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9 turbo Phase 1 9 Turbo

So Big Steve is being an absolute lad and is selling me a brand new tank, which is a spectacular result.

On with the axle, back from blasting so I attacked it with Bilt Hamber, I like this stuff @Turbell thanks for the tip!

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Left to cook, 24 hours at gas mark 0.1 :D

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In the mean time I hacked out this bit of grot on the back chassis rail where the fuel pipes cross through

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Cardboard template, cut it out and bent it, trimmed and welded in. Still struggling with neat welds, bit frustrated tbh I should be doing better than this.

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Back edge is a bit better

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Then on Sunday did the rear axle with some nice thick primer over the Bilt Hamber

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I had another 40 min before I had to head off to the Snowdome Sunday afternoon for my first ever Ski lesson, so i investigated some suspicious looking metal on the rear axle mounting points, between the front and rear bolt holes.

Tap (crunch) tap (crunch) oh dear that doesnt sound... TAP - SMASH - oh f**k

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Surely the other side can't be that bad.... tap-tap- SMASH oh F**K

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I investigated further, and what i think has happened is that water gets in between the axle mount and the bottom of the car where its rotted and doesnt dry out very well. Its eaten through from the outside to the inside. Where the axle is bolted tight against the bottom of the car where water/damp can't get to is not rusted. As I cut away the rotten patch you can see up into the box above and actually, both sides are in pretty good nick considering the shambles of the outer skin. I was absolutely dreading what I was going to find behind the rusted bit but as it wasn't actually holed and water didnt get inside that cavity it looks like i've been able to cut back to solid metal and a flat square patch will sort both sides once i've treated inside the cavity.

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The floor carnage

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Thats all for this update folks :)
 
The tin worm has met his match on this site , you lads on here are seriously committed to patching these French classics up . Great work .

I feel like i'm trying to sweep water uphill at the minute mate!!

Welding neatly is all fun and games on thick stuff. I struggle to get neat welds on sheet metal too, easier when it’s not 20 years old and rusty as well.

Good work, keep at it. 👍🏼

Well, every bit I patch is one bit less to do innit :)
 
I agree, bad idea, more projects on the go. I do the same haha. But it's still a step in the right direction. I have a 19 16v axle here if you ever go down that route, plus some mint seats for when it becomes a full resto!
Are you butt joining or overlapping on the joins? I assume you've tried testing with 2 new bits of metal and it's better than what you can do on the car? Have you tried just spot, spot, spot to make a seam rather than a continuous weld as its easier to control?
I was chatting to a Ford mate about the renault metal recently. They don't seen to rot away in huge chunks like the fords do, and it's a struggle to get the welding as nice. As if there's something mixed in the steel to help prevent corrosion?
 
I agree, bad idea, more projects on the go. I do the same haha. But it's still a step in the right direction. I have a 19 16v axle here if you ever go down that route, plus some mint seats for when it becomes a full resto!
Won't they be 11 seats? They're different as they fold forward being a 3 door, this has fixed 4-door seats, but they're in decent nick anyway tbh :)

Are you butt joining or overlapping on the joins?
No overlap

I assume you've tried testing with 2 new bits of metal and it's better than what you can do on the car?
Yes, much much better.

Have you tried just spot, spot, spot to make a seam rather than a continuous weld as its easier to control?
Yes, but I still struggle with it blowing holes regardless, even on the smallest spots, with 0.6 wire and the welder at about 40% power.

I was chatting to a Ford mate about the renault metal recently. They don't seen to rot away in huge chunks like the fords do, and it's a struggle to get the welding as nice. As if there's something mixed in the steel to help prevent corrosion?
Didn't work very well did it! :D
 
Saturday I treated the inside of the box where the bottom of the axle mount had rotted away

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Then I painted the axle black, and while I did it had a good old think about how to handle the refitting of the bushes. (Yes, continuity error here as the bushes are already in, get over it :P )

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I cleaned up the inside of the axle parts with a dremel and rubbed grease in to aide refitting

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I decided to fit the bushes to the mounts first, and not wanting to press down on the middle bit and stress the rubber to sink the outer bush in, I plasma cut a ring from 4mm steel that fitted over the bush inner and rested on the outer metal ring, but inside the edge of the axle mount

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Then it got a damn good pressing. You can see the ring I made under that old-wheel-bearing stack.

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Success

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To refit the mounts to the axle I went with an M10 threaded bar to pull the stud in, like so

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In the end it wasn't man enough and stripped the nut thread at the point shown below, so i dug out some fine pitch M12 stud I had made to long-stud a 21 Turbo block many moons ago and used that, and an air gun to dugga-dugga it to death

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This pulled the inner bush collar right in nicely.


Sunday morning I was against the clock a bit as I had another Ski lesson booked for 2pm, so I started fixing up the N/S axle point now the Bilt was dry

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I'd also cleaned down and used Bilt on the floor above the fuel tank to see how well it treated.

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Not too bad, I guess once properly undersealed it'll be fine (you'll note from the factory its not undersealed at all!)

I made a plate to insert in the hole

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Painted the back for what it was worth. Probably pointless after I attacked it with a welder lol

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Then I welded it in, which proved incredibly frustrating. I didnt take pics because I was short on time, but for about 50% of the seam I got a good weld, nice and clean. 40% of it was pretty bad, and I struggled with the weld sticking to the gas shield of the torch, the weld pool was behaving like mercury almost and just running away from the bit I wanted to weld (some of it down my arm too which has left some lovely burns) and 10% was just a massive hole blown through the metal and I ended up with a weld mountain trying to fill it in, which I then had to grind back. Even more annoying is that stood up on the bench the welder is doing great work, really neat and very pleasing but as soon as I get near a car it all seems to go tits up. Maybe I should build a rotisserie so i'm not trying to weld upwards....
 
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More good stuff mate . The welding above your head and uphill on a car does not get any harder . I found if you try and get a nice weld it ends upon the floor or inside your boiler suit rolling down your chest and a scar only certain people get to see . So I start at the bottom and spot it and build up from there . Can look neat with practice but strength out ways neat . Skiing lessons ,snow or water?
 
Skiing lessons ,snow or water?
Snow, always wanted to try it, and i'm not getting any younger so when the chance arose for a week in Italy with the lads I had to do it. I've had 2 3 hour lessons so far, I can ski well enough to go to normal public sessions now so we're going to do 2-3 of those before we go in March. Really looking forward to it! 4 of us are seasoned ski/boarders, then me and James are total noobs :)
 
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