John Bonnett

Here are a couple of pictures bringing everything up do date

I've finished planishing the long TIG weld and the passenger side rear wing is now bolted and bonded on to the body. A few pictures to follow.

I've recently gone through this exercise and the hinge bodies seem to wear preferentially and fitting a new pin has made no difference. New hinges are of variable quality and if you do go this route my advice would be to reject and return to the supplier any that have slop. John

The back panel is now fully TIG welded to the tailgate aperture and rear quarter light panels which completes the welding of the rear end. By welding on the curve distortion is kept to a minimum but shrinkage always occurs which necessitates tapping up the area immediately around the weld and then filing flat. The lows are brought up with a slapper and weight.

On fitting the rear wing a misalignment was apparent. Quite how this happened is a bit of a mystery because before the side panel was bonded on everything fitted perfectly. I suspected that the side panel hadn't sat down properly so I removed a wedge shaped piece and then replaced it in the correct position. I also removed a section of the wing to be replaced by another that replicated closely the contour of the side panel. Pictures show the sequence. In order to make the wing section piece easy to form it was annealed by first blackening the surface with an acetylene rich flame and the n removing the black by heating with a neutral flame. Once the black disappears this is a signal that annealing temperature is reached. Once clamped in place over the wing it was an easy matter to hand form the new piece. I hope the pictures clarify the process. Picture 1 shows the problem and the final one the solution.