EIJ 5885 Pt2

Neil Fletcher Racing

The story of EIJ 5885

My New Project Mexico - Year 2

Click on any of the images below for a larger photo.

This is my latest AVO car which I lovingly call my "New Project Mexico".

Year 2 starts off in November 2008, and first off is sorting a seat crossmember for the driver's floor.
	This is a Seat Crossmember in the vice and I’m going to remove the broken bolt. I’ll not be using this crossmember but, as you’ll see later I do need the little bracket than the bolt goes down into.
	First I drill a hole down into the bolt, I drill far enough so that I think I’ve cleared where the nut would be.
	Next I turn the crossmember over and grip the end of the bolt in the Vice Grips. Now I slowly start to screw the remnants of the bolt out – well in actual fact I’m really screwing it on in.
	Once I have the bolt out I ascertain what thread it is a then run a tap down into the nut to clean up the threads.
	And just to make sure everything is ship shape I screw a bolt down into it.
	Here is that crossmember, the red one in the foreground along with the one I’m going to replace it with. The replacement is actually a Mk2 item and there are a few minor differences.
	The main difference is the position and type of seat mounting brackets, the Mk2 ones are further apart and have only one bolt instead of the three bolts of the Mk1 type. You will notice that the holes for the Mk1 style bracket are still in position in the Mk2 one.
	Here you have a better view of the “one bolt” mk2 type as I start to grind out the spot welds ready for removal of the bracket.
	A little levering with an old screwdriver soon sees the bracket on its way out, I don’t want to damage the crossmember any more than is necessary.
	Sometimes the easiest way to tell where a spot weld is situated is to run the Angle Grinder lightly across the area and the spot weld shows up as a slightly lower spot.
	A little work soon has the original Mk1 brackets removed and here you can see the differences in both the Mk1 and Mk2 brackets.
	There were a couple of minor cracks to weld up in the replacement crossmember as well as the original holes for the Mk2 style brackets.
	Then it was a matter of smoothing off the welds, this is best done with a coarse Flap Wheel rather than the normal Grinding Wheel, for those than haven't see one, a Flap Wheel is just like lots of bits of sand paper stuck to a rigid backing wheel .
	Then it's just a matter of welding the Mk1 brackets into the mk2 crossmember and after grinding down the welds it's all ready to weld into the shell.
	After doing all the changes and repairs it's now just a matter of spot welding it in place.
	Moving to underneath the floor, another job which gets done at the same time is welding the seat strengtheners which are under the floor, these strengthen the area around where the rear of the front seat bolts to the floor.
	Once again the welds are smoothed off with the Flap Wheel.
	Leaving the floor for a while I moved to the front of the car, the next job I did was to cut off the lower part of the Front Panel.
	This allowed me to get at the Under Rad Crossmember. It was in a really bad state and would need to be completely replaced.
	The bottom bit of both Radiator Supports was completely gone as well, luckily the rest of the Rad Supports were in good condition so I would just be patching in the lower bit where it joined to the Under rad Panel.
	The other other side is, if anything, in an even worse state.
	I started be cutting off the rot and cleaning up and straightening the remaining edge.
	Next up I cut and shaped a little piece which I welded to the bottom of the Radiator Support, I also offered up the Anti Rollbar Mount and marked where the hole needed to go to allow it to bolt to the Under Rad Panel.
	With both sides done it was then time to offer up the new Under Rad Panel and weld it in place.
	The one other thing that had to be done was weld the bottom of the centre Support back onto the Under Rad Panel.
	Then I took another go at the bottom edge of the Inner Wings. The area just behind where the Bumper Iron goes was in really bad shape, first the rot is cut out - at this stage I'm not too worried about the rot you can see in the chassis leg as the complete leg will be replaced later.
	Next thing is to make a cardboard template roughly the same shape as the hole.
	Then transfer this to sheet metal, with a little gentle shaping, grinding and cutting of bolt holes I soon had a couple of patches which were a perfect fit.
	First they were tack welded in place.
	Then welded completely round three edges, the bottom edge would be spot welded to the Chassis Leg once it is replaced.
	And finally the welds were ground down until they were nearly smooth.
	From there I moved back up the inner wing to the strut towers, the welding of the Turret Sides etc at the Drivers side followed much the same pattern as the Passenger side which had been done a few months previously.
	Once again the old bit of copper was used both as a heatsink and to try and stop the metal of the Inner Wing warping away from the Turret Side as I did the spot welds.
	It was jammed in place by a couple of bits of wood and it was moved along for each separate spot weld.
December 2008 and I start to replace the middle and front chassis rails and repair various parts of the rear rails.
	With the front end looking a lot stronger and tidier it was time to move on to the Chassis Rails. Both centre and front rails would need to be replaced. I started by removing the skid at the Leaf Spring Hanger.
	The bit of the rear Chassis Rail just in front of the Spring Hanger was in a pretty bad state so I cut that section out completely.
	I used some 1.5mm sheet steel and started to make a complete new section to set in here.
	I also needed to make sure it would fit inside the new Centre Section that I was going to fit and that they would mate up correctly.
	I also included a few extra strengthening pieces inside this section to add a bit of extra strength.
	The finished section is almost ready to weld in place.
	A series of holes is now drilled in the floor so that the new section can be spot welded in place.
	The shell is now turned right way up and the new section is held up into place while it is welded from above.
	Once it's welded it's given a coat of primer, as you can see the old Centre section has been completely removed and a series of holes has been drilled ready to weld the new section in place.
	And I do a couple of tack welds first just to hold it in place.
	To ensure that the chassis member was a tight fit to the floor I turned the shell the right way up and used a Hydraulic Jack to jack the chassis member tight up against the floor before welding all the rest of the spot welds from above.
	That leaves just the welds where the two parts of the chassis overlap each other to be finished off.
	Next I moved rearward to the wheelhouse/tub area. A previous owner had done some fibreglassing here, he had taken a 6" nail and made a few extra holes to give the fibreglass a good grip. Of course the rust had just spread under the fibreglass, I really need to blast this area to see what is rot and what is just surface rust but I can still start with the Air Hacksaw and cut out the worst of it first.
	In the same area the bump Stop plate on the chassis leg would also need to be replaced as it was showing signs of serious rot.
	This bracket will need to be removed, I just know that the bit of the chassis leg hidden underneath won't be good. Once again a quick run with the grinder shows up the position of the spot welds.
	And that proves to be the case. Luckily it's just the outer leg which is bad, the inner one looks to be in reasonable condition.
	Before cutting out the rusty bracket I had taken some cardboard and made a template of the bracket, I can now transfer the shape to a sheet of suitable 1.5mm steel and cut out a replacement. It is quite an intricate little shape with lots of folded-over edges.
	After a little cutting and bending I soon have a reasonable shape starting to form.
	A little extra time and effort is will worth it and it's not long before I have the bracket fully shaped, including all those little edge folds.
	And even if I do say so myself, it turns out to be a perfect fit - not that I'm ready to fit it yet, the chassis leg itself still needs to be repaired first.
	At the Spring Hanger itself there's a bit of light metal plate inside it which will need to be cut out and replaced.
	Removing it completely reveals a couple of small holes where this inner bit was spot welded to the chassis leg itself.
	Using another Cornflake Packet, I soon have a template made for that inner bit of the Spring Hanger.
	I cut out the rough shape from some 1.2mm sheet steel, I'm going to leave the final rounding of corners etc until after I get a trial fit done.
	Compared to the bracket that I had to bend and shape for the Bump Stop this one is fairly straightforward to make with only a few simple bends in the vice.
	It's a tight fit but a couple of good taps with the hammer and it goes down into place.
	I didn't fit it at this stage as I still need to do a repair on the chassis leg itself as seen in the lower left of both this picture and the previous one.
	Never staying in one place too long I now move on back into the wheelhouse. Here I've cut out most of the rot round the front of the wheelhouse.
	Apart from the very outer edge which I'm cutting off most of the rest of the rust only looks like surface rust. Hopefully if I blast it and weld up the nail holes - as mentioned earlier, I'll not need to replace the whole Outer Wheelhouse.
	Unfortunately the back end of the Wheelhouse will also need a couple of patches set in to it.
	Here I'm cutting a shaping a bit of a patch for round the front edge of the Wheelhouse.
	Moving back to the front of the car for a while, I start to remove the N/S Front Chassis Leg.
	It's a matter of drilling out a whole row of spot welds along the top edge of the Chassis Rail where it's fixed to the Inner Wing. The ones along the bottom edge had already been removed when I patched the lower edge of the Inner Wing.
	Removal is then a matter of slowly prising the Chassis Rail away from the Inner Wing, there is still the odd small bit of weld to be ground off before it eventually comes away.
	Here you see some of those repairs I did to the bottom edge of the Inner Wing, all this will need cleaned and painted before I put the replacement Chassis Leg in place.
	I had bought a pair of secondhand Chassis Legs for the front of the car. The N/S one only needed one small repair piece let into the front of it.
	And with a little work it was soon ready to fit.
	On the other hand the O/S one was a different matter entirely. The rear end of it turns out to be in very bad shape indeed.
	At the rear end the Chassis Rail is made out of two separate halves, I start with some 1.5mm steel plate and replace the outer half/edge.
	With this piece replaced I can start to cut out the inner side and curved lower part of the leg.
	Then I start to cut and shape a piece for this half, it is a slightly more complicated shape.
	And it needs to be cut and shaped up into an upward curve, then welded along the inside edge.
	Before being welded along the outer edge, and then the excess weld is ground off to leave a nice curving shape.
	After cutting off the old rusty bit the new part is offered up and tacked in place.
	Once I'm happy that it is going to line up properly with the rest of the Chassis Rail I go ahead and weld the two bits together.
	And here we have the finished item all ready to fit to the O/S of the car.
	Back to fitting the N/S one to the shell and I start by putting a run of weld down where it overlaps the Centre Section.
	With the back end tacked in place I can now start to weld the front end of it up in place. A few pairs of Vice Grips hold it all together.
	There's a fair few holes along the Inner Wing to be spot welded up.
	And from the Engine Bay side it's starting to look good again.
	The main thing is making sure that it's all a good tight fit against the Inner Wing.
	This front Chassis Rail has been put in place with the car on axle stands, once it's well fixed and welded in place I can put the shell back on the spit and roll her over.
	With her upside down I can now spot weld along the underside of the chassis rail where it mates up with the lip on the bottom of the Inner Wing.
	Then it's just a matter of grinding off all the excess welds and the job is done and almost looks original.
January 2009 with the middle and front chassis rails on the passenger side just about finished I move the the drivers side which needs much the same work as well as doing some patching around the rear legs.
	Next I moved back again to the O/S Chassis Leg and started by removing the strengthening plate at the Leaf Spring Hanger.
	After grinding out all the spot welds removal is a fairly easy task.
	While it looks rusty, the most of it is merely surface rust.
	Unfortunately the same can't be said of the area where the Rear and Middle Leg overlap each other.
	There's nothing for it but make up and weld in a new section just as I did at the other side of the car.
	Before welding the new Middle Leg in place I need to add the strengthening plate around the Jack Hole - something which I neglected to do when fitting the nearside leg to the shell. The plate from the old leg isn't really worth removing and re-using as it's just to rusty and damaged.
	But the plate from the previously removed N/S leg is just about useable. Unfortunately when I offer it up to the new repro leg a problem is clearly evident.
	It is more obvious in this photo, the curled lower edge of the plate does normally sit a little below the level of the Chassis Leg, but not nearly as much as this. It turns out that the new repro Leg is actually a little bit shallower than the original one.
	There's nothing for it but to make up my own plates to suit the repro legs, I use the old plate as a pattern.
	Four spot welds, one in each corner and the plate is soon attached to the leg and once I have holes for Brake Pipe clips etc drilled the leg is ready to fit to the shell.
	This is the completed repair to the front part of the rear Chassis Rail where it overlaps, or should that be is overlapped by the centre section. You can also see the centre bit all drilled for spot welding and ready to fit.
	Next I offer up the centre section and make with pencil where it touches the floor, this gives me a rough idea of where to drill the floor panels for more spot welds.
	De-burring the edges of the spot weld holes with a Carbide Burr turning slowly in an Electric Drill, it's a little easier than the old method of using a larger drill bit turned by hand.
	One slight problem that I found when fitted both the centre sections of Chassis Rail was that they didn't quite meet up with the floor in the middle under the area of the seat crossmembers.
	The only thing that I could do was put some weights in the floor of the shell and then jack the Chassis rail hard up against the floor before welding.
	There's still the Driver's front rail to do but she's looking good underneath even if the centre sections had to be jacked up a little, it's certainly not noticeable in the finished product.
	Next I moved back along the chassis rail to where it goes over the axle. The area around the bump stop bracket needed some patchwork. A couple of patches of heavier steel are cut and shaped for the chassis rail.
	Also inside the car there was still a lot of work to be done to both the Inner Tub and Chassis rail area. I brushed some Etch Primer and then Zinc paint into the Chassis Rail, trouble is the etch Primer is like water and runs everywhere including down my arm.
	I've now cut a patch to go right up under the crossmember here and started to tack it in place.
	It's soon welded in, including spot welded to the Chassis Rail and welded to the Inner Tub. Then grind down the welds with a flap wheel, I'm not being too particular as it'll all be hidden by the rear seat.
	Moving back under the car I also start to fit the skid to the leaf Spring Hanger. I found that these were so big/wide that they would almost go over the original skid and needed a really good squeeze in to get it to fit anything like properly.
	A few spot welds down each side and then a few Mig runs round the back edges and it soon looks original again.
	This is the underside of that floor repair shown in the couple of photos above with the inside of the chassis rail once again painted.
	I then weld together and trial fit those two of pieces that I had cut a couple of days ago.
	Once I'm happy with the fit I can then I start and weld them into position.
	Now it's completely welded and the welds all fettled down with grinding and flap wheels.
	Again I position that bump stop bracket I made a few weeks ago, just to check that it fits properly. I'm still not quite ready to weld it in position.
	In the meantime I continue with the job of replacing the bottom inch or so of the inner tubs, just to make it a little easier I did this in section about 8 inches long. This made the pieces easier to shape for butt welding.
	And here that section is welded in and all ready for grinding of the weld and final trimming down to shape.
	This is the same area on the drivers side of the car and it is going to need similar repairs. The bump stop bracket wasn't quite as bad on this side but as I had already made a pair of replacements I am going ahead and removing the old one.
	Once removed it does reveal a hole up into the boot area that will need to be repaired.
February 2009 I still have plenty of small repairs to do around the rear chassis legs but I also start onto the passenger door post.
	At this stage I moved back to the area around the n/s door post. As you may remember from earlier photos the area of the bulkhead side was very bad where it met the A-post. The bottom 8 or 10 inches was very bad so I cut it out first.
	First off I cut out the rot and than made a long repair piece to go from the side panel and mate up with the inner door post.
	And a run of weld up the outside to the side panel.
	And up the inside to the inner door post soon has the repair bit fixed in place.
	As far as the top half was concerned I was going to leave well alone, but then I saw sense and decided to do the same repair job on it as well.

	At this stage I moved back to that rear wheel arch again and continued to cut out the rusty inner edge section by section.
	Each time I would cut out a bit then using cardboard as a template I would cut a patch from metal.
	And then trim it away a little at a time until it was a perfect fit and ready for easy butt welding.
	There's still plenty of grinding to do until the welds are ground down almost flush - not that I'm really worried about the look of this area in behind the wheel but it's good practice for other more noticeable areas.
	Another little item that has proved very useful is these little clips which hold the patch in place and with the perfect gap for butt welding.
	Once you do a few short tack runs you can remove the clips.
	And then follow on with longer runs before grinding them down flush for a tidy job.
	Inside the boot there are also a few small areas which need some repair.
	Another patch gets cut and shaped but I'm not quite ready to weld it in place yet.
	Also inside the boot you can see there's still a fairly big hole at the rear of the wheel arch to fill up, meanwhile the screwdriver holds another patch in place.
	It's not going to be quite the same shape as original but at least it will all be nice new strong metal and that's the main thing.
	This lip is now almost complete but there's still plenty of other work to do in this area including replacing the complete outer lip which is rusted right through in places.
	On the other side of the car most of the same lip will need to be replaced.
March 2009 and I'm still doing lots of small work around the rear legs but towards the end of the month progress starts to get slower as other projects - mainly a new BDA engine and other repairs to the rally car start to take precedence.
	Meanwhile back at the drivers side rear chassis leg and another repair that needs to be done is this bit of the spring hanger. The skid plate had been removed a few weeks earlier.
	After cutting out the rot I shape a bit of thick steel plate and mark out where the hole needs to be cut in it.
	After cutting out the hole with a hole saw I use two sockets to shape the edges of the hole inwards.
	And here is it just set in place and ready for a couple of small tack welds.
	After tacking I place the replacement skid plate in place just to check that the two holes line up with each other.
	Once I'm happy with the positioning I can then go ahead and weld it completely up.
	And then it's just a matter of grinding all the welds down flush and that's another job all finished.
	While fitting the skid plate above to check that the holes lined up I also noticed that it was a rather poor fit. At the front end it was rather wider than the chassis rail that it was meant to fit over. To narrow it down I started and made a short cut with a cutting disc in the angle grinder.
	I then extended the cut to about half the length of the skid plate using a combination of the cutting disc and the air hacksaw.
	Then with it refitted and squeezed tight into place I tacked the end of it up.
	Then I was able to weld the full length of my cut.
	One other job to do was drilling a drain hole as per the original skid plate.
	Another little job that was missed earlier was fitting this little plate around the jack hole in the N/S centre chassis leg. At least when I was fitting the second leg to the car I remembered this little bit before fitting the leg in place.
	Another poorly fitted part was this tramp bar bracket, the little angle piece has already been removed because it was fairly rusty, but notice how big a gap there is between the bracket and the chassis leg.
	There's not much that I can do about the gap but at least I can make up a new angle piece that goes between bracket and chassis rail.
	As well as fitting that angle piece you can also see a repair that was needed further back on the outside edge of the chassis rail.
	It's funny how sometimes one small area can be very bad yet most of the metal around it is good. This is one small area of a rear wheelhouse, there is one 3 inch bit in the middle of the join between inner and outer wheelhouse which is completely rotten yet the rest is fine. First off is cutting all the rust from both layers.
	The top bit is part of both the outer wheelhouse and a structural member of the boot which goes right up to the parcel shelf, because of this it's hard to get the little grips in place that I usually hold repairs in place with while tack welding. In this case I tack an old piece of welding rod to the repair patch so that I can both position it and hold it while welding.
	Once welded I grind off the excess welds to get the repair as close as possible in shape to the original panel.
	Then with a fine burr in the die grinder I round off the radius between the wheelhouse and inner boot member.
	Another closer photo of the above work.
	And finally a shot from inside the boot. This repair now needs etch primed before covering it with the repair from the other half of the wheelhouse. I'll not be mixing up primer for this little repair so I move on to another area.
	So I move on to the rear chassis leg, I must have missed taking any photos of the first part of the repair. Anyway all the rot has been cut out and one piece already welded in.
	For chassis repairs I use heavier gauge metal, between 1.6 and 2mm thick depending on just where is is. I'll use the heavier stuff around suspension mounts etc. Here the patch is already shaped and tacked in place, with the heavier gauge metal I leave a wider gap than usual to get good weld penetration - it means you don't need to be quite as fussy when shaping the repair piece.
	Then it's welded all the way round.
	I then take the angle grinder and use both grinding disc and flap wheel to finally shape the repair and give a good radius to match the original leg.
	And here you can see the various repairs to both the chassis leg and the inner edge of the wheelhouse - I'm not yet sure what I'll do about the outer edge of the wheelhouse where it meets the rear quarter.
	And here you can see a couple more small localised repairs that I've done previously.
	Moving on to the door posts, first the passenger side, I had previously decided that the rear part of the post was in very good condition so I'm only going to replace the front part. Here I offer up the front wing and mark it's rear edge on the post.
	First thing I did was weld in a couple of small bracing pieces from the inner hinge panel to the footwell side panel. This is to stop any possible movement as I cut away the front part of the door post.
	As above I do the same sort of thing at the bottom of the door post.
	Then I clean the cut metal back as close as I can to the blue marks that I had made earlier, this will mean the the final repair will be well hidden behind the rear edge of the front wing.
	Next I cut the repair panel to roughly the same profile as I've already cut the door post too.
	At one stage I had wondered if it might have been a better idea to replace the whole post, it's a bit late to have second thoughts with the repair panel now completely cut in two.
	And then the bit I'm going to use is offered up to the post to get it finally trimmed into a profile that matches as closely as possible the remaining part of the post.
September 2009 and after a summer spent building BDAs and working at the rally car I finally get started back to this project.
	The shell as she sits at the moment and I am ready to start fitting the driver's side front chassis leg which I repaired earlier.
	First thing is to drill all the holes for the spot welds - the ones where the chassis legs overlap get elongated with a carbide burr in a die grinder.
	With all the dozens of holes drilled it's time to offer the chassis leg up into place.
	With the leg jacked up into place at the rear I start and fill some of the holes at the front end with spot welds.
	And then I move on to welding up some of the rearmost holes.
	Once started it doesn't take long to get all the spot welds done and I can then remount the shell on the spit for further work.
	With the chassis leg in place I turn my attention back to the passenger side door post. Over the summer I had taken the shell round to my mum's and blasted and primed various areas, this was one of them.
	If you remember from earlier I am only replacing the front part of the door post and here I have offered it up into place and started to weld across the top and bottom of it as well as a few tacks down the join.
	Here I'm using a G-clamp and a piece of flat bar to keep the repair panel pressed tight to the hinge panel and lined up with the original part door post.
	Then it's just a matter of putting down a number of short welds making sure to keep the two parts of the door post nicely lined up. You'll notice that I've left quite a gap between the two sides, I'm hoping that this will allow some weld penetration down into the hinge panel below.
	Next I put longer runs of weld between these short spots to leave a complete weld.
	And here I have started to grind off the excess weld to leave a nice flat surface for the front wing to mount to.
	Now all I've left to do here is a run of spot welds into the row of holes that I've previously drilled down the front edge of the door post.
	Another area which had already been prep'd and was then blasted and etch primer over the summer was the driver's side leaf spring hanger and it's associated strengthening plate.
	With the already drilled plate clamped in place I run a cutting burr into each weld hole.
	This has the effect of removing a little of the etch primer off the panel below. This will give the welding arc a quicker startup and better weld as it makes a "cold start" in each spot weld.
	Then I start with these three welds - all these spot welds will later be ground down flush.
	And then I continue on with the spot welds down each side of the strengthener and then do a few runs of weld round the rear edges to match as closely as possible the original weld patterns.
	I had previously been setting short pieces into the inner wheelhouses, it had been easy job most of the way round the wheelhouse as there was only one skin but at the rear a number of panels meet where the bootfloor/wheelwell sweep down to meet the wheelhouse.
	Rather than just doing a few spot welds which might leak any water throw up by the wheels I'm going to do continuous runs down here to join these two panels.
	Years ago someone had decided to fibreglass the outer wheelhouses - even though they weren't than rusty. To give the fibreglass good key they had taken a six inch nail and made lots of little holes.
	Thankfully the metal around these holes is reasonable sound so I'm able to fix them up with small puddles of weld.
	Another little patch gets set into the bottom of the wheelwell.
October 2009 and it's time to replace the driver's side door post - it is bad.
	But before doing that I set this repair piece into the area under the backseat on the driver's side.
	This is really the front part of the bootfloor where it meets the main floor and is also spot welded to the chassis rail.
	And now for the driver's door post, at first it doesn't look too bad in the photo but closer inspection will reveal that rust has got in between door post and the hinge panel.
	At the top, both the door post and corner of the scuttle are completely eaten away.
	Further down there are both holes and rust bulging out between the door post and the inner hinge panel.
	First off I put in little bracing pieces as per the passenger door which had been done a few months ago.
	Then I start to cut out all the rusty parts where the panels all meet at the front of the door post.
	And I continue right down the full length of the door post.
	Normally the inner door post and kick panel are two separate panels spot welded together but for simplicity I am going to patch and weld them together as one.
	A closer look at the tack welds.
	After tacking, all the tacks are joined together with continuous welds.
	Just to make the job a little easier I did the repair in two separate pieces.
	With the inner post etc welded and strengthened I can now remove all the rusty remnants of the outer post. You can now clearly see those little bracing pieces which I welded in at the start of the job.
	As you can now clearly see even the hinge panel is quite rusty. I intend to take the shell round to the farm and blast the hinge panel before deciding if it's feasible to repair it or if it will need replaced.
	In the meantime I return to the bootfloor and weld in some repair pieces which I had made-up some months previously. I intend to get the complete rear end of the shell ready for blasting.
	And at the rear of the wheelhouse another patch which had been made and shaped some months ago.
	Likewise up in the middle of the wheelhouse, this repair had been started some months ago.
	And this little patch was the last piece of this particular bit of the jigsaw.
	This is the rear corner of the bootfloor and petrol tank well. The rusty part has already been cut out.
	And here is part off that bit that I had cut out.
	The hardest part of making a repair piece like this is getting the shape of the double curvature just right.
	I'm going to make this repair in two separate pieces so I start off by cutting a piece of metal a bit bigger than required and use my old trusty 1/2 cwt weight and a dolly hammer to form the bends etc.
	With patience time and effort I eventually get it formed to as close as possible to the original shape.
	All it now needs is a little grinding round the edges and corners so that it will be a perfect fit into the hole.
	Now I start to tack it in place, there's no room to use my little clips so I have a piece old welding wire tack to the patch so I can hold it in place.
	Then it's just a matter of welding up the join the whole way round.
	Before grinding down the welds to almost flush with the surrounding area, eventually a very thin skim of filler will be used and once the bottom of the car is undersealed nothing will be visible at all.
	While working in this area another little repair which needed doing was where the petrol pipe comes out through the floor, the damaged metal is cut out.
	Then a simple repair piece is welded in place before marking it out for final shaping.
	The same repair from inside the boot.