1967 Morris Oxford Traveller - off to a new home

You can also remove it with brake fluid without damaging the vinyl. Worked a treat to remove the black paint on the brown vinyl interior of a Golf I had. Works on hard plastics too. Apply a small amount using a toothbrush/nailbrush dipped in the fluid, scrub until the paint comes off, wipe with a dry cloth or paper towel and allow to air dry. DON'T USE WATER. Once you've got all the paint off, clean as normal. If you use water during the cleaning stage it will go cloudy and you will have to do it again, even though it's really counter intuitive. Work on a small area, about 6" square, at a time. Takes a while but it's a dirt cheap solution and can even bring old vinyl up brighter and soft again.

The seat restoration seems to have some interest, so here is how I did it.





I decided to restore the seats using Furniture Clinic products, as I liked their website, and how-to videos.

Duncan on their helpline was also very helpful.

It worked out pretty expensive, as I brought plenty of products, and made poor choices and ended up buying more products.

It also takes a lot of time, Especially the acetone stage.


This is what I started with - sound, but old and dirty



Furniture Clinic leather prep appears to be just acetone. So I bought a load of acetone from the Poundshop

ScotchBrite pads and lots of acetone and elbow grease gets the original colour and varnish off, getting rid a lot of the smaller cracks in the process.

The leather also softens at this point.




Leather binder is a pretty cool product, five coats of it, gets the strength back into old fragile leather.









Now it is time to start filling in the cracks.

The bigger ones are done with heavy filler - the pinker colour

The smaller cracks are done with the white flexible filler.




Then you sand it down - just like car body work and add more to the low spots !!

N.B. The leather is softer than the flexible filler, so it is important not to put too much on, as it is very difficult to sand off.





Here are what my seats look like cleaned and de-greased - ready for spray.

Just like car bodywork, you can spend ages getting it perfect. I wasn't going for show quality, just good presentable seats, but even so I've got many hours in these.







Because the seats are piped with vinyl, and have backs and sides in vinyl.

It is necessary to spray them with adhesion promoter, mixed with 10% cross-linker X.

This is clear, so there isn't a lot to see.

It is worth pointing out at this stage, I've got a proper compressor, and spray guns, so didn't use the air-brush system they sell.

I was originally going to do the seats in bright red, but changed my mind.

So I sponged on a layer of the bright red colourant to act as a base-coat.







I'm re-trimming some of the rest of the interior in red vinyl, so I sent Furniture Clinic of the vinyl to match not only the colour but the sheen.

I sprayed the whole of the seats with about three coats of the proper colour. Be sure to get a 500ml bottle, as I doubt the 250ml will be big enough.








The colour coat comes out quite shiny, but needs several coats of the leather finisher, to provide the final finish - semi-matt in my case.





If you can do car bodywork, and you've got some patience - you can restore leather seats 

cracking jobs! i like the improved wheel treatment too, whats the deet's on them ?

Ah the wheels - glad you brought those up, as I'm rather proud of those.

TR6 rims running Morris hubcaps.
The rears are stock running 205/50R15's

The fronts have been narrowed by an inch or so, and run 165/65R15's

Narrowed you say ??
Yes I wanted the "Hot Rod" look of big'n'littles.
Also with manual steering, I didn't want a fat tyre on the front.
I also like to make things difficult for myself - why bolt something on, when you can spend hours with a grinder and welder ?

Here is what I did

Take a stock TR6 rim, lay it on a greased steel workbench, set up the grinder in a vice, and cut off the lip of the wheel in a "Hampshire Lathe" style




Take your time, and don't knock the grinder, and you can get quite an accurate cut



Reset the grinder an inch or so lower in the vice, and repeat, and then you've got this ( clean and tidy workbench not featured )



To align the rim and the cut of flange, I constructed this jig, and spun it up on the hub so I could check for alignment etc. Stick on a few tacks to hold in place




Fired up the welder properly, and seamed the inside, also seamed the outside, and ground it back to shape. One rim held air perfectly, the other had some troublesome pin-holes, so I did end up fitting tubes.



I really wanted hubcaps, so I sourced some VW clips and riveted them to the wheels to test fit before final paint.



Spend an awful long time, prepping for paint, and then lay down some maroon cellulose I got with the car.



Couldn't be happier with those 

I got the idea for narrowing the fronts, when I picked up the wheels from a Triumph specialist. He had some TR4 wheels in stock. They are the perfect width, but have various bumps, and the decorative hole pattern is wrong.



I'm better with a grinder and a welder than I am with a holesaw !!

I used the same products, from the same company, to repair our chesterfield sofa and change it from red to black.

Its held up ok but the big cracks have re opened. Also, and I doubt this is a problem for you, but dog/cat flea treatment stuff will just wash all that nice new leather paint straight off.

So It is time to dig in deep.
I'd previously repaired the boot floor, and I could see lots of bodges whilst I was in there.
Bits of aluminium glinted from the bottom of the rear wings, but underseal disguised the outwardly appearance.
Lots of tale tale Sikaflex or similar squirted around the lower rear wings and wheel arches.
Rear wheel arches were a mess but at least had some steel in them.
The sills were far from arrow straight, and and least the outers needed replacement.

So I fired up the grinder with the twisted knot brush, and proceeded to cover everything in the garage in filler dust.
No not sparks - but filler dust :-(




I'd previously bought a rust free pair of rear wings - I am going to need them
But another £400 was needed for repair sills, and wheel arch repair panels.



Because the next step was to do this !!



If you think I'm mad (and you may be right) but this is what I found lurking.
Check out the conglomeration of angle iron on the left !!
There must have been quite a few man hours into the bodge



Cut an inspection hole in the sill so I can brace myself for what is to come.
Hmmmm.....



So this weeks tool quotient is off the scale

• MAP gas blow torch
• Cleco pliers and 20 pins
• Intergrips
• Sheel metal folder

Andy when my estate had the rear wings done the original plan was to split the horizontal flanges and spot weld the new lower wings on but access is very limited so in the end they were welded alone the seam on the out side. I have recently had a saloon done and that was spot welded along the horizontal flanges it was still fiddly but there is far better access in the boot. Good luck. If you come across any inner arch panels I'm in need off an off side one. Also if you look at Seth's build thread for his Oxford it is invaluable lots of helpful info and photos.



forum.retro-rides.org/thread/36042/1970-morris-oxford-odds-filters

Filler on the outside, plenty of cavity wax on the inside? You could hide some of the seam with the chrome trim but you'd have to be really tidy about it if you were using a flexible sealant on the visible side.

well i just ground down, then dual actioned it smooth, then filled and painted. but within days the paint was bubbling up at the porous bits of the weld.

so don't do that