Rear Light Holes, Hatch Latch Support

Starting to think about priming the rear structure of the car. There are a bunch of little fixes and details that have been working on. Here are some of them:

Drilled the holes in the rear valence. Was a bit scared to drill the light holes but looks like they turned out nice. Also put in the holes for the bumper support, license plate light and license plate. Welded in nuts on the inside for the license plate to make it easier to put on and hopefully more likely to keep out water.

Welded in the hatch latch support or whatever it's called. Had that floating around for awhile and am glad to have it attached.

Repaired the lower left corner of the hatch weather seal. This had rusted away as is pretty typical. Looked like some metal munching mouse had taken a little bite out of it. But now it looks all good again.

Seam welded the fender to the lower valence pinch weld closed. This originally had a painted decorative cover over it. I'm considering not adding the cover as it looks like a water trap to me. The welded seem ground smooth looks pretty similar. Will see what it looks like with the car fully primed. I can always add the cover later.

Lots of grinding and sanding on the 100's of plug welds (over 500 just in the fenders and rockers). If I had realized how much finishing of the welds was required I'd found a way to get a good resistance spot welder. Little late now as I don't have that much left.

Top Of B-Pillar Repair

 As mentioned before there was rust where the B-pillar meets the side/quarter light window frame. There was also a small dent in the outside of that frame. So I cut out the plate that was rusted to about half way up the frame. It became obvious why it rusted. Where the quarter light window rivets to the frame water had came in through those holes. With no opening at the bottom (thanks triumph) the dampness rusted a big hole. But it also rusted the inside pretty good and there were some pinholes near the bottom as well. Bummer.

I cut the same part from the parts car but was not optimistic that it would be a lot better. It was better but it also had some thinning metal at the bottom. I was considering using it when I noticed a crease on the window frame side from when the roof was crushed pushing it against the glass. From the disassembly I was able to see there is NO primer of paint in there. Remarkable that it wasn't worse after 50 years.

Back to my original piece i finished removing the backing plate. Quite a lot of rust but near the bottom was the only really bad stuff. Sorry no picture. Not sure where it went. Sand blasted the whole thing which showed some patching was required. Decided instead of cutting out chunks and welding in patches to put in a piece of backing material and weld through the thin spots to build them up. Figured it was faster and less likely to get everything out of sorts.

While the back was totally open I hammered out the small dent. Then noticed some other warping near the bottom on the quarter light side. Perhaps this contributed to the water getting in.

In making a new patch piece for the back I decided that instead of trying to form the crease down the center I would weld a stiffening rib on where would be the inside. This worked nicely even though the welding was a bit terrible. But it did warp the plate and I had to straighten it. After straightening I put it against the car only to see that on the side window edge the car isn't straight at all but curves as it goes down. With a little work I put that curve back in. Epoxy primed the inside the welded it on.

Drip Leg/Water Separator

 It's usually really humid here and the small water trap on my air line was not getting out the water. Trev's blog, one place I go for metal working tips, showed how he made a drip leg that worked well for getting the water out.

Thought I would do the same but instead of welding it together would make one out of threaded together parts. So I did. I think it turned out nice. Not shown in the pictures is I mounted it to my shelves in the garage and added a 10 ft section of 1/2 pipe to make the "cooling" section. The shelves are a bit of a mess so I didn't take a picture of that.

Saturday I did some sand blasting to try it out. It had just started raining. Ran through about 100 lbs of media and then checked the traps. Nothing in the little water trap at the end of the line. This is working great. Opened the valve at the bottom of the drip leg expecting a big rush of water. Nothing. Weird. Drained the compressors and there was a little but not much. So perhaps today wasn't a good test. I dunno. But It's setup now and in theory should work well. Will see how it works on future days. But Saturday the blasting went well.

Oh to make the trip leg I needed a fitting that would let a pipe go through but still seal on it. For this I used a 1/2" x 3/4" Copper x Male Adapter and drilled out the ridge that would keep the 1/2 pipe from going all the way through. Then I sweat soldered it on the pipe where I wanted it. That worked perfect.

For the main drip leg (not the added 1/2 pipe) the parts list is as follows:
1/2" x 3/4" Copper x Male Adapter
1/2" x 3/8" Copper x Female Adapter
1/2 copper pipe
3/4" x 3/8" Black Bushing
2" x 3/4" Black Bushing (2)
2" x 3/4" Black Reducing Coupling
3/4" x 6" Black Nipple
2" Black Tee
3/4" Full Port Threaded Ball Valve
2" x 48" Black Nipple
And of course some quick connect couplers

I couldn't find the 2" stuff locally (small town) so I bought most of it from www.supplyhouse.com Prices seemed good and they shipped quickly.

Oh in other news I work out my blasting tip. Time to change it for a new one.

(oh there was no post last week as I had company and didn't work on the car much)

LH Side Welded

 After about 50+ man hours of work and 3 weeks the car looks......Well about the same. But instead of screws holding it together it is welded solid. Starting to feel like a car again instead of an art project.

It feels a bit weird to have to ask myself "what do I work on next". Been on the same part of the car for sooo long.

RH Side Welded

 Well the RH Rear fender and rocker are welded on to the car. Spent a few evenings doing one last hammer and dolly on the patches and punching the holes. Then welded it on. All except the end cap which I'm keeping open so I can paint and maybe even seam seal later.

Sadly the car looks about the same as it did when everything is screwed together. But it is much more solid now. I've had a strap holding the lower A pillar in position for so long (without the rocker the lower A pillar is mostly just one thickness of sheet metal). It was nice to finally remove it.

It all turned out pretty good except the vertical gap between the door and rocker panel. Despite it looking good when screwed together after welding I noticed it's not as consistent as it was. It's a bit tighter a little bast the middle of the door and then back to good. Humm. I'll try the shrinking disc on it later. Perhaps it can shrink the metal back so it is better. But that can be a future project.

The one white tunnel picture is the inside of the rocker panel showing that the bottom edge has been painted (will do the top when I flip the body over). The brown spots are blasting media that must have slipped through the upper seem. Guessing from the inner sill to stiffener. That blasting media gets everywhere.

Rocker Transition And Painting

 Before welding on the Rockers it looked like a good idea to weld on the transition piece. That way I could paint the inside and ensure it would be coated well. Then it would just have a weld seam against the A pillar similar to the rest of the rocker panel. I did not weld on the end cap. This was likely welded to the rocker before assembly to the car at the factory. I will leave it open so I can paint, or at least attempt to paint, the weld seams on the inside of the rocker. I picture moisture pooling up there and don't want any bare metal.

After that we primed the parts of the car that would be inside the Rockers and fenders. For projects where they don't remove these I don't see a lot of talk of how they get the paint in there. Or when they made the car originally. Perhaps that is a reason why they rusted so quickly? Who knows. I know I want it all painted/sealed.

The weld flanges were all taped off and the surfaces primed (still taped off in the pictures). This time we are using a white primer.

B-pillar Where It Meets The Quarter Window

 One of the oddities of this car is it was designed as a convertible and then the hardtop added later with changing as few parts as possible. This creates a few strange design and manufacturing choices. Where the side/quarter window part of the B-pillar has been added is one of them.

Where the side/quarter window post is welded onto the car body it has no passage into the lower part of the B-pillar. The red line in the attached picture. If one drills the rivets out to remove the quarter window frame the ends inside just fall down and are trapped and can't get out. Not a huge deal but what about moisture or dirt? And how did any primer of paint ever get in there? Also found that the forward edge of that horizontal metal is not even welded to the lock plate ("A" in the attached picture). Touches it but isn't joined. I could grab the edge and bend it back exposing the cavity in the upper B-pillar and let the rivet bits out.

Another part is shown as "B" in the attached picture. Best I can tell it looks like the spitfire part interfered with the GT6 adaption so the factory just bashed it out of the way leaving the flange hanging in space inside the rear quarter. (I have parts cars from other years and they are the same)

On the RH side of the car there was a rust through this part of the "B" pillar. Not sure if this mad design is the cause but it sure didn't help. Wanting to blast the rust out I cut away both pieces of metal that were just hanging in space and not welded to anything. Then media blasted it. Not sure how much I could get up into the side/quarter window post but it at least got the area's below it cleaned. From there I decided to cut the middle B-post down lower and fabricate a web similar to what was there but lower. But I made it extend all the way to the lock plate (which I welded) and have a opening directly below the side/quarter post channel to let out whatever might get in there. This seemed to stiffen it up and still gave plenty of air space to keep things from getting damp. And probably enough room for me to get some paint on it from the inside.

Oh one more change. Since I will not be brazing the fender on I choose to weld the side/quarter window post solid at the bottom. And also instead of using the vertical flanges turned to the inside of the car, I cut those off and added a horizontal tab. This way the fender joint there will be backed by some metal and I can hopefully weld a nice joint there without burning through. Will see how that turns out.

Well a lot of information that is uninteresting to most people. But I'll post incase there is someone in the future interested in such things.

Sand Blasting - Tricks And Headaches

 This week spent time trying to sand blast the inside of the rear fenders and the wheel arches that will be covered by the fenders. We were having better luck with sandblasting this time but it is still slow work (with my equipment anyway). The sand blaster needs more CFM than my compressor can supply. I looked to see what I might be able to buy that would have more CFM. Seems CFM isn't high on compressor buyers list I guess. As there were compressors with 3 times the tank size that gave FEWER CFM than my compressor with a 10 gal tank. And I don't want a big tank I want more CFM. The thought of using 2 (or more) medium compressors together isn't new. I looked on line and several people had done it. Went to buy another compressor like mine and the store was out. So had to order it. Went to buy some more aggregate and the store was out. Why do I go to stores?

Since I struck out at the stores I connected my small compressor, which has surprisingly good CFM for it's size and my medium compressor together. Screened my previously used media and went to town on the car.

I had read that keeping the moisture out of the lines is critical for sandblasting (and painting). I installed a water trap and when giving the compressors a break I'd refill the blaster. And I'd disconnect the air line to it and it would drain the trap. Well things were going well and so I had been pushing the compressors more and had found I could fill the blaster nearly to the top and not have to stop as much. Getting ready to blast another section I open the valve on the hose and...water comes out. What the? That can't be good. Turns out the water trap had filled and water, lots of water, had made it into the blaster. Whoa. Never expected that much water. It is really humid here. So I empty the blaster and quit for the night. Putting the media out into the sun the next day to dry it all out.

The next night of blasting went really well. Was able to run through a whole tank of media without issues. I'm having to reuse the media over and over and over because the stores here are all out. Maybe someone else is blasting too :-) All works well and things go a little faster with the more pressure with 2 compressors and I'm pretty satisfied. Other than stuff getting all over everything, despite trying to capture it.

Monday I decided I'd blast the paint of the inside of the rocker panels. The shape made it hard to use a wire wheel. I set up a blasting area just outside the garage. The new compressor had arrived and I'm thinking this is going to work out great. Sadly it was back to getting clogged frequently which was very annoying and slowed progress. This was similar to my first time blasting a long time ago. This morning it hits me that my blasting area was slightly downhill from the compressors and so was the first time. The times it all went well everything was mostly level but slightly uphill to the blasting area. Wonder if that is having an effect on either the moisture or aggregate flow. Next time I try blasting I'll be uphill and I'll have new aggregate. The store just got some in :-)