Club 80-90 Forums

Ta for the coments,
Note, if you dont have clecos then stick a few self tappers in maybe with spire clips behind, but the clecs really are worth their weight so to speak,
If you go down the road of adding a lip to the new panal then be very very quick and carefull as its easy to get a bit of warp in it.
with regard to the 3 support pieces that are affixed to the wing with bonding ie 'sikaflex' or equivalent, I cleaned the old gunge out to bare metal and bent them slightly out of the way so they would not interfere with the fit, now Im happy-ish and its welded up I will fill the join with sika or simmilar.
The panals I used are JK's and to be honest they are not a million miles out with regards to fit, if anything a tad oversize but not a problem , metal gauge is thin but would never expect factory standards on a cheap pattern.
mike

nice work owduck!!!!

Finally got another day in and decided that the slider was fit for some attention, scrap at £180/ton was tempting but.....
This is what I started with.

and then


The guy that did the repair was quite good in a weird sort of way, yes it was a bodge up but at least it was a good bodge! must have took ages anyway all the bad got cut off


new panal tacked in place

and door closed to check alignment.

This very important, in this case I have also fitted the rear wing and have left the welds undone down the slider side and also the bottom at the jack point, with the door seal out it is the ideal time to set your slider to be a good even fit and to latch shut correctly. , when the door is to your liking you can easily check to make sure the outer skin will then be flush with the rear wing, and as this was left unwelded and can move a bit.



happy with thisnow so inner panal welded up and a coat of weld thru applied, tea break time.

Better, I decided to cut some holes in the panal as last picky above, hadnt got the right size oval cutter so used 25mm ones paired up,

Ive gassed these parts as I can get a cleaner tighter fit and finish so will only have to grind back and no edge showing.

tacking the side and trial fit, must say the jk parts while knowhere near as good as an original are not too bad and fit fairly well, a little adjusment will allways be needed.

To save taking the door off all the time just swing it open onto a block/chair/aupair or whatever is at hand,

I would note that the panal is not strickly an 'over panal' and as such is perhaps a little short on the underside where the outer skin joins, it is not the most defined of panals in this area but good eneough for the job, I suppose i could have cut the panal and fitted it as a butt joint but that would I think have been messy and not as strong especially given the gauge of metal the pnal is made from.

I have now got a door that shuts nicely and fits the hole with an even gap, the rear wing is now secured and I have the drain holes to cut in the bottom of the slider inner skin.

I am lucky in that this is the only window rot on the N/S

so I will rattle that of in the morning and then I think it is time to show you the O/S..
mike

8am start today, not particularly keen just woke up early, anyhow thought I would attend to the window first, cut the old bit out along the top of the side panal cover,

I gassed it in as the metal is not that thick there and I wanted it precise so no filler to be used,

welded in and ready to grind back

now finished and will polish it with a wire head and so job sorted.


Just finnishing off bits on the N/Side, this is the start of the panal that sits behind the nsr light unit

I'm going to wheel a set of ridges in to give it more rigidity (18g) and to act as a drain, hence the 3/4 hole

and this is it in place ready to be welded



Back panal is held in place to check fit, its not a mint one but there is only a little work to do on the btm corners so no problems

And here is the O/Side 6 of one and half doz of the other as to which is more of a job, dont know wether I'd rather do the slider or fridge panal and cill



This will have to wait a week as Ive other works to do..

quality stuff !

Good Ive got a couple of days spare so can get on with the osr,
Cut the bad of the bottom rear 1/4 and made a new piece to weld in, this will give me a base from which to work forward and also tie in the back panal,

Got me spot blaster working now with clean medium grit so that will help clean stuff up.
New panal welded in

and also repaired the rear most inner arch and tied the 1/4 to this, just a quick grind off then a smidge of lead and it will be happy, I wont fit the very bottom repair panal until the new wing is fitted as I cannot be 100% sure of its placement.
,
tommorow it will be the inner arch repairs and finnish of the battery tray area and remount the expansion bottle etc,I might also weld on some new/spare earth posts.
mike

Nice steady day today , made the o/s/r plate that sits behind the light cluster.

welded it in and did the ribs and bits

and also welded same on the n/s

so doing some repair work on the new (to me ) rear panal and will weld that in tommorow and bolt the engine mountings to it, that will conclude the major nasty work , with the rest there is at least something to work from.
M

I would call it ART...!

I am highly impressed by the skills being demonstrated in this thread - must be great to have such a practical talent/knowledge. Top Stuff.
I paid handsomely to bodyman o do much less than this - and don't begrudge it.

Thats some nice fabricating you've been doing there. Well impressive.

Ta for the comments, its not that good compared to what i used to do, and many on here do very good works, thank god theyre not made of wood as I cant cut that to save my life..
mike

Well a part day today,the back panal which I aquired is from an a/c or fools fueler so had to make a pair of plates to carry the engine bars.

stuck a couple of spare bolts in the holes whilst welding as its a nightmare when mig choddies adhere to the threads.
The o/s developed a crack and so I chisseled this dog out of it
ahh wrong dog, here

In fairness it is in a really difficult place to remove and mayhap whoever did it was happy with pod, just shows how much the rust grows under it, any how dug it out and removed the dints and now good as new

I had to do a small repair to the n/s edge where it joins the 1/4 panal also the lower corners on both sides were shot so whilst I could easily repair it I was going to chop the lot of across the rear just under the main member, decided to sculp it back either side and add a lip but keep the centre section to cover the silencer.

Mounting bar now bolted to it will finnish welding it on tommorow,
I couldnt undo the header tank screws and as heat would have been out of the question I resorted to the angle grinder,then ground the screw heads off, now welded the brackets back on and job sorted.


thats it for today
mike

Well managed a few hours today, finnished welding the back panal to the rest of the body plus the chassis legs most of it went ok as I had prepared it first , vw must have been robotic when they built these as the spot welds on my replacement panal almost perfectly lined up with the original ones.
first picky is the os engine mounting showing the plates I welded on to support/mount the bars as viewed from the underside of engine bay.

I have choosen to weld the seams where the back panal joins the rear wing under the light clusters and will lead these in, this is my personal choice and I wouldnt do this with a customers van (unless requested)

close up picks dont have show the grind marks and stuff, still most will lanish out.
joy of joys the osr window surround needs the same work as t'other side did and the hweel arch the same too so thats tommorows job.

and inner arch

bottle of beer calling
mike

Bad bit cut out, I have left a lip which is good so will weld this from the underside as well,

New metal folded up for start of inner arch 18g (1.2mm) and tacked on then short lip over curved part,

camera battery gone dead so no more picks for a few days..window hole repaired and preps being done for wing fitment.
mike