August update
Ok, so, I got through all my Saturdays at work. The only time ive had is a few Sundays and a few hours a week after work some days.
I had a little bit left to do to finish off the drivers side rear quarter. I had just tacked in the wheel arch piece last time, well I got it all welded up and cleaned. I wasn't really happy with how it was when I first tacked it, so I cut the top flat piece off and welded a bigger section on. Looks a bit neater now than what it used to look like.
The next piece I done joins the van body to the chassis which had rotted out a bit.
So I cut it all out.
Made a pattern piece.
Cut it out and made a few folds, same thing with other little piece.
All welded in place.
And cleaned up.
So that is now the drivers rear quarter officially finished, hurrah!
After that I had the sudden realisation that "what if I never welded the bottom leg that holds the rear door hinge in the right place." To find out I had to cut the rear brace away. Which I should have done earlier as with the roof being fixed it doesn't need it anymore.
With it cut away it felt like I had so much more room. All those times I was welding inside the van in really awkward position, all those times I got myself in the 'cage' and realising I had forgotten a tool on the bench and had to climb back out, were gone!
I offered the doors up and crossed my fingers.
Great success! I even clamped the rear valance in place for better effect. Now, if you shut one eye and squint with the other it looks a lot like a proper van, wouldn't you agree?. Look, they can even open.
It was actually a good boost to put the doors on. I forgot what it looked like, its been that long. Doing that gave me the determination to get the passengers side rear quarter done. ITs a bit of a pain as its all the panels ive made but in a mirror image. Starting with the leg, this one was just as bad as the drivers side.
I cut the front piece off like I did with the last one and set about saving it.
ta-daa!
The next time I went to the garage I forgot my camera so there's not much in the way of how I done this part, but nothing was missed really. In fact, you could scroll up to where I done the drivers side and hold a mirror up to the monitor and that was the exact same process for the rest of the leg.
I had to tidy up and weld a new section in on the wheel arch section, you can see the bit I cut out just to the right. Then I put my brave face on and welded the other leg in place with lots of careful measuring and tacking.
Little top piece made up to finish it off.
And a quick hit with the grinder.
Whilst I had the wire brush wheel in the grinder I thought id just double check that what I perceived to be nice solid metal was actually nice solid metal along the passengers side. That would save me a lot of hassle.
bugger. Ah well, ive stopped expecting an easy job with any of this now.
I decided to put the doors back on again and have another check now that both legs were welded on.
I think I managed to do pretty well.
Check those door gaps, obviously there's adjustment in the hinges and the door rubbers aren't on yet.
I also done a little experiment. If you remember a while back I was trying to figure out how to put some tension back in the long side panel. I got a spare length of 25 x 8 flat bar and tacked it on along the inside every 80mm or so.
It worked pretty well. I sprayed a light coat of primer onto he side then used a piece or flat perspex , about 500mm long and attached some sandpaper on it and went along the panel to get a gauge of the low spots. Not too bad, still a bit of tapping to get it better but nothing a light skim of filler wont fix.
That's all for this time, I have my wedding coming up in 4 weeks so wish me luck everyone, cheers.
