19?? chrysler sunbeam no 2 (+½ )

Fantastic effort as always, you've got my vote in the voting booth

using yesterdays shoddy fabrication as a template i cut out new lip and clamped it in position.






same wing another profile






roughly marked out





roughly chopped out





after several attempts i used a bit of mdf and a hammer to put some shape in for the arch








i bashed the curve you can see above flat and then tacked the two peices together in situ

notice the perfect fit in the first pic and the rapidly expanding gap in the next few (i didn't ;D)







i then tacked the outside, ran a few beads on the inside to keep it stable, seam welded the outside and ground it flush.

on refitting i became apparent i had made a bit of an error somewhere .

the vertical joins had gone from flush to 5mm in places






area cleaned off with a wire wheel and weld/zinc primer liberally applied to the insides.










i had intended to stop here but i faffed about for so long the paint was touch dry (ish)

so i offered it up and marked the arch lip using the inner panel as a reference and chopped it to size.





i had come this far so tacked the repair in place and started seam welding it.





looks curse word in the pic but was quite pleased with this bit





bridging the huge gap meant huge lumpy welds.

this looks rubbish in the pic because it is.





the least said about this bit, the better






i started grinding back the welds.

the huge blobs of weld made progress very slow.

about 3 hours later this was as far as i got






deaf, dusty and with frozen feet i gave up and went home

not the greatest in fabrication techniques but it looks to be a bit better than the repair to the other side




total time spent (i really need to go christmas shopping ) 215.5 hours


total spend £1505ish (i really need to go christmas shopping )

mechanics with a small bodyshop 2 doors down.

they chuck everything in the communal metal 'skip', an old water tank the local 'travelling recyclers' empty once a week if i don't get there first

my rummaging has been noticed , as the bodyman has started offering me the larger offcuts from new panels

I think the using of other panels, is really resourceful, at the end of the day the repair will be just as good and it takes less time to fabricate, and it is recycling to, so everyone is a winner

Perhaps you should start a thread showing which wings etc offer the most useful patch panels

mine too

yesterdays update was delayed due to the pub ;D

I haven't been able to do the update until now because of the wine after the pub. I feel a bit unwell


yesterday a few christmas treats arrived, mostly for the braking system.




I gave the repair a bit more grinding and welded a patch into the last hole.






doesn't look too bad here. a bit of a low spot near the bottom of the arch a I have somehow left a step in the join between the large and small repairs


all extra material trimmed of , all ground to size and holes drilled for puddle welding








welding finished ,ground back then primer thrown at it (to see what it looks like)









not great really, but should be salvageable with filler.

but its a lot better than the other side , and it looks perfect from 5m (in low light conditions ;D )





thats all for now, I will update time/money and replies later (last minute shopping )


edit/

back from shopping, xmas eve curry, pub, xmas breakfast, helping cook lunch for 11 and then helping eat it ;D


total time spent (left it a bit late for xmas shopping : 218.5 hours


total spend £1535ish (not including exessive amounts of epoxy primer)

/edit

I was a bit unsure about the recent repair, but as you went along it got better, The end result is not too shabby at all and a sensible application of filler and probably stonechip paint because of where it is should see it become an invisible repair.

Besides, the end plan is to drive this, not put it in on a pedestal and polish it every day.

Repair looks good, nowt wrong with a skim of filler aslong as its over solid metal.

Matt

sorry for not updating/replying sooner guys:-/

family orders at christmas meant no time for play.

then my daughter got a fairly extreme dose of chicken pox (and I got the night shifts )

what little time I had spare was used up playing catchup with work I should have done before xmas

I hope to get started again soon

only progress made is via online/local shopping

job lot of exhausts parts including enough stainless to hopefully build something for the 'beam (£20 from tcs performance, nice chaps )




4 litres of jotamastic epoxy mastic primer from shepherdmarine £90
great service, sent overnight to get to me on xmas eve + free mouse mat ;D