom.

The before shots of the controller looking worse for 48 years of grime.

After the clean up all looked pretty good.

spring clip to remove the levers if required

before assembly

assembled

all cables in place

Quick Links:

Tools review – Dewalt Randon Orbital Sander D26453 or click here for the hyper link

Photo Menu – Inside the Car – Heater Controller Recondition or click here for the hyper link

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Seeing Red

Every four years my life is made a misery so I am going to drop the “F” word – Football, there I have said it. All around the world people are going mad, they take days off work to watch football, they attach things to their cars like cheap plastic flags or vinyl stickers of their world cup team. People have football match parties, the television is infested with it, newspapers are riddled with it and the radio is full of it. So you may or may not have noticed that I don’t like football, I don’t want to see football, I don’t want to play football and I don’t want anything to do with football. Now I do appreciate that football is a passion, it’s even patriotic and this particular event thankfully only happens every four years. But, for people like me it’s horrendous, I just can’t get away from it, it does my head in. There should be a least a couple of channels on the television that are football free, not on the news, not in adverts, nowhere, nothing, zilch. My Bluray collection is getting a few re-runs that’s all I can say. Like all things, there is a silver lining to this very dark cloud that hangs over me, I can go out when football is on and I can park in a super market that is now occupied mainly by ladies getting away from the football I guess. I get funny looks as if to say, does he know the football is on? The roads are quiet, restaurants are not very busy, but the pubs are full. Before every man threatens to unfollow my blog and the ladies get the hump because I suggest they don’t like it, I just want to say; please spare a thought for the people who don’t like it. However, I wish all your football teams the best of luck. Does the fact that I am a male and I don’t like football make me weird? Come to think of it, don’t answer that!!

It’s Sunday night and I am writing up my blog, what happened to Saturday and today? Saturday I went to Mustang Maniac to do some more work on my car. Their yard has been cleaned up and looks a lot better and that was the general opinion of the few people I was talking to there as well. I can say that my car is starting to progress a little. The welding is still to be done when they get some time. In the mean time Adam told me to I could clean up the panels on one side de-grease them and get some red oxide paint on there. The trick is to stipple it on, the stuff does not want to be painted on and looks odd if you do. I have done a few bits and it looks so much better. The rear right side wheel arch has been half done as we may need to replace the outer arch but we need to get the quarter panel off to check. The painting took me ages to do and was strangely therapeutic! I could even see the red changing colour as it dried. So I really did watch red (well sort of dirty orange in fact) paint dry! Next week I suspect I will do the other side.

Sunday I went to put stuff in the man cave and it was a real mess. As it (football), was on I decided to tidy it up. Now I can get in there and even have more storage space. Well, that is until the wife puts some more gardening stuff in there!

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Fill Her Up

The weekend was back to normal and I left home with thunder, lightening and torrential rain to accompany me on the way down to Mustang Maniac. I was about three miles away when the clouds broke and the sun started to shine. As ever there was people in the office buying stuff and picking up some orders. I decided to leave Adam to it went to see my car again. There she was feeling neglected and that soon changed as I got my overalls on ready for some work. Al was on hand to give me some professional training on filler and how to apply it. The sills needed to be bare metalled as well. Al looked over the welds and mixed up a big wad of filler, he spread over the large area and it looked dead easy. I have applied filler in the past but not on such a large area, so I was going to give it a go. I mixed up a wad and applied it, it wasn’t as neat as Al’s effortless application, the more I tried to make it neat the worse it got. The secret is to apply it and leave it, “don’t be afraid to put some on”. In a way if it looks a little rough it’s not to bad but it just means it takes more rubbing down. As long as the filler is over the low spot then it should be OK. That’s the difference when somebody who is good at what they do let’s somebody else try it. It’s a skill that takes time to master but I will get there.

Al’s applications looked neat and applied in about one minute flat.

My attempts were there but not as smooth and took longer. When it starts to look messy and drag its the filler going off, so it’s best to leave it alone at that point, then apply some more fresh filler if you need to.

The sills had to be bare metalled as well to check for any damage due to the dreaded rust. As the sills were galvanised as standard when new they looked remarkably good. The sills only showed a couple of issues right at the ends of the rear wheel arch, and a small pin hole at the leading edge on one side. Usual story – stripper, rub down with some coarse wire wool and repeat as required which gave some good results. These pics of the sills are before I drilled off the sill clips which hold on the chrome sill covers. Once the heads were drilled off I then punched through the rivets in order to make the rubbing down easier.

before removing the sill clips

The pics here are during and after the paint was removed. Those who are eagle-eyed will spot a ring on the sills in black marker pen. This is to mark up areas that will need a little mig welding work to secure. I went round the car marking up any areas ready for the welding before I miss any bits, again.

first stripper

second stripper

leading edge needs a tiny mig weld.

One of the jobs in prep for the welding was the seat belt anchor points that had broken welds. I was unable to get the bolts undone from inside. When I checked the outside with Al he showed me an eye opener. The lunatic who done some work previously on the exhaust had welded some bolts to the end of the anchor bolts. Why? Simple to hang the exhaust from rather than make proper brackets. This seems to have been common bad practice, but not to the extent to weld another bolt on. Amateurs to put it politely. This meant that there was no way they were going to be undone. So it was down to the last resort angle grinder to cut the welded bolts off. Once they were cut, they undone from the inside no problem and the rotten old seat belts were finally removed.

bolts welded to the end of a thread

old seat belts

I was hoping to get the welding started but quite rightly so it was decided to fill the floor pans now while it was easier before the car was the right way up and have to apply filler upside down as it were. Maybe next week for the welding? It really is worth looking at the before and after pictures so far. I have put a quick link at the bottom for the full story or click here.

Sunday I have finished the chassis cross brace which was a little dented and rusty in a few places. The whole thing has come up very well. Last week I rubbed the old paint of, got rid of the small surface rust that looked worse than it actually was. I then applied the filler and this week I rubbed it down, red oxide primer, and mat black top coat. I may apply a coat of silver at the ends the bar for a little detail. But I will think about that, after all nobody will see it – except me!