Oh dear, what on earth have I done?

You might also get some use out of that 11mm spanner now

 

7/16 ths surely

 

Yes

 

I've fitted the new clutch slave cylinder and driven it a few hundred yards up to my mate with a ramp , the good news is that it's as solid as a rock underneath. It also has new brakes, brake pipes, hoses and trunions fitted so mechanically sound. The structural points are excellent and the knackered inner front wing is mainly cosmetic.

Next up is removal of the interior and begin from the back end by welding in new rear arches and tidying up the doors. The inner arches and tubs are remarkably sound and will just require a small amount of work where they meet the outer arches. I'll let you know how I get on.

 

Will you be starting a resto thread fella?
It’s always interesting to see something different

 

Yes, why not. I'll document progess as I go along

 

I’ll look forward to following along

 

I had one of these years ago

 

Isn’t this it

 

It probably is to be fair Ray

 

I was marina mad, but I'm on medication now..

Bon courage with the ital, super car

Sent from my ART-L29 using Tapatalk

 

So, I've been doing some jobs on the Ital over the past few weeks starting with the doors. Both rear doors are perfect, the NSF door has a small amount of rust and the OSF door needs some welding. The elephant in the room is that when fully restored these cars are virtually worthless, maybe £2500 max, and the price of panels is the same if not dearer than a Bay. That means some creativity needs to applied, I'm not going to spend £1800 on panels so I'll have to do some fabrication and use some fibreglass which is what I've done with the NSF door to get me off the mark.

 

Next up was the NSR wheelarch, to do a "proper" job needed £450 of panels so I've patched it and made a new lip. I'm working aound the body in a clockwise direction starting here, just making it solid and painting red oxide over it, once all four corners are done I'll do the filling and fettling prior to paint.

 

This week I've started the NSF. The front is the worst part of the car with large amounts of metal missing. It took some head scratching and looking at pictures to work out what it's all supposed to look like but I'm confident that I'll be pretty close. Again the proper way of doing things would be to cut of the wings but they're virtually unobtainable so I'm having to leave them on and make the best of them. The photos show the front where part of the valence and the wing have disappeared along with parts of the inner wing.

Fortune is on my side however as the strucural parts of the inner wing are solid and most of the valence and lower wing is covered up by a huge 1980's bumper, grille and spoiler so I haven't got to be perfect with the shape, literally make it solid.

 

First up was to bite the bullet and cut out the rotten inner wing areas, I then fabricated the headlamp panel which acts as a datum for the rest as the position of the panel determines the position of the headlamp and grillle. I fiited it to the front and then tacked the first part in behind it and then made the other parts as I went. I've got one more piece to tack into place but I've run out of gas so It'll be next week.

I'm confident that it'll look ok and it's solid but my worry is the wings as there's not a lot to weld to, it's probably going to be fibreglass and the inevitable paint bubbles in a few years time.

 

Good work..
At least you saving it for the future..