It’s been almost a year now since my last blog on here. Oops! I’ve not given up though, and I haven’t been completely idle (although work has been a bit slow, other projects and hobbies have been taking up my time), it’s been more of a case of the work being fairly slow and fiddly, […]
As promised, I was down at the garage tonight after work (gotta love these long evenings), and took a few pics of the sill: It’s a mess alright! I figure maybe four new panels to make up and weld in, then make good all the rest, plus the new sill panel I’ll need to buy.
Now I feel ready to get started on the welding, I’ve started hacking the rusty old metal out – So far I’ve got the wheelarch holes cut out, filed down and ready to get started this weekend. I’m starting on the easy stuff, the big (and little) holes in the middle of the panels, I
Now I’ve got all the welding gear together, I thought it was time to get on and have a go. So last weekend, I took everything down to the garage, including some scrap metal (an old computer case I’d liberated from work) plugged everything in, and hoped. I should point out at this stage that
….it’s been a while. In my defence, I’ve been extremely busy of late, what with one thing and another – and what with the cold weather and dark evenings, I just haven’t had any time to devote to the car. However, I’m back on the case now, and ready to get started again. The last
I did a whole load more stripping this weekend: It’s surprising how much surface rust there was hiding underneath the paintwork – or maybe not, it is a Speke car after all! Either way, it looks like I caught it just in time. It’s all surface rust, with none of it looking in any danger
Got the paint stripping started today. 🙂 I’m using nitromors at the moment, for no better reason than I had some sitting on a shelf. Start: During: Finish: Check out the rust on top of the wheelarch! It’s just surface rust though, nothing serious – apart from the seatbelt mount. I’ll weld a new plate
Now I’m mobile again, I got back to the ‘7 today. I’ve now got all the underseal off completely, and the underside is now ready for stripping and painting. Finally! The only bits I haven’t done yet are the gearbox tunnel (gearbox is still in the way; I’ll sort that out once I’ve pulled the
I was just on my way to work on the TR last sunday in my Astra, I pulled up to a junction, and the engine died. Uh oh. When I tried to restart it, I got a strange whirring noise from the starter – I’ve heard that before. A quick check and sure enough, the
I’ve just spent a few hours over the last two days getting rid of the last of the underseal from the back end of the car. What a disgusting job! I’ve been thinning it out using white spirits, which is pretty effective, but turns it into a sticky, tar-like goop. It got in my hair,
