Well, I'm back in the ring to take another swing (anyone guess what was on the CD player in the shed tonight
)
Been tackling the absolute last bit of rust in the car, the box section underneath the radiator. I've purposefully left this till now because I thought I may have needed to modify the mounting points for thecaster rod bracket in order to get everything lined up with the 200B front end.
I ended up leaving it in the standard position after all, and have decided to make custom caster rod mounting brackets instead. I did strengthen it up a little by inserting a bit of 2mm RHS, cut down to a sort-of "U" shape.
And the underside of the car is now completely finished, all repairs have been smoothed with a light coat of bog (only really needed to do the boot floor and a minor patch in one footwell), and then sprayed with POR15 "Tie Coat" which supposedly gives the best adhesion to the POR15 rustproofing paint already on the underside. I sealed all the joints and seams in the body with Sikaflex 227, left it to dry for a week, then topcoated with the POR15 TIE Coat. The POR15 wouldn't set where it was painted over the Sikafles
. I ended up wiping it off with a rag soaked in thinners, then tried a coat of 2 pak polyurethane over the Sikaflex instead - worked perfectly
And I've changed my mind on colour yet again. Hopefully the last change, as I hope to have some colour on it in the next few months.
Underside all done, except for re-coating the seams
Starting to cut the rust out of the box section underneath the radiator - ended up cutting more out, plus removed the welded-in strengthening brackets that the caster rod bracket bolts onto.
Strengthening section - this was made from 2mm RHS (cut down into a "channel" shape) and now goes right across the box section rather than being two little 100mm sections.
And it goes here. This section is almost finished now, didn't have the camera in the shed tonight to get photos.