Doogs

So the rolla is now undercover at another mates place and has been for a week now. Due to it sitting in the rain at my other mates, water got under the primer on the bonnet and it blistered up :hmm: . This meant it was critical for me to strip the bonnet bare, and so I have. From here we also removed the rear screen and dropped the rear corner of the headlining so we could beat out a dent in the roof. Whilst sanding the roof I found a few splotches of rust, so this was stripped bare as well. From there we decided to start sanding the rear 1/4s and found that the left side had a hit in the past, and was filled with bog that was not adhearing well. My mate guessed that judging from the repair and paint we found this was done in the 80s. We have decided not to risk painting over the numerous layers of paint on the car (some mine and some prior) and have begun to strip the car to original paint and bare steel. (We trust the original stuff a little more than later aplications). So I'm slowly heading back to square-one :blinks: We have also established that the car must have had a reasonable hit in the back. We decided this after inspecting the dents on both sides of the back of the car, the back valence panel, and the misalignment problems with the new bootlid. This will require a bit of careful work with a slide hammer, and sadly lengthens the project further. Although once again time spent sorting these issues will help produce a good final result. It's a frustrating process undo-ing all my previous hard work, but it has to be done to get things right. I'm trying to relish the opportunity I have learing from my mate, and develop my skills as much as I can. The bottom drivers hinge has also now been re-built because it had too much slop, like the top one. An example of the rust under the paint; Rebuilt hinge;

Let me know what you decide on doing. If I'm free I will finally come down for a meet and greet.

He is still using the 5k... Just doing a few more trick mods to it. I really don't understand why you are complaining mate. "CT09 and 7K EFI, so that'll be going onto a 5K fitted with 4AGE pistons and rods, along with a 3KB head" Sounds pretty good to me !

If you are willing to fork out the dough, get them "jet hot" ceramic coated. It will drop the engine bay temperature a shitload.

I can't beleive I have missed this thread !Great work mate, I love your attention to detail. :jamie: I'm looking forward to seeing this completed, keep at it.

Thanks Matt, will be watching closely to see how you go. I think it will be the logical diff upgrade for me down the track, when things start to break.

Tonight I went round to a mates place so I could use his Lathe and rebuild the flogged out door hinge. Once dis-assembled I found that the shaft was worn and grooved, and so were the nylon bushes. I expect this is what was causing all the play in the hinge. To fix this I made up two new brass bushes and a new shaft to hold it all together. I'm pretty happy with the result and hopefully the problem is now fixed. Old setup dis-assembled; New brass bushes; New assembly;

Pain in the arse isn't it! With a bit of patient adjustment things should improve. You might find that once you have adjusted all you can, a little bit of careful bending will help too. My car is just the same.

Nice one! Interesting little runabout that goes alright, for not much. Like the job on the airbox.

Yeah they are not a bad option, it's a rarespares one and it was about $50. This said, because they are from rares they don't fit perfectly and are not cheap ! Thankfully it was not too much trouble to fit, because of where we chose to take the cut.

Yeah it does help morale when it actually has a few panels hanging !

On my 20 I used a wire wheel on an angle grinder. A slightly worn out one is perfect, because then it fits right into the gutters.

Good progress Matt, I didn't realise you were going for the diff upgrade too. Top stuff ! ;) Does the R31 diff require shortening to fit ? What's the width difference between it and your standard diff ? Cheers

G'day people, The repair section is now welded into the gaurd, and the repair is looking far better than previous attempts. Unfortunately the donor gaurd I bought does not line up all that well on my car, when you have the door hung. This meant we chose to use the original gaurd. The rear frame on the original was quite rusted out, so we had to weld in the frame from the new gaurd and then the rares-repair section. This was quite time consuming but has reaped quite a good result. We have spent quite a bit of time so far gapping panels up and twisting/bending to make things sit nicely. I beleive this will end up with a far better final result. I'm really learning some great tricks of the trade from my mate from our work so far. ;) Excuse my mate's guestures! lol Prior to gapping/adjusting Drivers door re-hung I have found that there is quite a bit of play in the drivers hinge, so this will need to be replaced or the hinge re-built. I spent time hanging the door and getting the lineup right, only for it to drop 10mm on me ! It's a tedious process but worthwhile.. Hopefully we will be back at it next weekend.

Bugger about the defect mate, love the style you have going on. Hope you get it cleared soon and back on the road.

Good to see you have got yourself another project, keen to find out what running gear you are planning. Will be watching this build.

Sweet, you will have a bit of a harder time killing that one. Don't stop trying though !:)

Looks like bags of fun mate, keen to see skid vids when you are up to that stage !

Unfortunately this weekend was far less productive than I expected. My mates shed is full and so we were forced to work in the driveway. In typical Melbourne style we were battling with showers on and off all Saturday. All we acheived was a bit of "gapping up" panels and we popped out the front screen. My car now sits in his front yard covered in a shitty car cover, with at least an inch of water in the footwells :). Geeeee I hope he got around to pulling the drain plugs out today... Hopefully we have better days of progress to come.

Hinges have since been primed and I have worked at getting the new left gaurd straight. I have also bought a Rarespares patch section for the base of the gaurd. My spraypainter mate came round on Saturday and thankfully he was happy with what he saw ! (phew) The plan now is for me to re-hang the left door, and we will weld in the new gaurd section after checking alignment with the door. From here we will spend the rest of the weekend going over a few areas he pointed out to me and then hit it all with the final lot of primer. My mate has said we will leave the car for 2-3 weeks after primer to allow it to dry a bit, because apparantley it is helpful for the primer to oxidise a little before topcoat. He has almost conviced me to lay a bit of pearl over the white to add a subtle twist, but not make the car look to outrageous and out there. My only worry is it might turn out like some disgusting riced Magna etc with a terrible pearl job. :) Having said this, I trust his skills and I think using a flat/true white instead of a cream/off white will help this. I understand this will make future touchups more challenging but I think it's a sacrifice I'm willing to take. I'm starting to get excited now ! ;) :D Hopefully will look shit hot when we are done. :wink:

Start here.

The 5k sounds like a good option. A Subaru boxer conversion would be quite a big job...

Have you thought about rigging up a reserve tank ? When borrowing a mates compressor I have sometimes had another bottle hooked up, it makes a huge difference. Just an old oxy bottle or gas bottle does the trick.

Hahahahaha lol Another reason for me to get my car ready asap ! :happy: True, when they are left for dead at the lights/on the strip who's laughing then ?!

Sounds good mate, keen to see the pics. What are your plans for the driveline ? Standard cruiser, worked K motor, or something more serious ? Cheers, Dougal