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I am shortly gonna resume getting my '81 dhc back on the road but have the 'daunting?' task of removing, repairing and re-fitting some bodywork pieces at the front end.

The bad news is, there are some small rust holes in the front suspension turrets which have also migrated slightly into the inner wings so I'm guessing the front wings have to come off to fix this. There's also some corrosion showing where the front wing meets the sill. I've never done any car body repairs before....ever!!

The good news is, I have a large, heated, well lit garage, lots of tools and a SIP 130 mig welder. I'm also pretty good with my hands and have restored a couple of show winning classic motorbikes.

Is it fairly easy to do these repairs or does it take years of practice and training in a body shop to turn out a decent job?

Anybody?

Dan

Hi,

If I can manage to weld up my floorpan, radius arm mounting points and rear bulkhead then anyone can.

Any rot will be far worse than originally expected.

Be methodical and don't rush things.

There's lots of help available on this forum from those who've suffered and overcome.

I wish my garage was large and heated.

Good Luck,

Adam





TR7 V8 DHC Jaguar Solent Blue. 9.35cr Range Rover V8, Holley 390cfm, JWR Dual Port, 214 Cam, Lumention, Tubular Manifolds, Single Pipe Exh, 3.08 Rear, 200lb Spax & PolyBushes, Anti- Dive, Capri Vented Discs & Calipers, Braided Hoses, 4 Speed Rear Cylinders, Uprated Master Cylinder & Servo, AT 5 Spokes and Cruise Lights. No Door Stickers. Mine since July 1986, V8 from 1991

I managed to weld mine with a 100A MIG given by a friend, mainly patching around the rear suspension/floor, cills and a small patch on one turret. The only previous welding I had doen was with a gas torch in school when I was 16.

If the turret is bad the problem is that to replace these panels it really needs jigging to keep the suspension geometry. Dependent on where the holes fall and the size, quite a lot can be done under the front wing with the suspension removed. If it is above the wheelarch liner then the wing needs to come off (unless you can live with the look of welded patches under the bonnet) and unfortunately they are welded on.

At least you have a luxury workshop to do it in. Good luck.

Alan
Saab 9000 Stg 1
Saab 9000 2.3 FPT Auto
'81 TR7 DHC

Thanks.

Yeah, my garage is nice, it's integral with the house (which I built myself) and, as I spend a lot of time in there, I've had the walls plastered and painted, had the floor tiled in light coloured ceramic floor tiles and made it as pleasant as possible an environment to work in. Just need the LCD tv and surround sound to finish it off and it'll be sorted, ha ha.

I've had the car virtually from new - it was ten months old when I bought it (from a lesbian in Manchester) back in 1982 but haven't had it on the road since '91. It's only done 47K and it's been dry stored in a heated garage all that time and hasn't suffered a jot in 18 years (JEEZ, is it so long ago???). I remember when I first got the car I went out and bought a couple of gallons of Waxoyl and a garden spray thingy and spent a whole afternoon injecting it in every nook and cranny I could find. It stunk for a month but it was worth it as it has really kept the rust at bay.


I'm expecting the rust to be worse than can be seen although I've removed all the suspension stuff from the front of the car and cleaned all the old underseal from the front wheel arch and to be honest, there isn't much there at all - just a couple of small patches on the suspension turret sides where the angle iron braces are fixed and a bit where the turret/ inner wing/ outer wing all meet. I'm hoping to remove the wing(s) by drilling out the spot welds (with a spot weld drill) and unbolting the bolts and hopefully they'll come off good enough to be re-fitted - does this sound do-able?


Dan

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Century Gothic, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Dandirt</i>

Just need the LCD tv and surround sound to finish it off and it'll be sorted, ha ha.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></font id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

All you'd then is a frig to keep the beer cold....ooops, I forgot, you Brits like your beer warm.

While I haven't done any MIG welding yet (that's to come) I hear it's just an afternoon's practice if you have a nack for it. It's a bit of an art, kind of like painting, only different. I've no doubt you can do it, just, like they said, if you have to replace rather than repair a turret you will have to jig it to assure alignment integrity.


TR7 Spider - 1978 Spifire - 1976 Spitfire - 1988 Tercel 4X4 - Kali on Integra - 1991 Integra

good luck Dan the deeper you dig the deeper it gets
hope all goes well and when the going gets tough flick through this thread for a good laugh[:D]:

http://www.forum.triumphtr7.com/topic.a ... ouragement

It rides again..... and again wehey!!!!!!!

Dandirt,

Go to my Download Page and get the file, TR7_Welding.pdf

It has all the spot weld locations for the car.

jclay

[url="http://web.mac.com/jclaythompson/iWeb/Site/Welcome.html"]My Triumph Site[/url], [url="http://web.mac.com/jclaythompson/iWeb/Technical/Intro.html"]Technical Stuff[/url], [url="http://homepage.mac.com/WebObjects/FileSharing.woa/53/wo/HJMTK8gsojtwKleP.1/0.2.1.2.26.31.97.0.35.0.1.1.1?user=jclaythompson&fpath=Triumph_Articles&templatefn=FileSharing4.html"]Download Page[/url]

as jclay said, first get the welding manual.

then i would sugest :

something like this
http://www.amazon.com/Blair-Equipment-F ... B000HI8R9Q

to help you with the welding , this way there will be less burntroughs.

when welding with mig/mag on thin sheet metal weld small patches like 10mm in a row, then move 100mm , and weld another small patch, later go back to the first patch and widen it. that way you wont let the heat acumulate in the same spot, and make you burn holes.

higher amperage is preferable so you dont pile up the filler metal on the first sheet, you need to connect overlaping sheets of metal.

angle grinder and flap discs will be your best friends to smooth out welds that shouldnt be seen [:D]

c-clamps , thickest sheet metal that is on the car is 1mm i think.

I'll be doing the same with my car soon.


anyway, you cant do worse than the BL craftsmanship [:D]

OK.....very helpful so far.

To clarify the picture....I started to renovate the car a while back - it was my intention to just go over everything mechanical and also clean, repaint and seal the underside and then put it back on the road.

<b><font face="Arial">I've owned the car almost from new and it's in great shape with hardly any rust</font id="Arial"></b>

At first everything went well. I lifted the back of the car up really high and removed everything - back axle, suspension, fuel tank, bumper...everything. I then cleaned all the old Waxoyl and underseal off and was pleasantly surprised to find virtually no rust had taken hold. All the places that were supposed to be rust traps were dead sound - boot floor, fuel tank, rear chassis legs - all sound. There was just the odd surface rust scab here and there but certainly no holes. I proceeded to remove what few rust patches there were, treat them with a rust inhibitor and then hand paint five coats of paint - one zinc primer, two undercoat, two top coat of gloss black. The whole area was then given a light rollering with a thin white spirit/ underseal coat - more to dull the finish down than act as an underseal. I've read that thick underseal tends to trap water in and cause more problems than it prevents. When it was finished, the whole underside of the car up to a point level with the gearbox looked fantastic - like brand new. I then refurbed all the components and re-fitted everything. I even had all the nuts and bolts re-plated ( I have a pal who owns a zinc/ chrome plating business).

So far so good.

I then turned the car round and lifted the front up and that's when I found the rust perforated suspension turrets. At first I thought I could just cut out the bad bits and weld in some new metal.....



..... so I bought myself a mig welder and a cutting disc but when I removed a piece from the turret I could see that the inner wing had suffered a bit too.....



...... and the only way that I could see to repair that would be to remove the outer wing.

I was venturing into unknown territory at this point an so the whole thing ground to a halt. This was eighteen months ago and I'm only just now getting the motivation back to tackle the problem.

As can be seen from the pictures, I've partially stripped the engine and also taken everything out of the engine bay. I have no problem with the mechanicals.....it's just the body panels that's bothering me. If I drill out the spot welds and undo the bolts, will the wing just come off easily or will I have to bang and hammer and lever it off? And if I do will it not be all out of shape then? And if it is how do I re-fit it and get it back looking like it does now?

....help !!!

<b><font face="Arial">Engine bay is quite rust free - the patchy areas are just the remnants of the old Waxoyl that I haven't cleaned off yet.</font id="Arial"></b>



Dan

Looks like you didn't waxoil the inner fenders. When I had the front bumper off I sprayed in the hole leading to the inner fender with lots of mist comming out of the two holes in the bottom of the sill ahead of the A post.


TR7 Spider - 1978 Spifire - 1976 Spitfire - 1988 Tercel 4X4 - Kali on Integra - 1991 Integra