Project Journals

Finally, after a huge lull in the proceedings we're back!

Where we'd left things in Part 2 was with the car in storage at a friends garage whilst we looked for new premises. To cut a long story very short I had to close my business after twenty years of trading and then had a small stroke three months later.
The car hit the bottom of the priority list at this point which was fine as it was safe and dry.

Fast forward to March 2010 and the story begins again. We found ourselves a nice old workshop on a farm with a 30 mile view out of the doors on a nice day!


First job to ease ourselves into the build again was some rear indicators.
Whilst visiting our Magnette specialists - Shortens - to collect the last available windscreen I spied some mounting pods for rear lights.



Some very careful marking followed by some chain drilling....



Pod fitted and lined up....




Then repeat for the otherside or it'll look odd!
Once done we started on cleaning and priming the chassis at the rear....



As plans had changed slightly with the engine I moved back to the front of the car and sealed all of the access panels that I'd built into the bulkhead....


Then the top was sealed....


Meanwhile my son dropped the rear axle out to check the rod ends - they will all be replaced - and cleaned/primed axle whilst it was out...



Whilst the axle was out a friend of mine, Perry, who happens to own a 10.5 second MGBGT, popped in for a cuppa.....and promptly got roped into the cleaning process.
He does like to be comfortable though....


Back to the bulkhead. In the engine bay I sealed the otherside (it's a double wall with fireproofing sealed inside).
Before....


After....


The next bit was a little odd but, as previously mentioned, I'm a little fussy. The underneath of the scuttle in front of the windscreen was very messy. The chances of anyone ever seeing it was slim but I still knew it was there so out with the sheet steel again and made one large curvy panel to cover it...


Then it was all seam sealed, primed and then painted matt black....




I fitted the pedals that I'd made 18 months ago but didn't like the way that the throttle sat at a slightly different height to the brake pedal and they were a little too close together. Out with the steel and the welder and remade the throttle arm.
That's better!



Happy days! I took delivery of a pair of these complete with matching side mounts...


The next job was a test of my origami skills....I failed!
Templates for trim panels in the car...





This led on to making boot (trunk?) floor panels.
First was to weld in the support bars for the fuel cell...


Then panelwork...



The raised bit is for the outlets from the fuel cell...




The outer panels needed support. This gave me an opportunity to fit supporting bars for fire extinguisher and nitrous tanks...


Panel fitted...


...and repeat for the other side.
The rear axle needed boxing in so back out with the sheet steel and the folder to make half a box...


Then fit to the car....


We then had a major disaster. After a lot of snow followed by torrential rain the drain that empties the field behind the workshop collapsed. The water table came up so high that it flooded up through the concrete workshop floor and created a swimming pool. It took a long time with a bilge pump to clear it all out...


Unfortunately we hadn't painted the underneath of the new boot floor panels...


It took many weekends and evenings of cleaning and treating to get back to square one...


Eventually normal service was resumed and it was time to make some strong mountings for those seats. Regulations call for 3mm thickness steel so I decided that box section would be the ideal solution...



Captive nuts were welded in...


....and the seats test fitted.




Now I had a height for the top harness slots in the seats I could fit some more roll cage bars.
First was some rear corner bars...


Followed by the harness bar behind the seats...


There are more bars to add once more steel has been delivered.

That brings us up to March 2011. It doesn't look very different but lots of small jobs have been completed and we're getting there!
We are going to take the car as a 'work in progress' to the GP100 event in the UK. This has resulted in a to-do list on the workshop wall as we want to make it look like as complete a car as possible.

More updates soon!

Curtis....Is there any way you could link this to parts 1 & 2 please?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/22/2011 05:36PM by 427ZA.

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