Mk1 VW LT 35 Tipper Truck 'Lucky Lloyd'

This just gets better and better for me. The workmanship you are putting into this is nothing short of incredible, the effort is second to none. I genuinely hope that you take Lloyd to a show somewhere when you've finished as I'd love to see the truck sometime.

Dan,
I've come to the conclusion that, if I could attain 1/4 of your skills I'd be both satisfied and much, much better than I can achieve at present,
I always try to improve with each task I attempt but you Sir are in a different league,
As usual, looking forward to seeing future updates,
Nigel

Few bits of rust coming back through on the Astra, so this is definitely the right way to do it

Excellent work!

Thanks Rian....appreciated as always 👍

Wow...thanks for the great feedback 👍

My plans for Lloyd once it's finished is to use it as a working truck.....but meticulously look after it. Originally, this was all meant to be a quick tidy up and back out of the door. But....as this thread demonstrates, that didn't happen. 
But.....as I've gone so far with it, it would be a shame to not to show it off. So....I will be taking Lloyd to the odd show.....if they'll have have him. I'd definitely like to take Lloyd to one of the Retro Rides shows as this is where most would know what  its all about. But looking at footage of previous shows, there doesn't seem to be a commercial vehicle section......so I think it might look out of place 😁😁😁.
Anyway.....I do hope that you'll get to see it in the 'flesh' one day....and when you do, I hope it meets your expectations. Plus.....come and find me and we'll have a chat over a pint or something 👍

Saying that.....I've got to finish it first!!! 😂😂
 
Dan


Thanks .....I've seen your work, so your comment really means a lot 👍

Hi Nigel,

Thanks for compliments....appreciated as always. 

Well.....my advice would be to stick at it.....and it sounds a bit soppy, but always believe you can do it. The worst that can happen is that you'll have to re-do something.
Your comments humble me, as there's so many talented and skilled people within the pages of Retro Rides. I quite often think I could of done better on certain things that I've done....but I suppose hindsight's a wonderful thing.
Anyway....more updates soon 👍

Dan

Cheers,,,,again, after now reading through the majority of your thread, comments like these are genuinely humbling. 👍

Dan


You've caught me out!!! 😂. What is disappointing though, is when I do get time time watch T.V......it's a documentary on flipping IKEA!!!!! 😂😂

Right....update time.

I've had a lot of distraction's over the last month or so.....and not good one's either. So as a result, I've had to temporarily stop all work on the truck. Hopefully....fingers crossed, I should be able to get back to it this side of Christmas.

In the meantime, there's still a load of updates to catch up with. 

As I've mentioned before, the updates/pictures are not being brought to you in the order that I did the work in. So please ignore the irregularities. 

Now, when I cut the front wheel arch off on the passenger side, the inner arch came with it as it was so rotten. This was going to be a nightmare to fabricate.....something I wasn't looking forward to. In the meantime, I set about looking for an outer arch panel as these are readily available on line. Whilst searching, I happened upon a company called 'Car Body Panels For U'. They listed an arch panel complete with the step. Now, the panels I'd seen before this were sold as a separate arch and step panel. So having a complete panel was a bonus. It was expensive....but I bought it.... and waited.....and waited.....and waited some more. After nearly three weeks of no contact from Car Panels For U, I received an email saying that my panel would be with me in two weeks time. Cut a long story short....but after another three weeks and a lot of hassle....the panel turned up.
I was unhappy with the service that the company provided, but at least I had the panel. Once I got the parcel home, I cut open the packaging....and had a great surprise!!
Not only was the panel a complete arch and step, but it also included the inner arch as well!!!!!........Pimm's O clock!!!
It was worth all the hassle after all.

Not the best quality of panels.....but a panel nonetheless.....








I wasn't happy with how the two sections were welded together. There were little blob welds all the way round. Plus, I could see that there was surface rust on the inside.
 
So to start with, a trial fit..... 













It wasn't bad.....but it did need a lot of adjustment.

In this picture, it shows how far out the fit is, The outer tab on the new panel should be in line/touching the the rusty bit of door shut that can be seen next to it.....





So, to make things easier, I separated the outer arch from the inner....
























Both parts went into my de-rusting solution for a good soak.


While that was happening, I cracked on with the door shut repair.

For this, I'll let the pictures do the talking.....















































































I'll just explain what's going on in the next few pictures.....

I needed to put a small reinforcement 'dent' into the panel. So I cut a 'V' into the side of a piece of wood.







Put the panel in line with the cut.....







It was then hit with a hammer and blunt chisel.....to produce the 'dent' you can now see in it in the next picture....

























A bit of protection to the inside......and then weld it in.......






















The small panel with the 'dent' in gets put in a little later.



Well......that's all for now. Hopefully not too long before the next update.

As always, thanks for looking.

Dan.

Bonus inner arch!

Living the dream.

A few weeks ago, I found someone breaking exactly the same truck as mine locally on Facebook. So I went along to grab a few parts. The truck cab had less than half the rot mine had....and it was going to be scrapped. The chassis was just as rotten as mine though.

Thanks for all your kind words there Rian...appreciated as always 👍
The little dent that I put into the newly fabricated panel was to reinforce the panel. A detail that won't be seen and maybe wasn't 100% necessary. There's a series of these little dents running up the entire length of the panel that was being repaired. In a few of the pictures, you can just about make out another little dent just above the repaired area. If you were to fold a piece steel to 90 degrees, you can fairly easily bend it back again. Putting a crease or dent in the fold will make it more difficult to bend back 👍
Dan.

When I was a kiddie mums car went through a time when the carb kept getting blocked and we had to keep taking the lid off to clean the jets.
So I'm doing this again one dark night so mum can go off to work the following morning. I've got the top off, I'm leaning over it looking for crud in the float bowl and thought that would be an excellent time to give the accelerator pump a damn good push. Got a good face full of petrol and got dragged off to casualty by my dad to get my eyes swilled out. It stings. I didn't do it again.

Great work by the way. I reckon you could do that with your eyes closed...