17th June. Back from holidays in Portugal and time to get on with the project. The sealer in the new tank has had three weeks to dry and looks OK so I need to finish getting the old one out. The old mounting studs actually came out quite easily - I had given them a good soaking with WD40 before I went away - but then I had to remove the rear exhaust section to allow the tank to drop out. Bit of extra work but no big problem.
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| Rusty area of old tank |
Interestingly there is a screw head that looks like a drain plug in the old tank (see picture) or it might be where someone has made some kind of repair before. I wonder?
With the tank out I was able to have a good look at the condition underneath the rear and found it mostly good but some potential trouble spots. All the main sufaces have a really good covering of sealer/stonechip except the tops of the two chassis rails. These have some scabby rust starting. Its like someone has done a very nice job and then completely missed some important bits. The area above the tank is all excellent so why miss the chassis rails? Weird.
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| Tank out, looks good |
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| Left chassis rail top, rust starting |
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| Right chassis rail top, rust starting |
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| Rust treated with Hydrate 80 |
Couple more pictures. First shows the remains of the tank fixings that came off, you can see they would never have come undone without breaking the straps anyway. Second shows the dodgy repair of the old tank done by the mystery bodger. I just hope it was an emergency repair and not typical of any other stuff I might find lurking in wait for me.
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| Old tank fixing studs |
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| Dodgy repair to the old tank |
18th June. Now the Hydrate 80 rust treatment has cured overnight I have painted the areas with some underseal I had in stock. I think it came with the previous red car project that I sold last year and has never been opened. Looking at the label it is priced at £1.09 so must be almost something for Antiques Roadshow but it looks to be in perfect condition. I know the shop ( A&B Autospares ) got taken over in the 1980's and the 4-digit phone number confirms it.
Just realised after writing the above that the underseal is just about the same age as the car, Now THAT is originality for you !!
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| Historic underseal |
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| Historic pricetag as well! |
23rd June. Well its all back together and the car is sitting on its wheels and running. Usual sort of dramas finishing the job, had to make a new brake pipe up on the axle as the old one twisted off when I undid it. The bleed nipple rounded off so I had to fit a new one. One of the KYB dampers had a thread picked up so I had to carefully run a die down it and the fuel gauge is still not working - more of this later.
On the plus side that old Tetroseal has worked out realy well and gives a good finish.
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Tank back in place,
note lots of copper grease everywhere! |
24th June. Three Cheers, after all the fuel tank drama the Blue car passed its MOT today so I can now run it down to the bodyshop to have the rear arches done. Feels like I can really get started making it into what I want now.
So it will just be the Sprint engine, poly bushed suspension, 4-pot brakes etc etc etc to all come off my original red car!!
Could be a busy summer.
