Badwolf Posted July 8, 2022 Report Share Posted July 8, 2022 Looks lovely. Shame to get it dirty or hide it away. What about a nice perspex tunnel cover?? 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colin Lindsay Posted July 9, 2022 Report Share Posted July 9, 2022 17 hours ago, Badwolf said: Looks lovely. Shame to get it dirty or hide it away. What about a nice perspex tunnel cover?? ...with an underfloor wash / wipe to keep road dirt off the perspex... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Twitchen Posted July 9, 2022 Report Share Posted July 9, 2022 38 minutes ago, Colin Lindsay said: with an underfloor wash / wipe to keep road dirt off the perspex.. And background lighting for mood..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete Lewis Posted July 9, 2022 Report Share Posted July 9, 2022 or a bit more bull shine aerosol lovely Pete Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted July 31, 2022 Author Report Share Posted July 31, 2022 Today’s job has been stripping down a spare passenger door to rebuild. I don’t want to effectively immobilise the car by removing the door. Besides the existing one has been previously professionally repaired, and they neglected to replace the drain holes… So the bottom is in a worse state than the spare, and missing at least some of the original shapes. I was considering trying to save most of the skin on the spare door. It’s very badly dented and distorted though, and getting a hand and dolly in behind the damage proved somewhere between awkward and painful! So, off it came. The shell is in pretty decent shape, much better than the Spitfire ones I’ve done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted August 5, 2022 Author Report Share Posted August 5, 2022 The Herald door bottoms don’t just have a straightforward bend on the shell to form the flange for the skin, there’s a little step. This has been a bit of a faff to make, especially as I only have a little metal break. A longer break and probably a bead roller would make short work of it I expect. Anyway, I’ve made three sections and got the first one welded in. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted August 7, 2022 Author Report Share Posted August 7, 2022 I got on with a bit of the door shell yesterday, but despite checking, adjusting, rechecking several times I ended up with a bow in the bottom of the shell. So it’s getting to think about what it’s done while I consider building a better, longer brake. I’ve got enough scrap metal kicking around that it shouldn’t cost me more than wire, gas and time. Anyway as the car didn’t like to see me idle, one of the sun visor supports snapped following a trip out to Tesco. I’ve ‘that’ll do’ welded it, it must’ve been braised or soldered originally. I couldn’t see anything after wire brushing but it was hard to weld and I got some white deposits forming. A replacement would be nice eventually, but I seem to remember these bits are hard to find? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted August 27, 2022 Author Report Share Posted August 27, 2022 I’ve been slowly getting on with a less wonky door repair section. It’s taken a lot of work, but I now have something acceptable and am starting to work on fitting it up to the shell. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted August 28, 2022 Author Report Share Posted August 28, 2022 Progress with the door shell patchwork. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Truman Posted August 28, 2022 Report Share Posted August 28, 2022 looks good, good job it's not a 4 door car! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted August 29, 2022 Author Report Share Posted August 29, 2022 The shell is pretty much done, needs drain holes and some trimming, and then stripping to figure out if there’s any other damage I’ve missed! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted September 17, 2022 Author Report Share Posted September 17, 2022 I recently joined the North East Restoration Club who have a well equipped workshop up near Washington. Popped over with the Herald today to play with the equipment! My target is a proper patch for the leading edge of the spare wheel well. The existing repair is still solid, but not pretty and badly overlapped. I was able to use a proper metal shear, bender and English wheel to get me a good way along. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted September 20, 2022 Author Report Share Posted September 20, 2022 The wheel well repair panel is starting to look something like the front of a wheel well. I need to even up the curve where the join will be before fully welding the two parts together, but looking promising. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted September 30, 2022 Author Report Share Posted September 30, 2022 After a lot of hammering, bending and English wheeling over finally got my wheel well repair section into an acceptable shape. Next job was to deal with the ends of the channels pressed into the bottom of the wheel well. I’ve built a crude, but effective, little press die to form the correct rounded ends for these channels. It has worked pretty well! And cost nothing beyond a raid of the scrap pile. So with that all ready, time to cut the old patch away… Managed to get rid of most of it without harming the remaining original metal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Faulds Posted October 1, 2022 Report Share Posted October 1, 2022 Hi Josef,just started reading your post. Great work making the panels, I used to live in various places in the North east and remember the restoration club, I wasn't a member but went to some of their open days. Give my regards to lenny ball , I dont know if you know him, he's in the resto club, I used to work with him in the 70s. He'll know me if you mention my name. Bonas machine company, we were jig borers there. I'm gonna go back and read your resto from the start. Flog on bonny lad.😀 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted October 1, 2022 Author Report Share Posted October 1, 2022 Thanks @Ian Faulds! I’ve not encountered a Lenny yet that I know of, but I’ll say hello from you if/when I do. This morning I ground away the old welds and remains of the overlain patch (that took quite some time and exhausted far too many flap discs). This afternoon has been getting the patch fitted and tacked in place. I’m very pleased with how well it has fitted. Next job will to make the pressings for the base of the wheel well. At least the left most channel will need a longer repair than the little press I made up will manage, but the straight section’ll be easy enough on to do on the small brake I have. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted October 2, 2022 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2022 Been working on replicating the pressings today. I messed up the left hand one, tried to rectify it and made it worse… So that’ll have to come out and be done again. But the rest of it is looking pretty good. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steveo Posted October 2, 2022 Report Share Posted October 2, 2022 Nice work, that will be invisible when finished, think the spare wheel well is the only place on mine that didn't need welding ! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted October 3, 2022 Author Report Share Posted October 3, 2022 Got a replacement pressing repair patch made up and tacked in this afternoon. I’m going to get this all welded and ground on the inside at least, and then deal with the small hole in the pitted metal just outside the leftmost edge of where I’ve been working. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steveo Posted October 3, 2022 Report Share Posted October 3, 2022 Just had a look on Rimmer bros website, £486 for a boot floor! (Only gave £1200 for my car) shame panels are so expensive for our cars, prices like this must contribute to Heralds getting scraped, lucky some have the skills to make patches and save cars. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted October 3, 2022 Author Report Share Posted October 3, 2022 12 minutes ago, steveo said: Just had a look on Rimmer bros website, £486 for a boot floor! (Only gave £1200 for my car) shame panels are so expensive for our cars, prices like this must contribute to Heralds getting scraped, lucky some have the skills to make patches and save cars. Yeah and that floor pressing is a poor copy from what I’ve seen so who knows how well it’d fit. Obviously a simpler repair could be done here, but I wanted to see if I could make the complex double curve and pressings (and the ugly old MoT patch had been irritating me for years!). But you’re right: a full panel, or getting someone else to do the work, is going to be a lot of money and quickly exceed the resale value of the car. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted October 8, 2022 Author Report Share Posted October 8, 2022 Well after a lot of welding, a lot of grinding, and about an hour chasing pinholes just now, the wheel well repair is done. On the inside at least, I need to book on to the NERC lift to do the underside as it would be a horrendous experience to try grinding he other side of this while the car is just on stands! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted October 9, 2022 Author Report Share Posted October 9, 2022 Having had my head under the car for the wheel well repairs, I found what I thought was a small hole in the chassis. Further investigation this morning has revealed that this was the case, and I found some much worse rot in a slightly different place… I’ve got a patch in for the bigger bit, but the wind is making welding difficult, and on top of that I slipped a bit with a flap disc and have hit a brake line Not badly enough to break it fortunately so nothing is leaking at least, but obviously this needs replacing too now. Consequently I’m giving up for the day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete Lewis Posted October 9, 2022 Report Share Posted October 9, 2022 30 minutes ago, Josef said: Consequently I’m giving up for the day. Im sure youre not alone with the odd mishap its all part of the FUN ...well you know what i mean Pete Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josef Posted October 9, 2022 Author Report Share Posted October 9, 2022 2 hours ago, Pete Lewis said: Im sure youre not alone with the odd mishap its all part of the FUN ...well you know what i mean Pete Yeah for sure, but best to take a break rather than make even more of a mess! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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