Spitfire Total Rebuild!

sogood wrote: »

Hi croppy and thanks for the response. I have since gotten a small mig welder and am experimenting with it, getting a feel for it and its' operation.

So far sogood, although I'm nowhere near ready to start any actual work on the car, still finishing off another project. So many restos, so little time.......

And of course, keep up the good work!

I've only started experimenting myself with the MIG welder recently. Just spotting panels on and tacking things together until my neighbour is free to weld it up properly for me. It gives me a bit more freedom in that I can get things mocked up and in place in my own time and then get him to do the proper job on it.

Its very hard trying to avoid burning holes in what is very thin metal! :rolleyes: But, inevitably holes do appear and then trying to chase them and fill them up! :mad:

Ah, best left to the expert!

So, the boot floor and rear valance!


Major body work almost at an end, just a few more jobs to tackle!




^ Rear valance I suppose wasnt the worse, had some patches, a few holes, holes of filler and some rust for good measure, but, seen as I had a practically new one that was salvaged I decided to rip out the old one and replace with the 'new'



^ 'Twould tap out I 'spose!





^ Not much to talk about really. The bulk of the old one was chopped out then the spot welds drilled and the new one, after being cleaned up was put in place. Fit was pretty good and as I still had the original rear light panel in place I was pretty sure everything was good! Here the new panel can be seen in for a dry test fit.




^ Original boot floor; not so good! Again, I suppose with time and effort it could have been saved! It was rusted around the inner arches, had patches and, as can be seen from the pic below......




^....the bumper iron bracket came away, along with a section of the floor with just a little wiggle!!




^ Luckily however I had a 'new' salvaged boot floor; however, this unfortunately had also been attacked 'chain saw massacre' style with an angle grinder *sigh* to the driver side and was missing a section. But, not to worry.




^ Old boot floor cut out, leaving just a lip of the original floor upon which the new floor would sit.




^ Dry fit not looking too bad!




^ A missing section of the original boot floor lip welded in place. This lip would later be cut back to approx 15mm or so.





Then, while waiting for the boot floor to be welded in I tackled the driver side wing!



^ Given a final coat of rust primer and then the weld areas cleaned back to bare metal.



^ Inside of the wing was also given an extra coating of rust primer on the lower sections and then a good dollop of Dinitrol seam sealer around the wheel arch to hopefully create a little bit of a seal between panels. Of course, these can be sealed up later from inside the car.



^ Wing spotted on and welder in the boot tacking the floor in place.




^ Spun over to get at the underside of the bootfloor and weld it along the lip of the original floor.




^ Sparks a flyin!



That is, the last of the major panel work done! Delighted!!! Now, of course, there are 101 smaller little jobs that need to me done, little patches, small areas of rust on the doors etc that need to be sorted. Its these jobs that will take a longggg time and you dont see any immediate result from it as opposed to banging on new panels, but, they must be done and so the show goes on.....

toastedpickles wrote: »

I really want one of them spinny things haha everytime i see it :P

Awesome work though

Cheers! Ah, if you closely, well, you dont even have to look close! You'll see its pretty simple, made up of scraps, bit of tubing and a couple of scaffold stands. Thanfully however I had a seperate chassis that I could mount this to and then build the tub on top of this; dont know how you'd do it with a chassis-less car.





Now its gets controversial!! Purists, divert your eyes!!


Now, you'll remember my light modification ideas. I simply dont like the cluster /slab lights on the tail of the Spitfire, I see them as an after thought, ill concieved and bland. Besides, I figure this car is my baby and I'm not out to satisfy the purists or make it look as it did when it rolled out of the factory, there are enough examples that look like that! Thus, I want to make this car unique, different, one of a kind....my car! :cool:



So, I had tried the landie lights, but, found them to be too small at 70mm and a bit; basic. Next (and most affordable) option was Lucas L691/692 light fittings that were contemporary with the Spitfire but never used on them. I had found a supplier in the UK and was about to purchase when I visitied a local car show and picked up a load of original bases and lens for a few euro; they were very grubby but cleaned up nicely!!





^ So here are the lights wedged in place along with some reflectors, just for a look-see. It was convenient that the holes for the original lines were 84mm, just the size of the chrome bezel of the new lights!




^ Just pushed in place, litterally minutes after I got them home.




^ Original Lucas reflector also.



Now, my plan was to use this layout and fit a reversing light under the bumper. But, with some thought and consideration, plus a few pointers from a few (and I mean very few) in the Spitfire world I decided I would go with three lights on either side and make a feature of them or create a bit of interest rather than just plonking them all on the flat panel.

So, I set to work....

Cheers guys! I'll see how the new light sections look once welded in and cleaned up, I dont necessarily want to draw attention to them with a different color, but, just create a little bit of interest on the back panel rather than just simply fixing the lights on to the existing panel.



Few more pics from very recent times, ie last weekend!


The major body work has been done so now its down to the trivial little jobs that need doing, like, patches of rust on the doors. I had been kind of dreading this, but, it was a pretty easy fix in both cases and I enjoy doing them, so, here we go.........




^ Rust had eaten through the skin of the passenger door. Wasnt sure what the lip/flange below it was like. Only one way to find out!




^ Rusty section removed and the lip below revealed and found to be very sound; apart from some surface rust that cleaned up.





^ New piece of steel in for a trial fit.



^ Excess trimmed away with enough left to fold over. The rusty section was cleaned up and treated before the metal was folded over.




^ Tacked in place and folded over; my first half decent attempt at MIG welding!! :P

I'll get back to that one later.



Now, driver side door needed work too!



^ Rust had eaten through door skin and unfortunately the lip/flange underneath; damn!



^ Outer skin cut away.




^ Flange cut away and template made up.




^ New section added.




^ New outer skin section in place and welded. Just to be cleaned down now and folded over.




And that folks is you up to date! I've been playing catch up up to this point and throwing up pics when I had the time/felt like it, now however you will have to wait until I get time to work on the car! :P

dharn wrote: »

Great stuff super welding, interesting to see how you manage the fold over on that curve

Curve has been sorted Simples really, just cut the curve with about 20mm extra, then cut a number of slots and folded it over. There will be images soon that will show it infinitely better than I can explain!


But, in the meantime, I just realised my modifications to the lights look remarkably like the set up on the rear of the Aston Martin DB5!! :eek: I swear I didnt use this as a style que! They even use the same Lucas light fittings.....






The plate onto which the lights are fixed seems to be chromed, or stainless?? Hmmm........



Also, the Jensen C-V8 has a similar set up also using the same Lucas fittings.






So, whilst I can no longer claim my car is original, it is at least in good company!

Got another bit done yesterday evening; few little holes welded, little bits an' bobs cleaned up and I reckon come the weekend *hopefully* I'll be able to lift the tub off the chassis!!

The plan then is:

1. The crappy bonnet can come off now and the chassis that I have been using can be put aside for the time being. Flip the tub over onto stands, give it a throughout cleaning back to bare metal and then it'll be chemically rust treated, sealed and painted.

2. The second, spare chassis that I havent used yet will be brought in and inspected. This chassis looked to have been cleaned back and coated, possibly power coated, unfortunately it's in a Triumph deep orange :cool: So, I'll scrape that back a bit, see what its like underneath, if its good then it'll be sanded back a bit and given a coating of black.

There are a number of new parts on this rolling chassis, so, I'll have a good look to see whats what, order new bushes, seals, brake parts etc then, once the chassis is rebuilt and rolling the tub, with its underside seaded can be dropped on ready for the inner prep!


At least thats the plan.....

So, not going exactly to plan, but, the weather has turned, there has been more little jobs needing to be done and even managed to squeeze in a weeks holidays!

This is how she stood last week....

I picked up a cheap tin of red spray just to cover up any raw areas of metal to tide me over until I could get back to it. The red will eventually be cleaned off! There was also a reason for picking the red; I wanted to see what the light mod to the rear would look like with some color on it!


^ A patchwork of color! Bonnet off, Bare/raw areas sprayed red and the seam covers on the rear wing seams to keep any water out!



^ Mid way through the repair on the rear light panel.



^ Repair just about finished and still in need of a little cleaning up.


Below are some images of the rear panel with the lights temp in place (with wood screws! :P) and the chrome trim in place. I'm pretty damn happy with it!!

Took the opportunity over the weekend to go take a look at the chassis! It's exactly as I got it back in February and stored at a family member house with other odds and ends (mostly junk) from the build.

The chassis is in very good, clean condition with no evident rust or previous repairs and had been finished in a Triumph orange and assembled by the previous owner whom obviously never got round to finishing the project. It looks to have a number of new, or very seldom used parts fitted already (thankfully!).

Those parts being:
- Aftermarket/custom? 8 leaf spring with lowering block.
- Shocks on the rear
- Discs and dirt guards up front.
- Bushes and gators

Thankfully someone has already spent a few bob. The plan however for this chassis will be to strip it down, clean it back to bare metal in a few areas and assess the condition of the metal underneath; if good it'll be generally roughed up and painted black (should be the body color by right, so, we'll see). All the suspension components will be cleaned up also and repainted.

dharn wrote: »

I cant believe my eyes I saw thes pics already today on spitfire facebook page, thats a well kept secret croppy, the level of knowledge there is amazing:)

Hah, glad you joined the group! Its a great page alright with plenty of knowledgable guys and gals that'll answer any and all questions (no matter how trivial), still though, they cant tell me what kind of leaf spring I have! :pac:

dharn wrote: »

Id say its off an ould trailer

Y'know what? It could be! :pac: I like to think however that it was a special, custom made one off spring for the car :P