S2 Restoration Options.

[Twenny Benson]

Cheers dude

[quattrostyle]

respect for your work

[Twenny Benson]

respect for your work

Thanks mate

The first floor repair section is pretty much fully welded where it needs to be now, I was cautious to take my time as I'm worried of warping the panels. Welding thin stuff is a whole different game to welding fat section stuff. Here is what the finished weld looks like.....



Not massively pretty but it has penetrated through to the other side nicely so I'm happy its as solid as it can be. I will dress the weld down when I exchange grinder number 3 under warranty!

In between welding small spots at a time I turned my attention to finishing the sill prep. There is a bit of surface rust that has pitted the metal so still deciding what to do with that, I could POR15 it or cut it out!?! Anyway it had suffered the usual jack damage and a little transport damage


Jack damage





Transit damage





This one is nasty because you will easily see this on the car, the dent aint to bad but the crease to the swage line will be visible from a far, so I broke out the hammers & dollies and started tapping them out







Gone! well good enough you wont see it anyway

I've made a start on the jack damage buts its tricky cause you can't the hammers in there to knock the metal out, slight improvisation and over enthusiasm!



More work required! It will get there eventually, I guess you have to tread carefully to not overly stretch the metal but I can't leave dents in it!

I've resided to the fact this will take ages and I thought I would have got alot more done this week, hours just turn into minutes. Good job I'm enjoying it really!

[Twenny Benson]

Slow progress update. I haven't been feeling 100% for a while, just about over it now I think as my strength is slowly returning.

So almost there with the sill dents, been bashing away.

This end I have finished to a point I can live with, it wasn't to bad anyway.





The dent in the middle is pretty much there now





The problem end is starting to play ball but still requires more work!





So enough of the tin bashin

Back to the shell, I've made a start at the front floorpan replacement, removed a section from the CQ



After taking some measurements something wasn't right, after a quick check with the floor cross members it was obvious the 6 speed tunnels are different from the 5 speed!



So quick headscratch, I trimmed down the replacement piece and was left with this



Marked out the floor pan and started trimming it away.



You can see the end of the floor pan rib here, this extended right into the rear half of the floorpan on the Coupe, much shorter on my ABY. I once again lost my breakfast when I saw the state of the A pillar behind the floorpan





Errr thats a bit worrying, it should look like this



I really am starting to wonder what happened to this car and how bad the smash was that resulted in these half arsed repairs. I found the reason why the sill was filling up with water which has caused most of these issues, the front driver side sunroof drain wasn't connected to the outlet grommet in the A pillar, the outlet was plugged with a regular grommet and the drain left dangling inside the A pillar to fill the sill with water! Nice one.

So what to do about the inner A pillar??? Do I deconstruct the A pillar and repair it all or just hammer it into shape the best I can with the limited access and live with it, no doubt it has lost some of its structural integrity as it is. To put this right will require alot of structurally invasive work, more than I had planned for anyway. She will never be a show queen, in all honesty it will just get the crap flogged out of it everytime it gets driven so is it worth the time & effort to put it 100% right?

[Error404]

nice pussy

I think the question really is can you live with it knowing its there?
No-one else will ever know except you. Things like that grate on me when I know about them, even if they;re hidden. That's why i started stripping mine previously, and why one day i will replace both sills and outer rear arch tubs as i know they are not right... i only did a quick fix to stop them corroding any more

[Twenny Benson]

The cat is 22 years old, deaf, almost toothless constantly barb'ed up so he doesn't have a seizure and follows me everywhere I go, thats why he's always in the background of most of my pic's! Because he's deaf the grinder, MIG or metal bashing doesn't scare him off! He would happily sit in the shell while I cut it up if I let him. Gets right on my ****!

I have a feeling trying to replace the inner A pillar for some straight metalwork will be a reet headache, nothing is going to lineup, the picture doesn't really show how badly dented the whole area is, but your right, now I know its pretty fooked it will do my head in if I don't put it right. I guess I better start bracing this shell up properly before cutting anymore out of it.

On another note, replacing your rear outer wheel tubs will be a challenge & a half with the rear quarters in place, not sure how you would pull that off to be honest, that said my skills are fairly limited!

[AndyP]

that said my skills are fairly limited!

I think looking at what you've achieved so far, that may be a bit of an understatement

[andy10v]

This is really interesting to see what is under the skin.

Keep up the good work!

[geryS2]

huge respect for your work !

that takes some courage, impressive, keep on man !

[newsh]

Good work dude

[Twenny Benson]

I think looking at what you've achieved so far, that may be a bit of an understatement

Well I've only really taken it apart thus far, bar one piece of metal lets see what it looks like when it starts to go back together

This is really interesting to see what is under the skin.

Keep up the good work!

Cheers Pal

If i'm honest I find it a little scary how basic it all is, it comes apart quite swiftly once you've found all the spot welds, the brazing is a bit of pig to deal with but I think I've found a work around~ish.

huge respect for your work !

that takes some courage, impressive, keep on man !

Thank you for the kind words, I must admit it is a little nerve wrecking taking a cutting disc to the floor of your car especially if you've never done it before. I just hope it comes back together OK.

Good work dude

Cheers fella

[Twenny Benson]

Quick Update

Progress has been slow, I have just about shook off this winter virus thing knocking about, I'm about a stone lighter now and just about back to full strength, one bonus is I've not had a cigarette in ages and have decided to not bother with them anymore! So bit more money to splash out on the rot box, so no more twenny Bensons for me.

Anyway, progress.......

After finding the bent as fook A pillar, I've removed all the pieces from the donor. Its a shame I plasma'd me way through it really, nevermind.



I thought it was a good idea to put as much back into the floor pan as possible so the whole thing isn't twisted. So I chopped my floor pan piece in half and fitted up one section.



I left a little window in the floor so I can replace the A pillar metal work when the time comes



I also tacked in the floor cross member to try and keep it in shape





I will remove the cross member again when the A pillar is sorted and weld in the other floor pan piece and dress it all back in one go, I have to admitt dressing welds is one thing I hate doing for some reason, especially when the metal is only 0.8mm thick.

Right now before I take the A pillar apart I thought it would be a good idea to sort the B pillar out, I had mentioned previously the B pillar is floating, surprised no one picked up on that! So chopped part of the sill out





Cleaned it all up





I think the flanges need some attention before I can close this section up, you can see the cowboys had a go at fixing the flanges and this is what I meant by a floating B pillar!



Smooth ****ing idiots had used buckets full of filler in attempt to hold it all together :corey:

So the plan is to cut the lower section of the B pillar off and replace it with another piece from the donor as well as some of the flange. I'm still undecided how to preceed with the A pillar repairs as you have to remove some of the inner wing to access the spot welds, very destructive indeed and alignment is a big concern. We will see I guess. I'm hoping now I'm well again to make some real progress to get the car winter proof, the constant rain is certainly slowing me down.

And thats it, slowly slowly catchee monkey

[Error404]

well done dude, you're making good progress. Each bit of rot you cout of and replace is a step closer to getting it all back together, properly this time
Shocking to see the quality of work that some (most?) body shops will turn out - this had to h\ave been an insurance claim job when it was originally "repaired" which is even more worrying, you would expect it for a cheap cash job :corey:

What is you plan once you've sorted the rot out dude? Will the shell be dipped and coated?

[Twenny Benson]

It is rather scary to think the pro's obviously classed this as repaired! I've know doubt that time & the ingress of water have played there part but that was also down to there shoddy efforts. I'm just glad that DJH donated the CQ shell otherwise I have no doubt I would have scrapped it, so big thanks once again dude.

As far getting the shell dipped, E coated & epoxy primed, not sure. It's a hell of alot of money to throw at the car and money I would never see again. I agree its the right way to restore something but the costs are hard to swallow. This car will need some suspension and brake mods before its trackable and before you know it your edging towards a big budget build, something I've always planned to avoid and besides if it ends up being too nice I won't thrash the life out it on a track which is one of the primary reasons for doing all this. I guess I will cross that bridge when it comes to it.

[Error404]

/\ Cool - I always say have a plan and stick to it

Once you get liberal with the cavity wax and seam sealer, should be fine.
I'm assuming the other side if the car is ok? Just the driver side that's been snaffled by the tin worm?