Thanks guys :)
January 2016
Happy new year! , lets see where I get to in this one.
I spent the first week of my holiday doing absolutely nothing, it was great to just not do anything. I started the garage in the last xmas holidays so every weekend/nights/holidays I had I spent building the garage. Then when that was done I was helping my bro to do up his new house then when that was done I spent about a month and a half remodelling my hallway/stairs. So to be able to just sit on my butt and relax was amazing!
But, I cant be lazy all the time so I went into the garage in the second week to continue the van. I started by just recapping what I had done before and familiarizing myself with where I had put everything. After some time I settled myself back into the front suspension set up. I had remembered that the anti roll bar was now being fouled by the 4 pot callipers so I had to do something about that.
I figured id need to move it further back by 35mm so I first redrilled new holes in the chassis I brought the brackets further back.
Then I had to extend the lower mounts which re attached to the A arms.
Cut it off with the grinder.
Which left me with this.
Then I used some 3mm sheet to extend it, weld, grind, clean.
Welded it back on. Much better position.
To try and stop any fatigue now that it was longer I also welded in 2 braces.
Put the link in and Ta-da, The callipers now clear it on full lock. I repeated the same for the other side.
Now that that was done the front end is pretty much ready for connecting and testing the brakes. Before I do that though I want to get the rear end finished. I have the axle and stuff fitted already but I still need to buy new bushes and paint it all. Something I need money for so that will have to wait for a few weeks.
Now for something not van related again but it is classic car related.
I was asked by a guy at the pre67 Ford forum to have a look and fix his wings and front valance for his Mk2 Zodiac so I got started on them.
This is his original valance which had 2 dents underneath and the corners had fatigued.
I started on the smaller ding first.
It wasn't really that bad so I was able to just use the hammer, dolly etc.. To knock it back out.
The other side was quite a bit worse. The metal had stretched quite a bit too much to knock out.
Luckily he had a spare valance. The lower half of which was rust free so I cut that section out.
Then I cut the same area out of the old one and tacked this section in its place.
Weld it up and clean it off.
And there we go, one fixed valance.
Upnext was the offside wing. The paint was blistering around the rear edge so I started to sand it down to get an idea of what was going on.
Quite a bit of filler was removed from a previous "repair".
I suspected that this was just a patch welded on top of rusty metal, which it was.
So to fix this I cut slightly larger than the patch right out. That also revealed the inner part had rusted right through also.
I needed to repair this inner piece before I could do the skin.
Then put a new section in flush with the skin.
Weld it up and grind it down, beautiful.
Then I added a new lip and tidied that up.
Quick wee spray of primer to stop it surface rusting in the mean time, seamless :) .
Upnext is the headlamp area. You can see how water has ran in between the wing and headlamp plate and has just rusted away at the bottom and pushed the metal apart in other place.
To get the old headlamp plate out I used my spotweld drill but .
And the offending plate that's too far gone to be repaired
I had to make this section up. Looks simple enough but it had a double lip, the inside and outside edges.
I started by getting my sheet out and tracing out the shape slightly larger to allow for the lip.
Easiest way to cut it out was using my old slightly knackered plasma cutter, does the job though (I should really fix it up one of these days). I then traced the shape of the plate out to its correct size in marker pen.
To get the fold started I used long nose pliers with a little bit ground off one jaw (flatter end for internal bends). Then I got a bit of 5x50 flat bar and cut a small grove in it to bend the lip up more.
Once I got it raised I used a hammer and former to finish it off.
I repeated the same for the outside lip and after a bit of time and fettling I had a replacement for the old one.
To attach it I began to wirewheel inside the wing when I noticed another bit of rust. Its a bit hard to see but its where the water would have been running down below the headlamp area. Which I thought of as odd as externally the panel seemed fine.
So, sander /wire wheel out I wanted to investigate what was going on.
Yep, you guessed it, another patch over rotten metal. That's why it looked OK externally.
Ok OK, cut it out and time for a proper repair.
ITs a bit of a tricky repair. Looks simple but that shape was quite complex to put into a flat sheet. I managed to tack it into place.
Welded, dressed and started to repair the other rotten bit around the bowl area. I also repaired a little bit that ran underneath and into the grill area but I forgot to photo that, dam.
Then I clamped and welded in the new headlamp plate.
Last little piece to fix.
Fixed.
Little spray of primer to stop surface rust and that was this wing done.
Now I just have one more wing to go.
I really enjoyed fixing those up. I forgot just how much I like to do bodywork. Maybe il make a career out of it one day :).
Hopefully next update il have made enough money for bushes, paint and new shock absorbers.
