1958 MGA Coupe

picked some low hanging fruit today, pulled radiator and gas tank

started cutting out the rust to see what was left

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I took the ice pick to the trunk floor and to my amazement those pitted areas were still solid....i had figured that i would replace the entire floor with a sheet metal panel but since this car will be a "driver " quality job i am just fixing what has actually rusted through...ugly is ok for that area under the carpet.
 
I took the ice pick to the trunk floor and to my amazement those pitted areas were still solid....i had figured that i would replace the entire floor with a sheet metal panel but since this car will be a "driver " quality job i am just fixing what has actually rusted through...ugly is ok for that area under the carpet.

Better paint it some sort of polycantpronounceit paint that LOVES corroded metal....:bounce:
 
[Better paint it some sort of polycantpronounceit paint that LOVES corroded metal....:bounce:

i think before i make my patch panel i will aggressively take the cupped wire brush on a 4.5" grinder to it that will definitely show up any weak spots and clean the crap out of the rest.
 
[Better paint it some sort of polycantpronounceit paint that LOVES corroded metal....:bounce:

i think before i make my patch panel i will aggressively take the cupped wire brush on a 4.5" grinder to it that will definitely show up any weak spots and clean the crap out of the rest.

Shades of my welder buddies '68 Goat, he so lovingly restored to perfection, and still has it in his garage, the new cars set outside....but the Goat had every bit as much resto work done on it as you showing there,....

John still laments his late busted ass, it passed away during that job, :clobbered::nuts::banned:
 
well my son Joe and I worked on the boot floor replacement tonight for a couple of hours

we cut out the rest of the floor to give a nice unified look

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made a template out of carboard

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cut it out and made template for bead roller

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rolled the beads in the floor

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bent the sides

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and heres the mock up fit

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update: pulled the carbs off to clean them and put them to the side and found a broken intake manifold, cracked heat shield on what turns out to be an MGB set up soaked one carb last night and the other one is getting soaked tonight. overall they were pretty clean inside. i bet that cracked manifold created a big vacuum leak and made the car run pretty poorly. look closely at the frame and you can see how they wrapped the throttle return spring around it.

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put a couple hours in after work today while everyone was at the pool...

cleaned up the other carb definitely needs throttle shafts and played around with making a piece for the rusted out areas of the rear window, used a sheet metal break and a shrinker and stretcher to make the part will final fit it tomorrow

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me and Ed we are old blokes sorting stuff out so its not dodgy.....


i made the brake start at post 90

http://weldingweb.com/showthread.php?t=60659&page=4




well nibbled away this afternoon i cut my pieces to size to be an insert fit.

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used the best ground ever trick for the mig, i use this grounding strap for all my welding and plasma cutting the idea is that the many copper strands arew always in contact with the ground and the area you are welding better then just the clamp

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heres a backing strip so the insert piece doesnt fall through

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and voila some mig welding and grinding and here it is, this will be the rough cut and when the sanding for body gets done the final sanding will be done


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the clamp is only holding the backing plate in place so the insert doesnt fall through


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Can you find a intake here in the US ? Ebay ??? Hope you dont have to repair that one ....

they are a dime a dozen, one thing about the Brits is that their supply chain was so limited they used the same parts on everything that was made, so engine, mechanical,gauges and lights are common to a zillion vehicles...the body panels and especially the rear glass are the unique items. the rear glass that came with the car is worth more then what i paid for the car...seriously its really close. i said to my brother that my biggest profit margin would be to just to part it out and do nothing to restore it...
 
well my son and I tried a new technique today with my bead roller and a flange die to make this replacement panel..




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wow what a fun day. everything went perfectly i will say i did a lot of prep work for this to make sure i understood the angles and how to make them. layed out the bend lines. i followed Barney Gaylords write up from MGAGuru for these parts

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made a to size template to keep every thing straight in my head

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made the next bend.

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templates verified i was goin in the right direction and i pretty much followed Barneys write up paragraph for paragraph. i bent the flanges 8" at a time and measure them so i would have a nice straight and even bend. when you do this much bending on sheet metal it takes on a shape of its own and the flange bend straightens it out again.

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made the graduations for the twist

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layed out and cut out the inner panels

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the punch and die for the big flanges

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rolled the flanges and done!

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