Thanks for the hints. I plan on making some toolboxes and other handy trinkets before having a go on the van. I've managed a few captive nuts and other bits so far. Is the sliding door a good or bad first little project? I guess good for easy access, bad for big flat bit of steel. It is in desperate need of doing and won't lead to a far bigger project. I don't think I'll have loads of time this winter for a full on project, but want to be able to hit the ground running next winter. Anyway I'll stop hijacking your thread and start a new one when I've cleared some space in the garage.
I started repairing the rotten drivers side step as well........had to chop out most of the top section as it was pretty much rotted completely......just about salvaged enough of it to use as a template lol welded that up quite nicely and then cut a four inch section out of the side and replaced that too. Was just about to repair a couple of large holes in the side of it when my Mrs decided that she'd suffered enough being a project widow for one day and called time, so hopefully get that wrapped up tomorrow at some point soon as that's done I can one-piece the bumper, steps and overriders and strip it all back to bare metal and let the patina process begin
if its just the skin its not too tricky...just easy to warp The panel by getting impatient and putting too much heat into it. I took a whole afternoon with mine and still got a couple of ripples in it lol the inner bottom repair is a bit more fiddly to get right, but still doable for a novice (as I was when I tackled it lol) I keep saying it but a large chunk of it is confidence to try...if you have a fairly practical mind and reasonable problem solving abilities you'll be alright
This^^^ I always think taking a brave pill and start cutting is biggest part. Then just learn by doing that's what I'm doing although I'm not quite at Luis' level
yep, that about sums it up.....you'd be surprised how creative your brain can get once you chop up bits of your bus and there's no turning back lol I still think 'you sure you mean me?!' when people say nice things about my work lol I look at it very critically and only see with hindsight how I should have done it I guess
stripped, tacked up and ready to weld it all together tomorrow afternoon still some.fine tuning to do to get it positioned right but there's some adjustment in the step mounts and what I have planned to mount the main bumper so should iron out ok
looking to get the front bumper knocked on the head this afternoon, then I can have a look at the job I've been most looking forward to....and dreading in equal measure.....modifying the rear vents lol gonna be a right arse of a job I reckon but will be the most noticeable change so it'll be interesting if nothing else
no progress for a few days as my gas bottle finally ran out lol sorted out a credit account with BOC now though and picked up a fresh one yesterday, and have two weeks off work after today so it'll be all systems go again feel like the end is in sight now, only the arches, vents and roof to sort out then its scruffy but mot worthy need to get it finished as I have some paid work in the pipeline for next month
front bumper one pieced and mounted today.....i love it! decided to have a crack at the roof, since it seems to be in demand lol made a corner repair from segments of a straight repair section welded together and then beaten into shape.....wasn't too tricky really and went in ok, just needs a skim of filler to shape it up. Let in straight section too. Turns out most of the inner frame is not too bad, few holes where the outer had gone but the rest was alright so I patched where needed.
Weekend with the fam so not much happening, but hoping to tackle the other roof corner tomorrow. Made card templates for the side I've done so plan is to reuse them for the sections of the other one. Had I known how simple it was, I would've repaired it ages ago....before it got as bad as it is lol just spoken to the cabinet maker fella, and he wants me to build him a spray booth this week and he said he'd take a look at some ideas I have for furniture etc and prototype one of them for me so that's pretty exciting Finished off my website last night, so that's ready to go, and my new dickies company workwear arrived from the states all embroidered up and looking good ....too good in fact to ruin with welding spatter and grinding burns hahaha I've got one of the shirts on now to go out in
the gutters are rock solid....just surface rust, so I just had to cut out the skin about 3 mm above them to give a flange to weld the repair to took about an hour and a half to do the bits in the above pics
the original plan was to try and blend the new and old stuff. Problem now is that there's so much new panel to blend its gonna be really difficult, so I'm thinking to respray the whole bus using a satin finish paint, and have the bumpers, front grille and brightwork rusty bare metal to give it a patina feel in a different way. Planning on painted signwriting for the panel sides too