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 engine out) and the bits where the axle stands are. Still, seeing as how none of those areas have any underseal, it shouldn’t take long to do them when the time comes.
Once I’d finished all that, I was a bit stuck for something to do – I can’t do much more on the underside until I can get hold of some paintstripper and a tarp, that’ll be a job to get started on next weekend. A few weeks (months? Time passes quickly!) ago, I mentioned that I was worried about the windscreen surround. So I pulled off the screen base finisher to see what was underneath – it turns out I was right to be worried:
Seriously rusty! 🙁
The pictures don’t show it too well, but the top inch or so below the screen has rotted right through along about half the length of the panel. This is going to hurt! And as far as I can see, the panel is now unavailable, and I can’t see any repair panels for it either.
This is going to seriously test my (as yet nonexistant) welding skills I think, but at least I don’t have to worry about it just yet – I’ve got to finish off the rear before I even look at that again.