I made a post about a month ago about i got my Thames ( http://www.rv.net/forum/index.cfm/fuseaction/thread/tid/24150005.cfm ). Since then ive made a start stripping it out and assessing all the******i have to do to get it back to life.
I figured out how the 'dining table' was set up
and how the seats fold out into 'beds'
This is the first weekend we went to the garage and the magic started.
My girlfriend has taken an unusual interest in helping me to restore the van. I think its great as if i was in the garage myself it could get a bit boring but its a good laugh having her around and helping me out. Its ok right now at the stripping down stage but i think she may get bored when I'm welding and cutting **** up. I was thinking i could buy her a sewing machine and she could re-upholster the seats and curtains etc..
Yeah, check out those comfy ugly slacks I'm rocking.
I got Jana started on removing the light lenses and units etc.. she even managed to get the rear bumpers off herself. I don't mean to sound patronizing but when someone calls a ratchet the "clicky-thing" its quite a big step for her.
I even bought her a special tool kit for the job, shes since bought herself a proper tool bag and pliers set.
First door removed. It was a ***** as the hinge bolts were rusted solid, lucky for me there is a huge tool store opposite the garage (machine mart) so i managed to get an impact screwdriver.
All the seats and interior came out easy, the gas cooker was a bit of a joke really, The cage that held the gas bottle underneath the floor was about 8 inches from the ground and about an inch from the propshaft, then the gas pipe went to the cooker where someone had used a T-piece for some reason, with one pipe going to the hob and the other pipe was bent round a few times to stop gas leaking.... i don't know why the never just used a single pipe. There was a lot of cork insulation which i think had been stuck on with tar. Oh what fun i had with a scraper. Jana 'helped', but well, she got bored of it a lot quicker than i did.
Handsome eh,
Then i got stuck into the wiring loom, there was a lot of house-hold wire in one colour for switches and lights all over the place. I know I'm going to be re-doing the interior lighting differently so those got binned and i kept the standard loom. Note the intensity of my concentration.
The next weekend we started on taking the pop-up roof off. The fabric of the roof its self isn't too bad. There is a rip in it but its along the seam so once stitched up it will be ok. It was held down with aluminium strips and brackets.
WEST SIDE Y'ALL
peek-a-boo
Starting to get quite bare now, in total we found 3 dead birds in the van, 2 of which were skeletons and the other was quite fresh looking underneath the radiator intake, perhaps from the drive home on the trailer, oops.
We got the other door off and then i set about the lower panels, there pretty easy to come off as there all bolt on panels, something Ford promoted as a key selling point apparently.
The right lower panel its self was not bad, just a bit of surface rust and a few dings. Even behind the panel it was not bad. You can see the battery tray is pretty much gone but thats not really a problem at all, its just a welded up box. Although a lot of rust came flaking off as you can see.
The back of the wheel well is the worst, good thing is a lot of the panels to replace are just flat sheet with bends in it.
The other side was a bit harder to take off as it had spot welds along the side door opening but it came off none the less.
During all this a few bolts were completely seized and i had to grind them off, sending sparks flying. I finally thought id be a lot safer doing all this **** with the petrol tank out. Only problem was the bolts underneath had seized and the only access was to rip the floor out and take them off from the top.
So out the floor it went. The guy that rents the other side of the garage popped down and gave me a hand. The floor was inch thick plywood and all the coachscrews holding it down were, as you could guess, seized. We came up with a plan of him using a big lever and me drilling lots of holes around the coachscrews. You can see the petrol tank is quite small for something to go travelling with, may need to find something bigger. Once i disconnected the tank i poured the petrol away and it was pure orange, like irn-bru. Must have been laying in the tank for years.
The weekend after my brother came along instead of Jana as i wanted to get the engine/gearbox and the rest of the glass out. We even managed to get the rest of the doors off.
Glass out
Checking out how to remove the engine. We disconnected the gearbox first and tied rope around the engine to lift it straight up.
My garage buddys engine crane came in handy.
CHEEESE!!
A full 53bhp or so of pure antique metal
This is the hole that has been left from taking the motor out, The plan is to replace it with a 3 litre Cologne/Essex V6, i know it fits as ive seen the set up before in a Thames van. I'm going to go for an automatic box too as i just want it as a cruiser and i hope to keep the column change and rig it up to the autobox.
Thats as far as ive gotten with the van. I'm pretty much at the stage where i need to take the suspension, steering and rear axle off but before i do that i need to make up a way of supporting the van off the ground. I was looking at building a rotisserie but i came up with a slightly different idea. I'm going to build 2 huge dodecagons that split into 2 pieces. That way i can roll it on its side and sandblast/repair underneath then roll it back, unbolt the top half of the dodecagons and work on the roof etc..
Only thing is its going to cost about ยฃ180 in material so i need to do a few homers to make up the money for that. I also just put down a deposit to rent a new house with Jana so money is quite tight. Next update will probably be in a few more weeks.
I figured out how the 'dining table' was set up
and how the seats fold out into 'beds'
This is the first weekend we went to the garage and the magic started.
My girlfriend has taken an unusual interest in helping me to restore the van. I think its great as if i was in the garage myself it could get a bit boring but its a good laugh having her around and helping me out. Its ok right now at the stripping down stage but i think she may get bored when I'm welding and cutting **** up. I was thinking i could buy her a sewing machine and she could re-upholster the seats and curtains etc..
Yeah, check out those comfy ugly slacks I'm rocking.
I got Jana started on removing the light lenses and units etc.. she even managed to get the rear bumpers off herself. I don't mean to sound patronizing but when someone calls a ratchet the "clicky-thing" its quite a big step for her.
I even bought her a special tool kit for the job, shes since bought herself a proper tool bag and pliers set.
First door removed. It was a ***** as the hinge bolts were rusted solid, lucky for me there is a huge tool store opposite the garage (machine mart) so i managed to get an impact screwdriver.
All the seats and interior came out easy, the gas cooker was a bit of a joke really, The cage that held the gas bottle underneath the floor was about 8 inches from the ground and about an inch from the propshaft, then the gas pipe went to the cooker where someone had used a T-piece for some reason, with one pipe going to the hob and the other pipe was bent round a few times to stop gas leaking.... i don't know why the never just used a single pipe. There was a lot of cork insulation which i think had been stuck on with tar. Oh what fun i had with a scraper. Jana 'helped', but well, she got bored of it a lot quicker than i did.
Handsome eh,
Then i got stuck into the wiring loom, there was a lot of house-hold wire in one colour for switches and lights all over the place. I know I'm going to be re-doing the interior lighting differently so those got binned and i kept the standard loom. Note the intensity of my concentration.
The next weekend we started on taking the pop-up roof off. The fabric of the roof its self isn't too bad. There is a rip in it but its along the seam so once stitched up it will be ok. It was held down with aluminium strips and brackets.
WEST SIDE Y'ALL
peek-a-boo
Starting to get quite bare now, in total we found 3 dead birds in the van, 2 of which were skeletons and the other was quite fresh looking underneath the radiator intake, perhaps from the drive home on the trailer, oops.
We got the other door off and then i set about the lower panels, there pretty easy to come off as there all bolt on panels, something Ford promoted as a key selling point apparently.
The right lower panel its self was not bad, just a bit of surface rust and a few dings. Even behind the panel it was not bad. You can see the battery tray is pretty much gone but thats not really a problem at all, its just a welded up box. Although a lot of rust came flaking off as you can see.
The back of the wheel well is the worst, good thing is a lot of the panels to replace are just flat sheet with bends in it.
The other side was a bit harder to take off as it had spot welds along the side door opening but it came off none the less.
During all this a few bolts were completely seized and i had to grind them off, sending sparks flying. I finally thought id be a lot safer doing all this **** with the petrol tank out. Only problem was the bolts underneath had seized and the only access was to rip the floor out and take them off from the top.
So out the floor it went. The guy that rents the other side of the garage popped down and gave me a hand. The floor was inch thick plywood and all the coachscrews holding it down were, as you could guess, seized. We came up with a plan of him using a big lever and me drilling lots of holes around the coachscrews. You can see the petrol tank is quite small for something to go travelling with, may need to find something bigger. Once i disconnected the tank i poured the petrol away and it was pure orange, like irn-bru. Must have been laying in the tank for years.
The weekend after my brother came along instead of Jana as i wanted to get the engine/gearbox and the rest of the glass out. We even managed to get the rest of the doors off.
Glass out
Checking out how to remove the engine. We disconnected the gearbox first and tied rope around the engine to lift it straight up.
My garage buddys engine crane came in handy.
CHEEESE!!
A full 53bhp or so of pure antique metal
This is the hole that has been left from taking the motor out, The plan is to replace it with a 3 litre Cologne/Essex V6, i know it fits as ive seen the set up before in a Thames van. I'm going to go for an automatic box too as i just want it as a cruiser and i hope to keep the column change and rig it up to the autobox.
Thats as far as ive gotten with the van. I'm pretty much at the stage where i need to take the suspension, steering and rear axle off but before i do that i need to make up a way of supporting the van off the ground. I was looking at building a rotisserie but i came up with a slightly different idea. I'm going to build 2 huge dodecagons that split into 2 pieces. That way i can roll it on its side and sandblast/repair underneath then roll it back, unbolt the top half of the dodecagons and work on the roof etc..
Only thing is its going to cost about ยฃ180 in material so i need to do a few homers to make up the money for that. I also just put down a deposit to rent a new house with Jana so money is quite tight. Next update will probably be in a few more weeks.
November update
Whew, its been a couple of months since I last updated. Trying to save some money for a new car so not a lot has been happening to the van. Whilst I was looking for extra work I got a little bit more of the door done.
Starting of with this.
I laid the door on a work bench that I had placed 2 bags of sand on to support the panel. Little bit of a closer up shot.
And on the inside.
I had thought about re-skinning the whole lower half of the door but settled on patching the bad bits instead. So I cut out the corner to gain access inside.
Then the other side.
Which let me see the strengthening piece inside the door which also needs replaced. Best to do this first. I used a bit of guesswork to imagine how the panel would have originally looked and made up a template.
Cut it out.
Few folds and shaping.
Then attached it to the old piece that was save-able.
I flipped it over and coiled up a strip of sheet to make a spacer for when the door hinges bolt back on.
New tabs welded in place to hold the hinge plate in with a bit of adjustment. I then welded that piece back on to the door.
The next piece was the inside door panel. Its a bit of an awkward panel and took me a while to figure a way to do it. I made up the flat pieces first then tapped the edge over a round former to give me a nice radius to match the original door.
I drilled a few holes so I could attach this panel to the previous inner repair piece and tacked it to the door.
Then the next piece was templated and cut out. I forgot to mention, the reason its so awkward to do is this part of the door is a compound curve, so it curves in both axis, like a sphere.
Drilled 3 holes for the hinge bolts and tacked it on.
The door now had enough strength in it to bolt back on to make sure the hinge would be in the right place.
Which it did, yippee. So, door back off and finish off the corner. Before I put the last piece in I had extended the inner panel inside and spot welded it to the bottom of the door for extra rigidity. Welded it all up.
Then the door went back on again ( I think I put it on and off about 50 times over the whole time of repairing it) so I could template for the outer door skin. I used some thin cardboard to make the template and some corrugated to mark the curve off the panel in both plains.
This was a bit tricky to do, I used the same technique as I used for dishing out the rear panel. I pretty much used a sandbag and a round headed hammer to knock a bit of shape into it then bent it over my knee, tubing etc.. Anything round to try and stretch a light compound curve into it. After a lot of dicking about I had it tacked in then welded and cleaned up.
Now all I need to do is the rear of the door, which can wait, because....
Shortly after that I got an email from a guy in the pre67 club. He was asking if I could copy a set of ramps he had found on the Internet for a cheaper price. The ramps he was talking about are made by www.restorationramps.co.uk and they look like this.
I managed to get their measurements from the website, each ramp is 16" wide, 12 foot long and 26" tall. They didn't look very difficult to make, just time consuming so I agreed. I'd rather make these than gates and railings.
I started by getting all the metal I would need and cut them all to the right size.
Then making up the front box sections first. These also unbolt from the angled apart for ease of storage.
I drew on the floor how much of an angle I would need, then placed them on a chair to visualize it standing up.
Then I made up the other side.
Once I had completed the angled section I used that as my template to make another.
The next part was to cut 98 bits of angle for the treads. Very time consuming when I only have a chop-saw.
Halfway through my Mig welder decided it had had enough and conked out. My mig has been pretty good so far for the thinner sheet work I've been doing but I think something was up with it as thicker stuff just bamboozled it. I decided to splash out on a nice new Mig so I ordered a R-Tech mig180. I have been impressed by their Tig/Arc that I bought a few years ago so I had no qualms in ordering a Mig from them.
Whilst I was waiting on it I used my Arc to weld one of the ramps up. I also made up 4 posts to support the rear when its in the level position and a brace that acts as an adjustable jacking beam.
Once I got my new welder I finished the welding off, cleaned them up and gave them a coat of primer.
Then the next stage was to test them out. The restoration ramps say theirs can hold 2000Kg so I tried it with my 1900Kg Lexus. I was a bit nervous as there was no one else in he garage to guide me so I was being very cautious, I did record it on my tablet just in case something happened and I could send it to "you've been framed" to make some money out of it. Fortunately it went well.
The guy who got them was really happy and said they will be used to help restore his mk2 Zodiac, so we were both happy.
It had been about 6 weeks since I had done anything tot he van, I really want to get on with the engine swap so I had been looking on Ebay pretty much every day for a LS400 with LPG. I missed out on a couple and was thinking about something else when about 2 weeks ago I saw a nice, honest looking 1999 LS400, 105,000 miles, wee bit tatty bodywork but most importantly, it had LPG. The bad thing was its 300 miles away from me in Birmingham. Not something I could just pop over and have a look at. I contacted the seller and asked a few questions and I was pretty set on it. It was a bit over my budget but would be worth it on fuel savings alone. I asked one of my relatives if I could borrow a bit of cash off them and they agreed, so, I had the money. Now the gamble was how honest the seller had been.
Which brings me up to yesterday morning at 5:20am . I bought a plane ticket from Edinburgh to Birmingham, then 2 train tickets and the seller met me in the Lexus at the train station car park around 10:30am. We took it for a test drive and I checked everything over. I was really happy with it, it does have a few dings but over all its a great car. I bought it from the guy and drove the 300miles back home. Using LPG and sitting just slightly over the legal speed limit ๐ on the motorway it cost me ยฃ45. Compared to my original Lexus that would probably have cost me atleast ยฃ100
The drive was ok, there's a slight wobble in the steering between 50-65 mph which I'm hoping is just the wheels needing balanced and the tracking done. It needs a good clean, inside and out. New drivers side indicator lens and a good service for the engine and LPG. It has a service history upto the previous owner, fortunately he only put 10,000 miles on it as he has never had the engine oil changed since he bough it 2 1/2 years ago.
Older and younger brother, 5 years apart.
I can now plan the engine swap. I'm going to have to wait another month I think. I cant take any holidays from work right now as winter is our busiest time of the year but were going to be closed over Christmas so I may ask for an extra week at the same time. Atleast it gives me a few weeks to plan it out and maybe get the rest of the drivers door finished.
Whew, its been a couple of months since I last updated. Trying to save some money for a new car so not a lot has been happening to the van. Whilst I was looking for extra work I got a little bit more of the door done.
Starting of with this.
I laid the door on a work bench that I had placed 2 bags of sand on to support the panel. Little bit of a closer up shot.
And on the inside.
I had thought about re-skinning the whole lower half of the door but settled on patching the bad bits instead. So I cut out the corner to gain access inside.
Then the other side.
Which let me see the strengthening piece inside the door which also needs replaced. Best to do this first. I used a bit of guesswork to imagine how the panel would have originally looked and made up a template.
Cut it out.
Few folds and shaping.
Then attached it to the old piece that was save-able.
I flipped it over and coiled up a strip of sheet to make a spacer for when the door hinges bolt back on.
New tabs welded in place to hold the hinge plate in with a bit of adjustment. I then welded that piece back on to the door.
The next piece was the inside door panel. Its a bit of an awkward panel and took me a while to figure a way to do it. I made up the flat pieces first then tapped the edge over a round former to give me a nice radius to match the original door.
I drilled a few holes so I could attach this panel to the previous inner repair piece and tacked it to the door.
Then the next piece was templated and cut out. I forgot to mention, the reason its so awkward to do is this part of the door is a compound curve, so it curves in both axis, like a sphere.
Drilled 3 holes for the hinge bolts and tacked it on.
The door now had enough strength in it to bolt back on to make sure the hinge would be in the right place.
Which it did, yippee. So, door back off and finish off the corner. Before I put the last piece in I had extended the inner panel inside and spot welded it to the bottom of the door for extra rigidity. Welded it all up.
Then the door went back on again ( I think I put it on and off about 50 times over the whole time of repairing it) so I could template for the outer door skin. I used some thin cardboard to make the template and some corrugated to mark the curve off the panel in both plains.
This was a bit tricky to do, I used the same technique as I used for dishing out the rear panel. I pretty much used a sandbag and a round headed hammer to knock a bit of shape into it then bent it over my knee, tubing etc.. Anything round to try and stretch a light compound curve into it. After a lot of dicking about I had it tacked in then welded and cleaned up.
Now all I need to do is the rear of the door, which can wait, because....
Shortly after that I got an email from a guy in the pre67 club. He was asking if I could copy a set of ramps he had found on the Internet for a cheaper price. The ramps he was talking about are made by www.restorationramps.co.uk and they look like this.
I managed to get their measurements from the website, each ramp is 16" wide, 12 foot long and 26" tall. They didn't look very difficult to make, just time consuming so I agreed. I'd rather make these than gates and railings.
I started by getting all the metal I would need and cut them all to the right size.
Then making up the front box sections first. These also unbolt from the angled apart for ease of storage.
I drew on the floor how much of an angle I would need, then placed them on a chair to visualize it standing up.
Then I made up the other side.
Once I had completed the angled section I used that as my template to make another.
The next part was to cut 98 bits of angle for the treads. Very time consuming when I only have a chop-saw.
Halfway through my Mig welder decided it had had enough and conked out. My mig has been pretty good so far for the thinner sheet work I've been doing but I think something was up with it as thicker stuff just bamboozled it. I decided to splash out on a nice new Mig so I ordered a R-Tech mig180. I have been impressed by their Tig/Arc that I bought a few years ago so I had no qualms in ordering a Mig from them.
Whilst I was waiting on it I used my Arc to weld one of the ramps up. I also made up 4 posts to support the rear when its in the level position and a brace that acts as an adjustable jacking beam.
Once I got my new welder I finished the welding off, cleaned them up and gave them a coat of primer.
Then the next stage was to test them out. The restoration ramps say theirs can hold 2000Kg so I tried it with my 1900Kg Lexus. I was a bit nervous as there was no one else in he garage to guide me so I was being very cautious, I did record it on my tablet just in case something happened and I could send it to "you've been framed" to make some money out of it. Fortunately it went well.
The guy who got them was really happy and said they will be used to help restore his mk2 Zodiac, so we were both happy.
It had been about 6 weeks since I had done anything tot he van, I really want to get on with the engine swap so I had been looking on Ebay pretty much every day for a LS400 with LPG. I missed out on a couple and was thinking about something else when about 2 weeks ago I saw a nice, honest looking 1999 LS400, 105,000 miles, wee bit tatty bodywork but most importantly, it had LPG. The bad thing was its 300 miles away from me in Birmingham. Not something I could just pop over and have a look at. I contacted the seller and asked a few questions and I was pretty set on it. It was a bit over my budget but would be worth it on fuel savings alone. I asked one of my relatives if I could borrow a bit of cash off them and they agreed, so, I had the money. Now the gamble was how honest the seller had been.
Which brings me up to yesterday morning at 5:20am . I bought a plane ticket from Edinburgh to Birmingham, then 2 train tickets and the seller met me in the Lexus at the train station car park around 10:30am. We took it for a test drive and I checked everything over. I was really happy with it, it does have a few dings but over all its a great car. I bought it from the guy and drove the 300miles back home. Using LPG and sitting just slightly over the legal speed limit ๐ on the motorway it cost me ยฃ45. Compared to my original Lexus that would probably have cost me atleast ยฃ100
The drive was ok, there's a slight wobble in the steering between 50-65 mph which I'm hoping is just the wheels needing balanced and the tracking done. It needs a good clean, inside and out. New drivers side indicator lens and a good service for the engine and LPG. It has a service history upto the previous owner, fortunately he only put 10,000 miles on it as he has never had the engine oil changed since he bough it 2 1/2 years ago.
Older and younger brother, 5 years apart.
I can now plan the engine swap. I'm going to have to wait another month I think. I cant take any holidays from work right now as winter is our busiest time of the year but were going to be closed over Christmas so I may ask for an extra week at the same time. Atleast it gives me a few weeks to plan it out and maybe get the rest of the drivers door finished.
September update
I got an email shortly after my last update saying the wheel studs i ordered were out of stock and wouldn't be in for a few weeks. This was about 4 days after i placed my order on eBay, uuugh, why sell something you don't actually have. Anyway, I thought before ordering of the net again I'd see if there was anywhere local i could get them. I found the trailer company "indespension" sold the ones i needed at the correct length. Went to my local depot and got a set. Nice one.
So with the new wheels studs in hand i set about pressing them in. I done a stupid thing and thought i could use the vice to press them in. Turns out they say not to use a vice as a press for a reason. I managed to break the vice. Its not even my vice, its the guy i share the garage with so i had to give him some money to replace it, thats me down another ยฃ60, bugger. I was going to wait and use my dads press at home but i looked at my hydraulic pipe bender and figured out a way to use that to press the studs in. Then bolted the wheel on. I set up a stand next to the wheel and spun it to make sure it was true, which it was, bonus!.
Good to see the van on the same wheels all round.
The wheels are centralized by the wheel studs but i will be getting some spigot rings machined up for the road to take the strain off the nuts later.
I wanted to get the watts linkage setup finished for the Scottish ford day show. I added some bags of sand to act as ballast to the back off the van. Somewhere close to what the weight will be when finished to get the parallel bars level. The axle already has the watts linkage bracket on the back. I decided to use the scimitar linkage bars aswell. I leveled the bars and took some measurements. Then i drew up and cut out some plates.
I wanted the brackets to look similar to the 4 link brackets so i took a few design cues from them. I then tacked it all up.
Then welded and cleaned.
I went back under the van and tacked them into place and connected the linkage bars up.
Looks good, i jumped up and down on the van and swayed it side to side. Axle stays in place and the bars move as expected, yey.
The next weekend was the big Ford day show. I was happy with the progress i had made for the show. I had a bit of planning to do before the show though. My dad managed to get a loan of the trailer again from his friend. Which meant i had to sort out the wiring for the towbar. I really should have done it earlier but ive been so busy. I done it on the Saturday morning and couldn't really test it before i left. everything worked with the multimeter but i couldn't do a proper test with a light board, oh well, fingers crossed.
In the afternoon, my dad, brother and I went on a little trip to collect the trailer. The guy that owns the trailer has his own haulage company and he showed us all around his toys. He is into pre war Humbers, he even owns one from 1908. I think he had about 10-12 classics in total. Anyway, we got the trailed hitched up, tested the lights, they worked! and went on our merry way. Took a little bit of extra care driving back with the trailer to the garage and prepared the Thames.
First time it has been wheeled outside in 3 years!
Testing the suspension ๐ .
Then loaded up.
From there we drove to my brothers to put it on his drive for the night. Having the Lexus compared to the Punto as a tow vehicle was a completely different experience. I felt a lot more in control, especially when braking. I always felt like the trailer was pushing the Punto when braking.
On Sunday we got up early, went to my brothers then headed to the show. Nice drive up there but the wind was staring to pick up. Once there we got the van unloaded.
Pushing it into place.
Ta-daa!, i even brought my nephews trike as he was coming along aswell.
It was good meeting and chatting with the other guys there. The van got a few looks as-well. I had brought a big bucket of the old rusty pieces i had cut off but forgot to take them out the boot, doh. Later on my nephews turned up. Broden got a quick shot of the van.
And Ruaridh had fun on the trike, i also had fun on the trike.
There was a lot of cool looking cars there, heres a few of my favourite.
The wind started picking up in thew afternoon and knowing i had to take the van back to the garage then return the tailer we left around 3:30-4pm. I had a really enjoyable day with the van and my family.
Ok, so now that the axle is all tacked into place (not fully welding until the engine is in, just incase) I can begin on the engine swap. Unfortunately, i need to wait until i can buy another second hand car. So, whilst im saving up for that im going to keep myself busy with the doors and side skirts.
I went back to the garage yesterday and looked over the front doors. The passenger side i worse than the drivers so I'll start with the drivers and that will give me a good one to copy for the passengers.
Some of the worst areas.
I stripped all the paint off so i wouldn't get any more surprises later.
A nice easy bit to get me back into the swing of metalwork. This is the top hinge area a wee bit rusted out.
Patched and tacked.
Then tidied up.
Little area around the window frame.
The rear edge of the window frame was a bit worse. The channel was rusted out but i could also see the door itself was rusted underneath.
I knew i was going to cut the frame away so i braced it before hand to keep it in place.
Then i cut out the frame section.
Then the door section.
Using a bit of guesswork and measuring i fabbed up a repair section.
Tacked/welded it in.
The frame section has 5 folds in it to make up the profile. 3 of which are turned over into them selfs. A bit too tricky to make in one go so i done it in 2 sections. First is the outside section.
Then the inner.
I forgot to take a pic of it afterwards, oops. The only bits left to do to the door is the bottom edge. It is a bit deteriorated so i wanted to get the door on the van so i can visualize and draw a template for it. I also wanted to check the door gaps as i haven't fitted the door since doing the guttering or whole A-post.
Not bad, atleast it fits snugly.
Now i can measure up for the lower part. Looks like i wont need to be re-skinning a lot, mostly build up door edge and patch the skin.
I really enjoyed today. I like the mechanical stuff but i found myself really enjoying the metalwork again. Im going to keep going with the doors and sideskirts until i get another car. Then take a week off work and get the engine out the Lexus.
I got an email shortly after my last update saying the wheel studs i ordered were out of stock and wouldn't be in for a few weeks. This was about 4 days after i placed my order on eBay, uuugh, why sell something you don't actually have. Anyway, I thought before ordering of the net again I'd see if there was anywhere local i could get them. I found the trailer company "indespension" sold the ones i needed at the correct length. Went to my local depot and got a set. Nice one.
So with the new wheels studs in hand i set about pressing them in. I done a stupid thing and thought i could use the vice to press them in. Turns out they say not to use a vice as a press for a reason. I managed to break the vice. Its not even my vice, its the guy i share the garage with so i had to give him some money to replace it, thats me down another ยฃ60, bugger. I was going to wait and use my dads press at home but i looked at my hydraulic pipe bender and figured out a way to use that to press the studs in. Then bolted the wheel on. I set up a stand next to the wheel and spun it to make sure it was true, which it was, bonus!.
Good to see the van on the same wheels all round.
The wheels are centralized by the wheel studs but i will be getting some spigot rings machined up for the road to take the strain off the nuts later.
I wanted to get the watts linkage setup finished for the Scottish ford day show. I added some bags of sand to act as ballast to the back off the van. Somewhere close to what the weight will be when finished to get the parallel bars level. The axle already has the watts linkage bracket on the back. I decided to use the scimitar linkage bars aswell. I leveled the bars and took some measurements. Then i drew up and cut out some plates.
I wanted the brackets to look similar to the 4 link brackets so i took a few design cues from them. I then tacked it all up.
Then welded and cleaned.
I went back under the van and tacked them into place and connected the linkage bars up.
Looks good, i jumped up and down on the van and swayed it side to side. Axle stays in place and the bars move as expected, yey.
The next weekend was the big Ford day show. I was happy with the progress i had made for the show. I had a bit of planning to do before the show though. My dad managed to get a loan of the trailer again from his friend. Which meant i had to sort out the wiring for the towbar. I really should have done it earlier but ive been so busy. I done it on the Saturday morning and couldn't really test it before i left. everything worked with the multimeter but i couldn't do a proper test with a light board, oh well, fingers crossed.
In the afternoon, my dad, brother and I went on a little trip to collect the trailer. The guy that owns the trailer has his own haulage company and he showed us all around his toys. He is into pre war Humbers, he even owns one from 1908. I think he had about 10-12 classics in total. Anyway, we got the trailed hitched up, tested the lights, they worked! and went on our merry way. Took a little bit of extra care driving back with the trailer to the garage and prepared the Thames.
First time it has been wheeled outside in 3 years!
Testing the suspension ๐ .
Then loaded up.
From there we drove to my brothers to put it on his drive for the night. Having the Lexus compared to the Punto as a tow vehicle was a completely different experience. I felt a lot more in control, especially when braking. I always felt like the trailer was pushing the Punto when braking.
On Sunday we got up early, went to my brothers then headed to the show. Nice drive up there but the wind was staring to pick up. Once there we got the van unloaded.
Pushing it into place.
Ta-daa!, i even brought my nephews trike as he was coming along aswell.
It was good meeting and chatting with the other guys there. The van got a few looks as-well. I had brought a big bucket of the old rusty pieces i had cut off but forgot to take them out the boot, doh. Later on my nephews turned up. Broden got a quick shot of the van.
And Ruaridh had fun on the trike, i also had fun on the trike.
There was a lot of cool looking cars there, heres a few of my favourite.
The wind started picking up in thew afternoon and knowing i had to take the van back to the garage then return the tailer we left around 3:30-4pm. I had a really enjoyable day with the van and my family.
Ok, so now that the axle is all tacked into place (not fully welding until the engine is in, just incase) I can begin on the engine swap. Unfortunately, i need to wait until i can buy another second hand car. So, whilst im saving up for that im going to keep myself busy with the doors and side skirts.
I went back to the garage yesterday and looked over the front doors. The passenger side i worse than the drivers so I'll start with the drivers and that will give me a good one to copy for the passengers.
Some of the worst areas.
I stripped all the paint off so i wouldn't get any more surprises later.
A nice easy bit to get me back into the swing of metalwork. This is the top hinge area a wee bit rusted out.
Patched and tacked.
Then tidied up.
Little area around the window frame.
The rear edge of the window frame was a bit worse. The channel was rusted out but i could also see the door itself was rusted underneath.
I knew i was going to cut the frame away so i braced it before hand to keep it in place.
Then i cut out the frame section.
Then the door section.
Using a bit of guesswork and measuring i fabbed up a repair section.
Tacked/welded it in.
The frame section has 5 folds in it to make up the profile. 3 of which are turned over into them selfs. A bit too tricky to make in one go so i done it in 2 sections. First is the outside section.
Then the inner.
I forgot to take a pic of it afterwards, oops. The only bits left to do to the door is the bottom edge. It is a bit deteriorated so i wanted to get the door on the van so i can visualize and draw a template for it. I also wanted to check the door gaps as i haven't fitted the door since doing the guttering or whole A-post.
Not bad, atleast it fits snugly.
Now i can measure up for the lower part. Looks like i wont need to be re-skinning a lot, mostly build up door edge and patch the skin.
I really enjoyed today. I like the mechanical stuff but i found myself really enjoying the metalwork again. Im going to keep going with the doors and sideskirts until i get another car. Then take a week off work and get the engine out the Lexus.
August 2013
About 80 photos for this huge update so it may take a bit of time to load, sorry.
First of, I want to say thankyou to everyone that bought the book. It has helped me out a lot with this update as it paid for the metal and other bits and bobs and has kept everything up to date, really appreciate it.
I done a lot of research on setting up a vehicle to take 4 link suspension. I needed to get my finished ride height sorted. To do that I had to work out roughly how much weight to add and where. The engine will be sitting over the front axle and checking Google I found out the 1uz-fe weighs around 220kg , add a portly driver at 85 kg and a passenger of the same weight. That brings it upto 390kg, the rest of the weight I wasn't sure about so I bought 18 bags of sand weighing 25kg each, giving me a total of 450kg. I laid these bags over the front half of the van which lowered the front by about an inch and a half. I then raised the rear of the body up to just over level and welded the rear lower dodecagon to the improvised level floor to stop it from moving.
Giving me my ride height.
I had a little bit of spare time on my hands so I took a few quick measurements as it was and mocked up how I would like the brackets to look.
The next time I went down to the garage I decided to get the axle in the exact location. I must have spent about 6-8 hours measuring and double measuring, then triple measuring to make sure the axle wasn't skewed and in the place I wanted it to be. Using my axle stands with shims to get the right height and measuring down from where the old bumps stops were I got the wheelbase sorted. Then measuring from the wheel hubs to the chassis rails got it centered.
I used the vans screw jack to get the pinion angle at 2ยฐ ( with a 4 link for street you want the axle rotated between 1-3ยฐ). Really I should have the engine in first to make sure 2ยฐ is suitable so my plan is to just have really strong tack welds on the axle brackets until I have the engine in, just incase I need to adjust it.
When I was happy with where it should be I welded in a couple bit of box between the chassis and axle to make sure it never moved.
Then it was time to take real measurements for the brackets. I got my notebook out and started scribbling like a maniac. Coming up with a slightly different design from my mock-up.
Then when I was settled with my sketches I drew up the plans.
I bought a length of xx and 50x6 to make up the brackets. I know the thickness is maybe a bit overkill but I don't want these brackets to move at all, plus chunky looks cool. I scribed my plan onto the 100x6 then cut out with the plasma cutter. I cleaned the edges up individually then tacked all 4 plates together, drilled out the holes and then went over them again with the grinder so they were all the same size and shape.
Using the 50x6 I joined it all together. The good thing with how I worked it out was that I'd get a really good strong fillet weld when welding.
To give me a little bit more clearance for the upper arm I used 3mm flat bar here.
Then the front of the bracket got its bracer.
Lather, rinse and repeat.
One thing I couldn't do was the shock mount. I got my local engineer shop to make me up 2 47x30x80 blocks with a 13mm hole down the centre.
Then tacked them to the brackets.
Next came the chassis mounts, bit of scribing.
To make sure I made a left and a right I thought it would be wise to mark them up.
Same as before, cut the plates out, tack them together, mark the holes and grind them all the same.
Once I had drilled the holes I placed the plates over the axle brackets with bolts sticking out to confirm the holes were in the right place.
Then building them up.
Quick little pre-assembly to see how it all looks, cool.
All tacked up and ready to weld.
I decided to use my Arc welded for welding the brackets. My arc has a higher amperage and I hadn't used it in a while so I thought it would be good.
All welded up, I took my time and had lots of tacks on the brackets to minimize distortion. They were quite solid so remained warp free. Left them to the side to cool down.
Grinder out and time to clean them up.
Nice and smooth. The other good thing about the fillet weld is it gave me enough to put a nice curved shape around the edges without losing strength.
Another mock-up of the finished brackets.
Time to get attaching them to the van. Some of the more astute of you out there will have noticed the axle brackets are made as a whole unit, how am I going to slide them onto the axle tubes. Well, its all part of the plan. I cut the axle brackets in half, like so.
Then placed them over the axle tube and tacked them back together. Here is where my photos begin to lose detail. I was so pre-occupied with getting all my measurements right I neglected to take more photos as I went. Once the axle bracket was leveled up and tacked into place I attached the arms and raised the chassis bracket to the right place. I determined the right place by having a 2.5ยฐ rake in the arms. You want the parallel bars to be between 0ยฐ-3ยฐ raked upwards from the axle. I decided to go with a 2.5ยฐ rake on the basis that if the back end of the van is heavier than I think then the angle should only go down 1ยฐ-2ยฐ keeping everything OK.
Once I had attached the other side and was happy with the bracket positions I measured up for the rear shock mounts. To be honest, this was a bit of a hit and miss. For convenience I am re-using the scimitar shocks just now. The springs are 200lb/s standard I believe so may just be upto the job. I wont really know until I am driving it around. I guess-timated how much the coil-overs will drop when supporting the van. The coil-overs have enough room to stand upright, allowing me to use the shocks to there best abilities.
I made up a set of mounts for the top of the coil-overs. I thought id make them look nice just incase I had magically found the right position.
With a piece of box section, I drilled the holes the length I thought the shock would compress by under load and used them to mount the upper brackets.
I took the rear part of the dodecagon away and lowered the van to the ground, would my tacks hold?
Yep, they did. Although the van was a bit too high. Even with weight added it wouldn't go down as far as I needed.
I had 4 more bags of sand that I added to the back of the van but it only moved down an inch. I worked out that the bracket was 30mm too short and that I needed to make different shock mounts, so , take 2.
Before,
After,
Now, it sat nearer to my ride height. I made a .GIF of how it is unladen, then with about 200kg on the rear.
Much better. Now the 4 link bars were all in place. I added a few extra strengthening plates.
Then 2 more braces between the chassis rails using the 100x50x5 I used for the flooring with yet more bracing for the brackets.
I was going to do the watts linkage at this point but I settled on re-drilling the scimitar hubs to ford pattern. The Scimitar PCD was 4 x 4.5" and I needed 5 x 4.5" to use the Ford wheels. First of all I had to get the hubs off. These hubs are notoriously difficult to remove.
I tried using one of my granddads old pullers, didn't quite work as I couldn't get it to seat right on the studs so it started to bend them.
Next up I made a crappy puller using an old brake drum and some scrap box section. I welded a M20 nut and used some M20 threaded rod to make a basic puller. This also never worked, infact, the hubs were so well attached I actually sheared the M20 threaded rod as you can see in the photo, bugger.
After a bit of thinking I thought id use the studs to my benefit. I got a piece of 12mm plate, drilled 4 holes and created a dished part that would press up against the end of the axle. The principal being that as I tightened the stud nuts up, the plate hits the end of the axle and the force pulls it off.
Good bit of heat also helps.
I put the castle nut nut back on the end of the axle to protect the threads then put my plate over and tightened up the studs, half turn at a time. They were so tightly on there that I was literally jumping on the 2 foot breaker bar to get the force it needed to pop them off.
But I won!
Time to re-drill the hubs. As im really keeping the distance between the studs the same and just adding an extra stud it wasn't as bad as you would think. I knocked out all but one of the studs then placed the old Thames brake drum upside down and over the hub.
It would be great if I had access to a lathe and make up a spacer ring to fit snugly in here but I had to improvise. I found if I used a 5.5mm drill bit it wouldn't fit in this gap, but a 5mm drill bit did, and could wiggle ever so slightly. I used that to locate the drum to the hub centrally and added a nut to the stud, tightened it up and added a few tacks underneath to stop the drum and hub from moving apart.
The holes in the old drum are 1/2. I found a piece of brass plated tubing at work which was a really good tight fit in the brake drum. The inner diameter was also a really good tight fit with a 10mm drill bit. I used the 10mm drill bit to just mark my new holes.
Then I removed the drum.
I placed the hub back on the axle and made up a little stand with a punch to act as my marker and rotated the hub to make sure my holes were on the same place.
With good clear marks and happy they are int he right place I set up the hub level and true with the drill press and drilled my pilot holes.
Then I done the same as before and checked my pilot holes were in the correct place, I made a quick little youtube video here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QQwsQTDIVc
I wanted to fill the old stud holes so with a piece of copper I blanked off the end and filled with my mig.
And cleaned it all up, ready to get drilled out for the new studs I have on order.
I also used the hub to drill out the Scimitar brake drum.
That's all for now. I should be getting my new studs next week sometime and that will allow me to get my Ford wheels back on there.
On the 1st of September I will be taking the van along to the Scottish ford day. If anyone here is going, feel free to come over and check the van out. It will be on the Pre67Ford club stand.
Thanks again everyone who bought my book.
Shameless plug : - ๐
For the ยฃ6 version, please follow this link. https://sellfy.com/p/zFxy
About 80 photos for this huge update so it may take a bit of time to load, sorry.
First of, I want to say thankyou to everyone that bought the book. It has helped me out a lot with this update as it paid for the metal and other bits and bobs and has kept everything up to date, really appreciate it.
I done a lot of research on setting up a vehicle to take 4 link suspension. I needed to get my finished ride height sorted. To do that I had to work out roughly how much weight to add and where. The engine will be sitting over the front axle and checking Google I found out the 1uz-fe weighs around 220kg , add a portly driver at 85 kg and a passenger of the same weight. That brings it upto 390kg, the rest of the weight I wasn't sure about so I bought 18 bags of sand weighing 25kg each, giving me a total of 450kg. I laid these bags over the front half of the van which lowered the front by about an inch and a half. I then raised the rear of the body up to just over level and welded the rear lower dodecagon to the improvised level floor to stop it from moving.
Giving me my ride height.
I had a little bit of spare time on my hands so I took a few quick measurements as it was and mocked up how I would like the brackets to look.
The next time I went down to the garage I decided to get the axle in the exact location. I must have spent about 6-8 hours measuring and double measuring, then triple measuring to make sure the axle wasn't skewed and in the place I wanted it to be. Using my axle stands with shims to get the right height and measuring down from where the old bumps stops were I got the wheelbase sorted. Then measuring from the wheel hubs to the chassis rails got it centered.
I used the vans screw jack to get the pinion angle at 2ยฐ ( with a 4 link for street you want the axle rotated between 1-3ยฐ). Really I should have the engine in first to make sure 2ยฐ is suitable so my plan is to just have really strong tack welds on the axle brackets until I have the engine in, just incase I need to adjust it.
When I was happy with where it should be I welded in a couple bit of box between the chassis and axle to make sure it never moved.
Then it was time to take real measurements for the brackets. I got my notebook out and started scribbling like a maniac. Coming up with a slightly different design from my mock-up.
Then when I was settled with my sketches I drew up the plans.
I bought a length of xx and 50x6 to make up the brackets. I know the thickness is maybe a bit overkill but I don't want these brackets to move at all, plus chunky looks cool. I scribed my plan onto the 100x6 then cut out with the plasma cutter. I cleaned the edges up individually then tacked all 4 plates together, drilled out the holes and then went over them again with the grinder so they were all the same size and shape.
Using the 50x6 I joined it all together. The good thing with how I worked it out was that I'd get a really good strong fillet weld when welding.
To give me a little bit more clearance for the upper arm I used 3mm flat bar here.
Then the front of the bracket got its bracer.
Lather, rinse and repeat.
One thing I couldn't do was the shock mount. I got my local engineer shop to make me up 2 47x30x80 blocks with a 13mm hole down the centre.
Then tacked them to the brackets.
Next came the chassis mounts, bit of scribing.
To make sure I made a left and a right I thought it would be wise to mark them up.
Same as before, cut the plates out, tack them together, mark the holes and grind them all the same.
Once I had drilled the holes I placed the plates over the axle brackets with bolts sticking out to confirm the holes were in the right place.
Then building them up.
Quick little pre-assembly to see how it all looks, cool.
All tacked up and ready to weld.
I decided to use my Arc welded for welding the brackets. My arc has a higher amperage and I hadn't used it in a while so I thought it would be good.
All welded up, I took my time and had lots of tacks on the brackets to minimize distortion. They were quite solid so remained warp free. Left them to the side to cool down.
Grinder out and time to clean them up.
Nice and smooth. The other good thing about the fillet weld is it gave me enough to put a nice curved shape around the edges without losing strength.
Another mock-up of the finished brackets.
Time to get attaching them to the van. Some of the more astute of you out there will have noticed the axle brackets are made as a whole unit, how am I going to slide them onto the axle tubes. Well, its all part of the plan. I cut the axle brackets in half, like so.
Then placed them over the axle tube and tacked them back together. Here is where my photos begin to lose detail. I was so pre-occupied with getting all my measurements right I neglected to take more photos as I went. Once the axle bracket was leveled up and tacked into place I attached the arms and raised the chassis bracket to the right place. I determined the right place by having a 2.5ยฐ rake in the arms. You want the parallel bars to be between 0ยฐ-3ยฐ raked upwards from the axle. I decided to go with a 2.5ยฐ rake on the basis that if the back end of the van is heavier than I think then the angle should only go down 1ยฐ-2ยฐ keeping everything OK.
Once I had attached the other side and was happy with the bracket positions I measured up for the rear shock mounts. To be honest, this was a bit of a hit and miss. For convenience I am re-using the scimitar shocks just now. The springs are 200lb/s standard I believe so may just be upto the job. I wont really know until I am driving it around. I guess-timated how much the coil-overs will drop when supporting the van. The coil-overs have enough room to stand upright, allowing me to use the shocks to there best abilities.
I made up a set of mounts for the top of the coil-overs. I thought id make them look nice just incase I had magically found the right position.
With a piece of box section, I drilled the holes the length I thought the shock would compress by under load and used them to mount the upper brackets.
I took the rear part of the dodecagon away and lowered the van to the ground, would my tacks hold?
Yep, they did. Although the van was a bit too high. Even with weight added it wouldn't go down as far as I needed.
I had 4 more bags of sand that I added to the back of the van but it only moved down an inch. I worked out that the bracket was 30mm too short and that I needed to make different shock mounts, so , take 2.
Before,
After,
Now, it sat nearer to my ride height. I made a .GIF of how it is unladen, then with about 200kg on the rear.
Much better. Now the 4 link bars were all in place. I added a few extra strengthening plates.
Then 2 more braces between the chassis rails using the 100x50x5 I used for the flooring with yet more bracing for the brackets.
I was going to do the watts linkage at this point but I settled on re-drilling the scimitar hubs to ford pattern. The Scimitar PCD was 4 x 4.5" and I needed 5 x 4.5" to use the Ford wheels. First of all I had to get the hubs off. These hubs are notoriously difficult to remove.
I tried using one of my granddads old pullers, didn't quite work as I couldn't get it to seat right on the studs so it started to bend them.
Next up I made a crappy puller using an old brake drum and some scrap box section. I welded a M20 nut and used some M20 threaded rod to make a basic puller. This also never worked, infact, the hubs were so well attached I actually sheared the M20 threaded rod as you can see in the photo, bugger.
After a bit of thinking I thought id use the studs to my benefit. I got a piece of 12mm plate, drilled 4 holes and created a dished part that would press up against the end of the axle. The principal being that as I tightened the stud nuts up, the plate hits the end of the axle and the force pulls it off.
Good bit of heat also helps.
I put the castle nut nut back on the end of the axle to protect the threads then put my plate over and tightened up the studs, half turn at a time. They were so tightly on there that I was literally jumping on the 2 foot breaker bar to get the force it needed to pop them off.
But I won!
Time to re-drill the hubs. As im really keeping the distance between the studs the same and just adding an extra stud it wasn't as bad as you would think. I knocked out all but one of the studs then placed the old Thames brake drum upside down and over the hub.
It would be great if I had access to a lathe and make up a spacer ring to fit snugly in here but I had to improvise. I found if I used a 5.5mm drill bit it wouldn't fit in this gap, but a 5mm drill bit did, and could wiggle ever so slightly. I used that to locate the drum to the hub centrally and added a nut to the stud, tightened it up and added a few tacks underneath to stop the drum and hub from moving apart.
The holes in the old drum are 1/2. I found a piece of brass plated tubing at work which was a really good tight fit in the brake drum. The inner diameter was also a really good tight fit with a 10mm drill bit. I used the 10mm drill bit to just mark my new holes.
Then I removed the drum.
I placed the hub back on the axle and made up a little stand with a punch to act as my marker and rotated the hub to make sure my holes were on the same place.
With good clear marks and happy they are int he right place I set up the hub level and true with the drill press and drilled my pilot holes.
Then I done the same as before and checked my pilot holes were in the correct place, I made a quick little youtube video here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QQwsQTDIVc
I wanted to fill the old stud holes so with a piece of copper I blanked off the end and filled with my mig.
And cleaned it all up, ready to get drilled out for the new studs I have on order.
I also used the hub to drill out the Scimitar brake drum.
That's all for now. I should be getting my new studs next week sometime and that will allow me to get my Ford wheels back on there.
On the 1st of September I will be taking the van along to the Scottish ford day. If anyone here is going, feel free to come over and check the van out. It will be on the Pre67Ford club stand.
Thanks again everyone who bought my book.
Shameless plug : - ๐
For the ยฃ6 version, please follow this link. https://sellfy.com/p/zFxy
Thanks for all the comments everyone, i still feel really glad that i have the main body done and ive started on the suspension already with a new buzz.
July 2013
I have another bit of good news, more at the end.
I got the front suspension dug out from under the bench and gave it a quick look over.
I also wanted to create a level floor to build up from. That way i can get the ride height sorted and measure up for the 4 link brackets i need to make. I borrowed 2 lenghts of 100x50x5 box section from work.
Bolted the front suspension on. It went on fairly easy. I'll be cleaning it all up much later.
.
Using a laser level and packers I leveled the wheel base of the van up.
Then welded some angle to the sides so i could bolt the box section down and know it wont move.
Next up was to remove the brackets from the axle. Easiest way was to take the axle to my work and using the plasma cutter, slice them off.
Then back at the garage i ground what was remaining off.
And position the axle back under the rear. I also went and bought 20 bags of sand to act as ballast untill i get the engine in place. The engine and gearbox is about 220kg. Each bag is about 22.5kg so 10 bags act as the engine and i added another 6 to act as the doors, radiator, seat, glass. Its all a bit guess work right now.
I took a lot of measurements which i will use to make the 4 link brackets and watts linkage. I am going to be off work for a week soon so i will get some 6mm plate to make the brackets.
Now on to the big news. If you remember a few months ago i mentioned that i was compiling what i have done so far into a book to make a wee bit extra cash for the project.. Well, i thought seeing as the whole bodywork was done, now would be a good time to complete the book and create the first volume. For the past month i have spent 2-3 hours a night putting every update i have done into one file. The good thing about this is its a hardcopy of all the photos and text. you dont need to wait on images downloading or, should anything happen to tinypic that i upload the photos too, pictures being missing or deleated.
The book is 590 pages and roughly 2 pictures per page so theres about 1125 photos in all plus all the text. I have the van, childs digger, pedal trike, wheelie bar, plus two new sections, tools and a tips and techniques section.
I was a bit stuck on how much to charge, when i asked before i was getting various prices, generally between ยฃ5-ยฃ10. I'd rather everyone had the chance to buy the book so i have made two files. The first is a smaller version (99MB), optimized for smart phones/small tablets priced at ยฃ5 ($7.55 USD) and the larger version (165MB) for pc/larger tablets is ยฃ6 ($9.06 USD).
If you have enjoyed my project so far i would appreciate it if you would buy the book. The money i hope to make from this will really help me keep the project going and the updates coming on a regular basis.
Here are a few sample pictures, they are saved in .jpg so obviously the .pdf e-book will look better.
Oh, and dont worry, i will always continue to update the forums no matter what. This is just to help me pay for a few parts for the van. I wont be starting to charge for updates.
For the mobile (99MB) ยฃ5 version, please follow this link. https://sellfy.com/p/A7vH
For the larger version (165MB) ยฃ6 version, please follow this link. https://sellfy.com/p/zFxy
July 2013
I have another bit of good news, more at the end.
I got the front suspension dug out from under the bench and gave it a quick look over.
I also wanted to create a level floor to build up from. That way i can get the ride height sorted and measure up for the 4 link brackets i need to make. I borrowed 2 lenghts of 100x50x5 box section from work.
Bolted the front suspension on. It went on fairly easy. I'll be cleaning it all up much later.
.Using a laser level and packers I leveled the wheel base of the van up.
Then welded some angle to the sides so i could bolt the box section down and know it wont move.
Next up was to remove the brackets from the axle. Easiest way was to take the axle to my work and using the plasma cutter, slice them off.
Then back at the garage i ground what was remaining off.
And position the axle back under the rear. I also went and bought 20 bags of sand to act as ballast untill i get the engine in place. The engine and gearbox is about 220kg. Each bag is about 22.5kg so 10 bags act as the engine and i added another 6 to act as the doors, radiator, seat, glass. Its all a bit guess work right now.
I took a lot of measurements which i will use to make the 4 link brackets and watts linkage. I am going to be off work for a week soon so i will get some 6mm plate to make the brackets.
Now on to the big news. If you remember a few months ago i mentioned that i was compiling what i have done so far into a book to make a wee bit extra cash for the project.. Well, i thought seeing as the whole bodywork was done, now would be a good time to complete the book and create the first volume. For the past month i have spent 2-3 hours a night putting every update i have done into one file. The good thing about this is its a hardcopy of all the photos and text. you dont need to wait on images downloading or, should anything happen to tinypic that i upload the photos too, pictures being missing or deleated.
The book is 590 pages and roughly 2 pictures per page so theres about 1125 photos in all plus all the text. I have the van, childs digger, pedal trike, wheelie bar, plus two new sections, tools and a tips and techniques section.
I was a bit stuck on how much to charge, when i asked before i was getting various prices, generally between ยฃ5-ยฃ10. I'd rather everyone had the chance to buy the book so i have made two files. The first is a smaller version (99MB), optimized for smart phones/small tablets priced at ยฃ5 ($7.55 USD) and the larger version (165MB) for pc/larger tablets is ยฃ6 ($9.06 USD).
If you have enjoyed my project so far i would appreciate it if you would buy the book. The money i hope to make from this will really help me keep the project going and the updates coming on a regular basis.
Here are a few sample pictures, they are saved in .jpg so obviously the .pdf e-book will look better.
Oh, and dont worry, i will always continue to update the forums no matter what. This is just to help me pay for a few parts for the van. I wont be starting to charge for updates.
For the mobile (99MB) ยฃ5 version, please follow this link. https://sellfy.com/p/A7vH
For the larger version (165MB) ยฃ6 version, please follow this link. https://sellfy.com/p/zFxy
