Category Archives: Bodywork

Details of bodywork for the car

Tom’s Car : Started

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Well last night we finally got round to starting work on changing Tom’s chassis.  This time round we are going to try and take the body off the car in one piece so that we haven’t got to worry about lining all the panels back up at the end of it.

To do this we have got 3 editions of Land Rover Monthly, which handily show the the process using a 2 post ramp to remove the body.  while we are reliant on human power we think it can be done.

So last night we carried out the following steps:

  • Removed the 10 M8 x 20 bolts from the rear of the tub to cross member tabs
  • Removed the 4 screws holding the filler neck to the tub
  • Removed the Gear lever
  • Removed handbrake cable
  • Removed front bumper

The next steps will be undoing the other connections between body and chassis such as fixing bolts electricals and ancillaries then looking to remove the wings and bonnet to make the body work removal easier.

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A long needed update

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Well things have been a bit manic recently so updates were last thing on the mind.

But alas here we are April 2015 and here is an update on how things are going.

Ian’s Car – 200tdi 90

Well 12 months since the rebuild finished, its MOT time again.  Car went in for its test Tuesday 7th April.  It failed 😦  The issues were headlights weren’t bright enough, the drivers door wouldn’t open from inside the car.

So all in all not too bad, but the worst item was down as an advisory but actually caused the end of the test.  A UJ in the rear prop had failed to the point where the tester wasn’t willing to carry out deceleration tests.  The prop was unbolted and the UJ’s purchased and replaced.  the prop then bolted back on and boy did it make a difference.

The door not opening was a case of adjustments on the mechanism for the handles just shortened them a bit and opening now much easier.

The headlights were the biggest concern.  As I have high performance bulbs fitted to the car when the tester said they didn’t register on the testing machine.  So reading around the subject points at a burnt out light switch causing poor performance.  The solution is to put a relay feed to the lights.  I purchased a Red Bison Boomslang from Paddockspares for £30 it was a bargain for the entire kit.  I had it fitted in no time and made a massive improvement, its a product I would recommend to anyone.

MOT Retest 18 April 1pm.  Result: Car passed

Jordan’s Series II

Well not much work has been done on the car since November, panels are now painted but not yet fitted to the car.  The accelerator has now been refitted and the car can be driven around.

The main reasons for this is we have been busy working on Jordan’s Discovery 2, which since november has had a number of coolant hoses as it has been loosing coolant and the pressure build up has popped them.  We have now replaced the suspected cause of the coolant loss and so far so good.

Nick’s Discovery

It has been plodding along as normal.  We had a bit of fun while jet washing it ready for MOT when the jet wash smashed the sun roof.  so that has been replaced and the alpine windows have been taken out and covered over.

Matthews Series.

As Matthew has decided he isn’t friends with 2 / 3 of us working on Land Rovers there will be no further updates about his car as we dont see him any more.

New Cars:

Yes we have been joined by two more land rovers that we can enjoy working on.

Daisy The Defender is a 2006 TD5 90, owned by some friends we have had a little bit of work to do on the car already including replacing a failed fuel pump and then adding some new bits such as chequer plate wing tops and a new bumper.  With being such a new car there shouldnt be that much to do on it for now.

Tom’s 300tdi 90, this is going to be our next big project, Toms car is in need of a new chassis, due to the amount of rust it has, we could go down the route of repair pieces but Tom fancies doing a chassis, so one has been ordered so big project ahead for the summer.  There should be plenty of updates on this one.

November Update

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Well after being quiet for a while since we updated the site so here is where we are up to at the moment.  Pictures of the cars will follow soon.

Car 1 –

The last update showed the van sides and roof bolted in place.  Since then we have fixed the inner sills and seat box in place, offered up the floor panels for a fit.

We have also replaced the carb that was originally on the car as when it ran there was a terrible misfire, we now put this down to an assumption the rotor arm moved one direction where it actually went the other so the ignition was only right on 2 cylinders.

With the running sorted we have actually had a short drive around and the engine seems to run very nicely indeed.  Hopefully will add a video to show this soon.

The bonnet has now been rubbed down and ready to paint, with the wings to follow.

Car 2 –

Not much has happened for now with the car still gently running it in driving most days.  We ventured on a 2 hour drive out to Betws-Y-Coed to watch the Cambrian rally in the middle of October, on the way home the car cut out with a diesel leak, eventually we got it home.

On the Sunday after the cause turned out to be the Fuel lift pump, as we revved the engine a mist was seen coming out the bulkhead side.  This was replaced and has run fine since.

We also fitted a pair of Wipac 100w 8″ spot lamps on the front for helping with night time driving on the dark lanes in the area,

That was until today, where got in it this morning and it wouldn’t turn over. Not sure what the issue is at present but will be looking in to it.

Car 4 –

Well progress on this car has moved on a bit now.  Body panels have been repaired painted and refitted, the rear electrics have been fitted.  A set of standard lamps had been fitted but as the owner turned 21 our birthday present to him was a set of wipac LED lamps for front and back.  The issue this has now caused is the need to change from a 2 pin flasher relay to a 4 pin set up.

The hope is to have the car rebuilt and in for MOT by the end of November.

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Car 4 : Update on rebuild

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Well this is a quick update on progress of car 4’s rebuild, there has been so much done to be documented fully.

Front axles rebuilt fully

Chassis rubbed down, repaired & painted

Front & Rear springs replaced with parabolic springs & new shocks fitted

Bulkhead – stripped, repaired, primed, painted, rebuilt & refitted

Front Grill panel – stripped, repaired, primed, painted and refitted

Engine – refurbished, refitted and running.

New exhaust system fitted

Wings & bonnet have been rubbed down primed, painted and fitted

Hopefully we will get a more detailed update with photos soon.

UPDATE:

Over the weekend we did enough work that the engine now fires up using the key and the car has had a short drive around the garden to give it a little test and move around under the car port.

Most of the front electricals have been sorted now.  Side, Dipped, Main and indicator lamps all work, along with the horn.  so left to wire is the washer pump and heater motor.  A rear chassis loom has also been made and will be plugged in tonight and tested for the rear lights.  The next big step is getting the panels all lined up before they get painted and any holes than need drilling can be put in.

Car 2 : Rock Sliders

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Well as the car will be used for off roading at times we decided to make some rock sliders like we had fitted to the car before the rebuild.  We were unable to re use the originals as fitting involved a big sledge hammer to knock one of the fixings in to the rear tubular outrigger.

This time round we got hold of some 80 x 40 3 mm box section, measured the lengths between wheel arches and cut to length.  The fixing for the sliders were to be the tubular outrigger at the back and the bulkhead at the front.

So with some handy extra bits of pipe and 80 mm angle we made the mounting plates and clamped up the sliders, tacking them all together before removing from the car and welding fully.  Handily at the time dads work were prepping a job for galvanizing and the bosses kindly let us put the sliders in with that.

On Friday i got a phone call saying that the sliders had been returned and looked good, so a small job for the weekend was fitting them, also swapping the bolts in the bulkhead over.

As Saturday was a nice sunny day it took all of about 30 minutes to fit them and it looks great, we just need to modify the wheel arch eyebrows to fit correctly.

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Car 2 : Nearing Completion

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Well with few updates recently jobs have been smaller and less noticeable.

Rear lights, we have fitted the remaining rear lights, fog, reverse and number plate lights, also rear number plate.

At the front, we have had the old bumper shot blasted for £20 at Impact Bead Blasting in Wallasey, a great quality finish, that was then spray primed and top coated in black.  A new number plate bolted on and then the bumper bolted to the chassis with the original recovery points.  This required 2 x bumper fixing plates which were britpart items and 4 x M10 x 130mm bolts.

The front lighting was wired in, but we had some faults, this came down to faulty connections in wiring and the fuses, some re soldering and cleaning of the fuse box sorted this out.

Interior, we started refitting the interior of the car, head lining, sun visors, cubby box.  these were all simple bolt in items and fitted in no time.

One of the major jobs was after running the car for a while steam started appearing from the heater matrix and through the vents inside the car.  After  bit of digging found a small hole in the heater matrix radiator which was replaced with Paddocks Spares part – AAP817.  This so far appears to have worked no more steam or leeks.

Most work recently has been taken up with fitting anti theft devices to the car which obviously we don’t want to detail on the blog, but we think they are pretty handy and should deter most people looking to take the car.

Pictures shall be added shortly

The plan for the car is to have in for MOT and tax the first week of May.

Car 1 : Bumper Bank Holiday Update

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Well its been a few weeks since the last updates on the blog and boy have things moved on recently!

With the long bank holiday weekend ahead progress started on Thursday evening, the removal of the tub rear cross member, this has been replaced with a stainless steel and riveted in place.  Also fitted are 3 x britpart tub floor supports and new rear quater pannels from the same material as the tub for car 2.

Then it was time for primer and top coat, as bright as the bulkhead looked the tub shows it off even more but it still looks good.

A second coat will be added then black cappings rivetted back on.

Also the repair for the battery box has been put back in to the seat box.  this will be bolted on to the tub soon.

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Car 2 : Doors closed

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Well we have been working away on the shut lines of the car the last couple of weeks, we weren’t happy with a banana in the sides of the body work, so we unbolted it all and played around with moving the panels.

Firstly we tried moving the tub forward as this was the biggest part we had changed. To get straight involved a 10 mm gap between the rear x member and the tub. This caused problems with appearance and also the door openings.

Next we tried 4 washers between the bulkhead and the outrigger on the near side. This allowed the tub to sit back fully with the doors shut but the bonnet wouldn’t close.

The final solution we came up with was to use 2 washers at the bulkhead and also space the near side wing a little, this allows for good door gaps, the bonnet to open and close without issue. After a bit more tinkering with final positions we tightened it all down and began fitting the door strikers and door seals.

After discussing with my normal parts supplier he said he couldn’t get hold of any AllMakes door seals that were recommended in the mud4fun blog, so for now i will settle with britpart. So on they went too, the fronts appeared to be a good fit, the rear one was a little long so shortened it to suit.

With all the doors shut we then put all the bolts back in and re tested the doors, for now they are a bit stiff but expect this to ease up after a bit of use.

As the weather was nice we also took the chance to paint the new light surrounds and front grill then fitted.

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Next job will be to start working on electrical bits, get all the lights working again.

Car 2 : Half Term Progress

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Well after a few quiet weeks busy with work and other jobs I had a week off so decided to make plenty of progress with the car.

This week we have re fitted the glass in the back of the car, bolted the body work down, wings bolted in place, checker plate riveted back to the wings.

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In the process of putting the off side rear wing in place we noticed a small drip of power steering fluid, so we tightened the pipe a bit more and a couple of minutes later the fluid was pouring out.

After a small amount of investigation we noticed a split in the metal hose, so a trip to the parts supplier resulted in the purchase of NTC8861 which is a hose from a 4 bolt power steering box instead of the 3 i have fitted.  Initially the new hose wouldn’t fit but after a small adaptation with a grinder the pipe fitted and refilled with no issues.

The photo below shows the new pipe fitted.

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After putting time in over the week we feel we have made some big progress and hopefully carry on with the refitting of the doors and bonnet so will look even better then.

Sunday progress

Well we rebuilt and returned the doors to the car today and it really looks like its getting there.

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We also fitted the bonnet back on

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Next up we are going to loosen everything up a bit and correct alignment, the tub is slightly wonky so the doors look out of line so we will correct this and hopefully realign right

Car 2 : Door Repairs

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Well after a couple of weeks work we have finished doing the metal repairs to the doors.

Where needed the doors have had the rusty frame cut out and replaced with home made sections.

The N/S door was in need of a lot of work we replaced almost half the frame.

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The O/S door only required the bottom replacing

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The Rear door was a little rusty plus also bent from a small collision a couple of years ago with a metal bollard.  The rear door also had its main skin replaced as it was in too bad a state and not too expensive to buy.

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The front doors could do with new skins in time but the best price that we can find at the moment is £114 each, so it may be a plan in the future to make some ourselves.

Soon we will be prepping the doors for painting then can be taken to the car after being built up again.