1986 Toyota MR2 - ...automatically re-dimensioned itself.

jelmerv8
👍 aah ! I forgot that Europe was AFM as well, IIRC the the fuel injrction is different as well ? MAP uses the Bosch D-Jetronic system (without the need for an O2-sensor) and AFM uses the L-Jetronic system (or the other way around) 🤔

Fold a bit of steel up and bond it with sikaflex. Bit of paint and it will fix it till you are ready to do it properly. Rust treat it first of course

I'd form a steel repair piece paint it in epoxy and glue it in place with tigerseal or something similar, I would though treat the rust under the paint on the roof, that's only going to spread and lift the epoxy you have applied

i am guessing there may be some pin holes under that roof scab

Steel? You do know that plastic milk bottle is more traditional for this car?
Seriously, yeah, I think that's the plan. I did have some Tigerseal but the tube went hard. I mean, it had only been open 6 or maybe 7 years. Things don't last these days.
Buying a new tube, using a small squirt and letting the rest go off feels a bit wasteful so I'm just pondering what I can use as an adhesive. I kindly chap at work (hello Alistair) donated a tube of windscreen sealant to the cause but I'm not convinced it'd work as an adhesive. I do have plans for that though so it's not going to waste.



I'm not that brave! I wouldn't want to weld that close to the glass and the edge of the roof is badly pitted so it's just going to blow through no matter how careful I am.



That roof scab isn't as bad as it might look. Ok, it was worse but I did scrape it back, rust treat it and epoxy it before the car decided to fill with water. It's got a bit of black paint brushed on it just so it doesn't stick out like a sore thumb.
It's badly pitted and it'll need to be cut out but it's not holed (yet).




You are absolutely right. That's exactly what I'm doing. Deliberately.
I'm working outside, it's cold, dark and it won't stay dry for more than a day. There is no way I'm taking the screen out now. It's just not happening. I also have a ton of other stuff that I need to crack on with. If I can keep the car dry for a year or three and slow down the damage I'll be very happy.


The car had a nasty rust blister on the roof long before I owned it. I've always known the screen has to come out. Just not today.
The fact that it's filling the car with water is no surprise. In fact I'm more surprised it's taken this long. I just wish it'd done it a week before I put the carpet and seats back in rather than a week after... Some times the devil just wants to take a wee wee in your gazpacho.

James

I don’t know about tiger seal but if you made a repair section and used panel glue you could call that a permanent repair. I mean if you can glue a whole Lotus together with the stuff then a little repair like that would be no problem

I have a garage full of trim. It needs to be on the car. As much as anything it needs to be on the car so that it’s not cluttering up the garage.
I wish I could remember what order it goes back though. First thing to go on are definitely the vents at the bottom of the C pillars. But they need fitting back together.





There was a rubbery flappy thing in them that made a sort of a one way valve. After several decades the flappy bits became detached and fell off so I made some new ones. I think out of thin pond liner.
Anyway, I never put them back together so that was the first job.

Next there is a rubber trim that runs along the top and bottom of the vents where they touch the body. I still had the bits but they were pretty stiff. There is a similar arrangement along the top of the side skirts and I’d bought some rubber strip for that job. It turned out to be smaller than the rubbers for the skirts but was exactly the same as the stuff on the trim. A happy accident that.





It’s also used round the trim that goes down the back of the C pillars and across the top of the rear window.





Good job I bought a couple of lengths of it.

Some time later I’d found all the parts, all the screws and bolted it back together. Unfortunately, as happens at this time of year, it was pitch black outside as a result of the sun having cleared off. But a few days later I got a snap.





It’s looking more like a car again.

Flushed with success I bolted the rear bumper back on.





It’ll have to come off again to finish a bit of paint on the right side but at least it’s not cluttering up a bench in the garage.

The other thing that was cluttering up the garage is the side skirt for the left side. So I found the fixings and bolted it back on too.





I used the slightly small rubber strip on it as the original stuff was spanked. It’ll do for the moment. Possibly for ever.

I have to admit that when the windscreen surround started letting water in I was a bit hacked off with the old car. I was very hacked off if I’m being honest. But getting the trim back on did make me smile quite a lot.
Maybe the car and I have been going through a rough patch. I’m sure we’ll get over it.

James

Not a lot has happened. Well, a bit has happened but it’s happened over several weeks.
There are a few reasons for this. One being that it won’t stop raining or drizzling and it’s hard to get time when the car is dry enough to do anything useful. And the other big reason being that it’s Christmas again so there are lights to go up and trees to decorate and stuff like that.

I mean look at this.





That’s not even all of it.


Right, enough excuses. Let’s get back to that hole in the windscreen that we are doing a bodge job on. When we last saw it I’d got a coat of epoxy on it for protection. What I needed was a piece of milk bottle (or similar) to stick over the hole.
I mulled it over for a while and remembered this…





It’s a piece of galvanised steel sheet. My dad got this probably back in the ‘80s. I can’t remember why but we’ve used bits of it ever since. You’d think it’s be ideal for car repairs but it’s only about 0.5mm thick so it’s not.
It is ideal for this little job though so a bit got snipped off, shaped and blown over with a bit of etch primer.





The next question… What adhesive shall I use to glue it to the car?
It had to be something that I have, something gloopy, something that will go off pretty solidly, and something that I can over paint. How about seam sealer? That stuff is pretty tuff.





Done!
The last job was to tidy it all up with a coat of black paint.





The black paint is a new tin of tough random black tractor paint stuff. The intention is to use it to spray the fuel tank and brackets under the car. I concluded that using spray cans was going to get expensive. The tank and stuff will get epoxy primed first by the way.

There is another job (several actually) to do before this is put to bed. I don’t know if rust has got between the glass adhesive and the car. If it has it’ll get back in and eventually leak. Alistair at work donated a tube of windscreen sealer to the lost cause so I’m going to run a fillet between the top edge of the glass and the surround. Hopefully that’ll go some way to keeping the water out. I’m also going to use it to ‘glue’ the piece of adhesive back in down the left side. I’ll show you when I do it and it’ll make sense then.



Lastly I have a dilemma that I’m pondering.
The clips are missing that hold the top trim in. The previous bodger, sorry, glass installer filled the channel with glass bonding gloop and stuck the trim into it. I might have to visit Mr Toyota and ask if the clips are still available when I do the job properly but for the moment it’s probably getting glued back in. I’m not sure the original clips would work at the moment as the glass is cattywampus in the hole.
Anyway, filling the channel with gloop probably didn’t help the rust problem. Once water got between the gloop and the metal it would be trapped there. So I’m thinking that I do 5 or 6 blobs across car. The ends of the top trim are held down by the side trims and they are screwed to the car.
However… If I put five blobs of adhesive across the car I make five little dams that will definitely stop the water getting out. So how do I allow it to drain?


James

hodgsonsealants.com/product/seamseal-cv/

James