mexico blue mini

[94touring]

Wrapping up the right rear corner. 

This is how the day started.



Next up was taking the closing plate and fitting the subframe mounting plate.  I used the left side as a guide to duplicate when I fabbed it up.



Nicely in place.  As a word of advice, make sure you know for a fact the trunions will fit up against the closing panels for the valance.  Not a lot of room for error.  I almost goofed and had them too far forward.  With the valance and closing panels off its crucial you have them lined up properly before welding in place.  Had I not drilled out the holes while I was doing my fittings I would have been royally hosed and had to redo a lot of work.   



Cleaned up and primered.  Everything blended out nicely. 








Next couple days I suspect I will be cleaning the bottom and removing excess waxoyl and seam sealer. 

[Mudhen]

Tetz uses short strand filler over metal repairs/welds...you?

Man that looks nice!  My issue with those little 'like' buttons is I can only do one per post.  ;D

Just ran out to the garage to check the trunnion area - it's gonna be close...  :(

[94touring]

The trunions will fit almost snug against the panel.  Its just if you've removed them, be careful positioning them when they go back on. 

Yeah I went over the welds with a line of filler, then sand it down flush.  Doesn't take much after you grind down the welds, but make it clean and smooth.

[94touring]

Wish I could say this was enjoyable.   20.gif

[94touring]

Spent the first part of the day doing a series of small patches, then threw up the other cill and rear valance.  Lots of spot welding.

[Nicholasupton]

Looking good Dan, I just bought a Dustless blaster to start stripping cars myself and because it is a wet process undercoating just flys off, and best of all no need to de-grease before blasting. Also I recommend dumping the Avco shocks and springs and going with Pro-tec it will make a world of difference in the car.

If you want a 100% brand new wiring harness that goes direct from the ECU to the engine and has prewired relays let me know .

[94touring]

Dustless blaster thats wet, I need to look into that.  Sandblasting is messy work.  This car had a combo of undercoat, seam sealer smeared in excess, and lots of waxoyl.  The needle scaler did good on the undercoat but had to resort to manual scraping with the waxoyl and most of the seam sealer.  Sand blaster to do the final clean up.     

The guy I'm building this for just ordered a harness thats plug and play.  He's going to be dropping the motor in and taking it from there.  I need to read over the instructions that came with the subby and verify a few things that need trimming and mount it up to check fitments here soon too.         

[Mudhen]

seam sealer smeared in excess     

I've really learned to hate seam sealer...but I guess it's a necessary evil???  Do you re-seal the seams?  Before or after primer?

Looks awesome, man... 4.gif

[94touring]

Either or, but needs primer on top of it.  I will need to hit a few areas with sealer, primarily the boot edges on the inside. 

[94touring]

Not a lot in the form of pictures today.  Needle scaled away the undercoat on the inside and started cleanup there.  Finished off some spot welds and put on the Apanel.




For this Apanel the backside should be flush with the door frame.  Use a couple vices to pull it snug.



Flush on the backside like so.



There is a lip that needs folded over once everything else is welded up.  I started with a hammer, then when I couldn't get the hammer on it, used a screw driver and hammer combo to drive it closer, then my handy vice grips to crimp it completely.  Throw on a few spot welds back there like the factory has and its ready to seam seal on both sides for primer/paint.

 

[Mudhen]

You wouldn't happen to have any closeups of some of your spot welds, would you?  Probably being too picky, but I still hate how mine are coming out.  I bought a spot weld setup from Eastwood (castellated cup for the welder and a pair of vice grips for it to sit in) but gave up trying to use it - sort of locked the welder in place too much.

Or maybe the punch tool I bought for making the holes is just too big...hmm....hadn't thought of that one before...

Thanks

[Nicholasupton]

An easy way to remove the factory undercoating is using dry ice to turn the rubber to a brittle state and then it bounces right off with a tap of a hammer. Normally less than an hour to do a complete mini floor. 

[94touring]

Cool trick Nick, I wouldn't have thought of that.  Took me about an hour with the scaler too, but its loud. 

Mudhen, close up of spot welds.  I user higher power on the welder when I do these.  Practice power settings and hole size on some scrap till you get it down. 



Today I bought all the paint supplies, cleaned up the paint booth, and threw on some paint.  Got the inside floor primered up too.  Will be gone for about a week before I'll have any more updates. 

[macmanron]

Nick, Tell me more about the dustless blaster, I was thinking it would be a nice side job, on the weekends to earn some cash.

[Nicholasupton]

I will post some pictures of it (and a video) when it arrives and I am up and running. It is not a cheap investment as it cost 5k just to start plus the cost of a compressor 185 cfm @ 150psi.  You can see youtube videos of it running at www.dustlessblasting.com

The reason I bought it was to strip customer cars as right now I am paying $1600 to have a car stripped with plastic and micro mineral, inside and out.  The cost was not the only issue as I was also having to wait 6+ weeks for a car to get done, and transport it over an hour away

[94touring]

As many cars as you do, 6 weeks and $1600 a pop, you will recoup cost in no time I would think.  I saw part of one vid, did I understand they are using recylcled bottles?

[Nicholasupton]

Yep it uses recycled bottle glass  about $9 a a 50lb bag. The thing I like the most about it is that it is PPG certified stripping so I will never have a problem with adhesion.

[94touring]

Back at it today.  Masked up the bottom and decided to play with the roof.  Doing things kinda all over, but whatever. 



Fixing dings and gouges.  Nothing major. 



And then for the time consuming and fun part.  For this I figured out width and length center to center.  Came up with 45 1/2 inches wide and 64 inches long.  Took off two inches on each end, divided by two, measured to the center, and then made 8.25 inch squares.   





As luck would have it as I turned off the fan to the paint booth to go home, the pvc that sits across the top decided to fall onto this nice new roof.  So I get to redo a couple squares and reclear it.  I was too tired to cry.  I didn't bother to take pics of the smeared clearcoat either.




 

[Mudhen]

Holy crap that is AWESOME!!!   4.gif

So you didn't paint it all white and then just do the black squares?  Trying to picture how you masked it off...

[94touring]

Yeah first I painted it white, then I took a magic marker and put spots along the outside of the gutter to lay my tape on.  You can see some of the markings in the pictures.  Once I had the centerline spot on each end I measured outward and put my marks for the longitudinal lines.  I measured inward on the longitudinal lines and was able to establish points along side of the car for the lateral lines.  I carefully layed the tape down and then it was a matter of masking all the white off and painting the black squares.   

[wevebeenhad]

saw the post on MM. That roof looks so sharp. Now you have me wanting to play! haha I will just relax and work on one thing at a time.

[94touring]

Its hard not to look at when I'm working on the car, lol. 

Today not much to show off.  Got the front end on, then the car off the rotissier and on the cart.  Started prepping the interior for paint.

[94touring]

Made the inside blue today.  Now back to my day job for a couple weeks...

[Mudhen]

Made the inside blue today.  Now back to my day job for a couple weeks...

What's that little bracket on the tunnel by the rear passenger footwell??  I have it on mine...thought it was something the PO had installed for something, but guess it's factory.

Another question - ever done any removal/installation/work on the rear side pockets?  I think I'm going to have to remove mine for the cage install...although I've yet to track down good pics of the main hoop feet...

[94touring]

Ashtray.  You're the 2nd guy lately wondering what that was.

I have yet to have to replace the rear side bins.  Looks fun though.