Bless ya dude --------------------------------------- So today was a bit of a tail chasing mission to start with... tried to borrow a plasma cutter, which I could have, but it was a 3 phase unit bugger, as I've only got single here!! So I've ordered the cheapy £200 one off ebay, so I'll let you all know how well it works!! Should be here tomorrow, or wednesday Then my local nuts n bolts place also was a missive fail on 4mm rivets... only had 4.8mm ones which is a massive overkill... so I had to run up to edinburgh for the local screwfix... so after that I pulled the inner/middle roof section out, drilled out all of the old rivets, replaced them with new ones, and then flipped the panel over to have a look at the frame work some previous attempts at fixing the breaks fish plate (1 of 6 to go in) so that's it for today, we shall have to see what tomorrow brings now!!
So the plasma cutter turned up today And tbh, for a chinese copy, the Giant Cut40 is a nice little machine... even came pre-fitted with a 16amp plug!! 20 minutes later (after I'd assembled it) saw the van looking like this: Whilst waiting on the plasma I got some prep done on the pop top proper mission getting the evostick off Started getting the new bellows attached, but had a bit of an issue with where the lifting arms go through the fabric... old fabric is 69.5ins for the lifting arms, new fabric is 71.25ins... so I've got some working out to do!! more tomorrow
Getting back to where I was nearly a week ago Aiming to have all of the welding finished off by the end of play tomorrow... Getting all of the jobs ticked off now... next I'll be throwing some paint on the chassis, and some epoxy primer on the body once it's had a quick skim of filler
todays update... front panel all welded in had a quick clean back and popped on some primer then I fired up the plasma and cut myself a length of plate... and cut out the badge mount Then I fired up the plasma again and cut a nice circle of steel to go in all welded in As it was getting late, I got the pop top out and got on with getting the canvas fitted... you can see the fish plates I made up in this pic... riveted on all on... just got to sort the outer frame, then that can be riveted on, and the whole lot can be bonded into the roof cap!!
I was wishing for a plasma cutter today whilst taking the outrigger jacking point and top hat out in pieces with the cutting disc My compressor wouldent be up to the job im sure and the larger one i was offerd for free got given to the scrap men before i collected it
So as the weather was a bit up n down today, I shifted the roof cap up into my old mans workshop so I could get it all bonded!! At this point I'd already finished paint stripping the outer frame, and attached it to the roof canvas... I then forgot to photo the seam sealer/bonding adhesive in place on the roof... although I did find it particularly annoying that you only get one tube when you really need 3 to 4... Bit poor considering your spending around £400 All together, frame bolted through the cap to hold it all together plus a few bags of cement to get the bonding compressed nicely more tomorrow
So some more progress Decided that as the welding was 99% finished that I'd crack on and get some of the chassis painted... still got a bit of underseal to pull out of the arches, and some of the chassis rail... Before: you can see the seam sealer in this pic After: Quite glossy looking, but it'll end up a satin finish once it's dried off nicely!! I think tomorrow, I'll be doing some fillering
Just read your resto thread from the begining, I can't believe how much you have done in just 4 months. Your really cracking through it, top quality work too. Looking forward to more updates.
so no fillering, but I did get the front bumper mounted, and the new indicators fitted up!! Plus a good chunk of the old underseal scraped off!!
My project van's got indicators mounted in the front bumper. I'm just about to go the other way and fill them in ;D
