project 1980 Austin Princess

[Angrydicky]

The engine bay is a lot tidier than all my cars already! How's the welding going?

[vulgalour]

Nothing doing on the welding.  Found a supplier but there's no funds for gas until I get more commissions in and more time to do those commissions.  I might end up farming the welding out to the neighbouring mechanic just to get the car done in time, he'll likely charge less than a bottle of gas to do what's there, most of it is just ordinary patches.

[vulgalour]

The brakes were going to be done yesterday but the weather was appalling up here. Instead they got done today. When the rear displacer went I swapped out a complete arm, displacer and brake drum assembly but never got it sorted beyond that. I can't remember if this was done before or after the MoT. I do know there was an advisory on a pretty serious imbalance on the back brakes and a virtually ineffective handbrake. Today I got the car in the air and whipped the wheels off. Driver's side brake drum was behaving properly and adjusted as it ought so I left that alone. The passenger side drum was sticking on very badly, even with all the tension taken out of the cable so something was definitely up.

 

Bit of time with a hammer saw the drum freed off enough to move properly and then I could get the hub split open to get a look inside.

 

The shoes were stuck to the drums, there was corrosion, random crud and not too healthy looking inside. A suitable amount of meat still on the shoes for them not to need replacing at least. I decided to do the least I could get away with and cleaned everything in situ, checked the operation of the cylinder and unseized the automatic adjuster. After a little while it was all clean enough to go back together and would release and activate as it should. For the first time since I've owned the car the handbrake is now strong enough to stall the car if you set off with it on and the brakes themselves are superbly reactive... oh yes, I drove the Princess around the yard a bit today! I'll bleed the brakes another day, Mike was busy fighting gearboxes so couldn't help me out with that, then the brakes should be better yet.

 

Had a bit of a poke around while the wheel was off and found another hole when I decided to peel back some loose underseal in the arch. Getting bored of finding these little holes everywhere now.

 

This crosstube mounting bracket is very tired and needs to be replaced. I've got some spares in stock so I'll try those out. It should be fine for MoT but it won't take long before it's knocking and spoiling the ride. The nut is what holds the pivot shaft for the trailing arm in place and should sit centrally in the metal hole.

 

I also noticed that the bottom of one of the rear displacers, the one I replaced, has started to crumble away in that way they do. There's nothing I can realistically do about this, welding it would risk destroying the diaphragm. Replacing it is equally not an option, parts availability is very poor. I just have to hope it won't burst too soon.

 

A pleasant surprise today was a visit from @Nomad in his superb Hillman Hunter. The paint on this thing is spectacular and it sounds amazing, it got me very excited.

 

Here's a video review of the Princess now she's running, first time I've used the video function on this camera. Timing is pretty close to perfect now but the exhaust has a bad blow that needs fixing. The visible emissions from the exhaust are... well there aren't any now. This car has always had a little puff of smoke out the exhaust but now there's nothing at all, replacing those stem seals when I rebuilt the head must have been a good idea.

http://i845.photobucket.com/albums/ab16/volksangyl/Serendipity/2015/20150217-video.mp4

 

There are some issues to note. The rocker cover oil filler cap need replacing, it leaks a lot. I've got a replacement thermostat and expansion bottle cap in the post as the current ones are well past their best, you can see the thermostat cap leaking badly with a bodged gaffer tape temporary seal rigged up just to allow me to drive the car around the yard and get it up to temperature to re-torque the head as per the book.

 

Most surprising of all was finding out the fan over-ride toggle on the steering column shroud now works. It never used to as far as I can recall and all I've done that might have affected it is to re-route the wire more sensibly and clean up the contact for the fan. I did investigate replacing the front sphere today and sadly there wasn't enough time to do that, instead I cleared some surface rust off a few places and gave it a splash of beige to tidy up while I still had a bit of daylight to work with.

 

All in all, a feel good day was had today.

[vulgalour]

My last proper update was way back in February and I had been getting increasingly frustrated at being unable to work on this car.  Just these past few weeks, that's all changed.  The one thing above all else stopping me getting that all important MoT certificate has been rust.  So much rust.  I mean, it's not terminal, but it's certainly been more than I wanted.

 

It just seemed that anywhere I found filler - and my goodness there's been a lot in this car from its previous 'restoration' - I found it was hiding rust that had started small and grown big.  More reinforcement, as if it were needed, to the theory that I bought this thing with my heart and not my head.

 

I had been getting together some important things for the welder, things like a new auto-mask, a decent set of tips and shroud, a bottle of Co2/Argon mix and various clamps all to make life easier.  Metal fabrication one of my weaker skills so I need all the help I can get on that front.  My welding is equally okay but I'm no master, I produce reasonable welds that are strong but they're far from pretty.  So with all this in mind I made a tenuous start on the worst part of the car, the rear driver's corner.  Here's just a shot of the welding I was getting when I'd already attached the sill and started building the arch.

 

Before much longer, that whole sill outer was welded in place and an arch repair section made from a bonnet edge.  I'd seen someone else take a piece of right angle steel, cut one face at regular intervals to the bend and then curve it to match the profile of the arch.  I did this and tacked the tabs to the existing arch, trimming the tabs as needed and filling the slightly triangular gaps with weld as I went.  Bit of a learning curve on that one and the end result isn't perfect but it's so much better than the big blob of filler that was there.

 

Really highlights just how rough that door corner is too, but since that's not structural it can wait a little longer yet.

 

Moving to the front of the car I explored some rust blebs on the front wing and found that a lot of filler was hiding here covering what must have been pinholes and had since festered.  Slightly trickier for me to resolve as this is very visible so I shall have to take care with this repair.

 

The bottom of the wing was also up for repair but on removal from the car more filler and poor repair was highlighted, the whole thing just crumbling in my hands.  The spare rear sill section I have for the opposite corner is a close enough match to replace this, I just have to hope the other wing isn't as bad!

 

Typically, hiding behind that is the reason the footwell on the driver's side would get wet, along with a lot of rust flakes and dirt.

 

The section I needed to repair was simple enough.  Luckily I had an odd bit of sill and some flat sheet that did the trick here.

 

 

I did find a section of the sill this side had gone from the inside out too but I'm putting off doing the rest of the outer sills until the floor is finished so I can do both in one go.

 

There's more to come, but I'll have a little break before I post that up.

[fordperv]

That's some good progress right there, this is exactly how I learnt to weld, i havn't looked back

[vulgalour]

I got a little distracted from the welding when I won a WINDSLAMMER aerofoil on eBay that I forgot I bid on, mine for the princely sum of 99p.  Talk about an obscure accessory.  As a kid I thought they looked really cool and associated them with the modern fancy trucks that had started getting those big fibreglass scoops on top of the cabs when most trucks were just brick-shaped.  I was an easily amused child.

 

 

So, that was some little holes filled which is great.  Then it was time to explore the front driver's floor.  I knew from when I bought the car in 2012 there had been some repair here, evidenced by a blob of pink fibreglass visible when the carpet was lifted.  I'd left it alone all that time and more fool me, I should have investigated it and sort it out because the filler, fibreglass resin, rivets, overpatch and old rusty floor pan turned a little visible repair into this demoralising hole.

 

I did the inner sill first while I had some access to it, leaving it long so I could trim it back before the repair section goes back on the wing.  It also made sure I had enough metal to tie everything together.

 

Typically it had gone over the jacking point too.  That seems to be a weakness on these cars.  I had thought the hole at the back of the floor was bad, forgetting that cutting out most of it made the inner sill much easier to repair and, unlike this hole, I didn't have a steering wheel or pedals getting in my way.  As a result I laid down quite a few welds not quite where I wanted them and had to go back over a few times so it's quite ugly.  Importantly, I couldn't see light through from the back.  Usefully I had a spare floor section from the orange donor car which proved almost big enough to fill this and saved me time on some fabrication.

 

While that was cooling off I investigated the other side of the car at the front.  I knew water or oil was getting in here somehow but had never figured it out.  After removing an enormous blob of bitumen and cleaning it all back I found the floorpan itself was remarkably solid but that the inner sill had rotted and just been smeared with bitumen to hide it.  Cheers restorer.

 

The more I cleaned the bigger that hole became.  Happily, it very quickly cleaned back to solid metal.  Another case of a small area becoming far worse because of bodging.  Lots of dirt and rust flakes had got stuck allowing water to sit in the sill and seep into the cabin thus explaining where the oil/water was coming from, finally.

 

 

 

I also cleaned up the back corner on the same side.  This was much better than anticipated but awkward.  I didn't want to cut good floor out to repair this and needed to have a think about how best to approach it so left it for another day.

 

My last job was to get some beige paint down on the rear corner of the driver's floor.  Not all the welds were dress back because I haven't the tools to give me access.  Since the welds are solid and no light visible through I thought it best to apply seam sealer and paint and leave it at that.  Once it's properly tidied on the other side and underseal and I've got the carpet back in the cabin you won't even know it's there anyway.

 

I had finished welding up the front floor too but didn't get pictures of that.  The panels aren't perfect and you can see the patches but again I don't mind so much.  Similar access problems with cleaning up the corners so it's a bit lumpy-bumpy to look at, there's nothing I can do about it and it doesn't bother me.  I know there's no filler here anymore and while I'm resigned to the fact that rust will always find its way back in, right now it's nice solid metal.

 

Here's that WINDSLAMMER with my old Thule roofrack, a very useful accessory that's helped me do tip runs and house moves and furniture collections with this car.

 

 

[Skizzer]

This is the real deal.  Great work.

[Vin]

Good work Vulg... 8)

 

'Windslammer' eh...you just need the caravan to go with it...

 

When I was a kid, my old man made his own for the SD1...he cut a piece of plywood, painted it and bolted to a roof rack bar...

[vulgalour]

The last bit of this big update then is what I did today.  I had earned a break from work and decided to see if I could get the floor finished since there was so little left, might just help me get through the rest of the week.  Started by tackling that back corner.  This was an absolute nightmare to cut out using a combination of worn-down cutting disc, almost small enough grinding disc, wire wheel and ingenious use of hand tools.  A Dremel would have been ideal but the one I have access to has a dying motor and just isn't up to the task.

 

Two small patches were made and stitched in, on the whole this went well apart from the inner sill catching fire and me having no access to put it out.  Welding gloved hands over the sill holes to starve it of enough oxygen did the trick.

 

I couldn't get anything in to clean up the welds and it looks appalling.  Everything about this repair was unpleasant, part of me wishes I had just hacked a massive hole in the floor for access.  If I get a working dremel in the future I can always go back and clean this up.  But as with the other repairs, when the interior is in and the underseal on you just won't see it so why bother beyond some pride in workmanship?

 

The front floor cleaned up quite well, the patch over the jacking point went in really easily and even ground back mostly smooth.  It's surprising too how much stronger all the jacking points are now, I hadn't realised just how weakened they were.  You see that daylight coming through?  Yeah... as I was welding the inner sill some bitumen melted off and I saw some filler.  BLOODY FILLER.  So it got a poke and that happened.

 

I had a poke at a suspicious lump in the A pillar too, a lump that wasn't present on the other side.  That was yet more filler and hiding this lovely hole.  I didn't want to cut the bottom of the wing off for access so this was a tedious job to clean up to something like weldable and impossible to dress the welds back on later.

 

If front wings were more plentiful and easy to remove I would have just taken the wing off.  The end result is really ugly.  Happily, I have some good arch liners to go in thanks to that orange donor car, my originals on this car were broken badly on both sides.  So none of this will be visible.

 

Inside I made sure all the metal bits joined up to all the other metal bits, found it again really difficult to dress back so just got busy with the seam sealer and paint to keep it watertight and solid.

 

 

 

And that is the update I've been holding off on all this time.  I wanted to get the floor finished before I shared what I'd been doing.  I know my welds aren't attractive but I also know the panels cannot be pulled off by hand or by tools so I'm confident they're suitable.  What did surprise me is that now these bits are all done the floor is more solid, it used to feel like it had a bit of spring in the front - possibly because large parts weren't attached to the sills - which it now doesn't.

 

I've got the driver's side wing bottom to repair, both sills to strip back to bare metal and weld up where necessary, the boot floor corners to repair and all four doors need attention, which they will get.  For the MoT, it's only the sills that need to be done, but that doesn't mean I want to rush it through with just a couple of patches, I want all this rust I know about dealt with before the car gets back on the road again.

 

Other than that there's very little to do on this car.  A new clutch kit has been ordered, I've got a hopefully good displacer to go on, a good set of tyres, enough metal to finish the repairs to the sills and other bits and the engine does run when it feels like it.  The brakes need going over because the car's been out of regular use for a little over a year now and I'm wanting to fit a good modern electric fuel pump.

 

Maybe one day a full restoration will happen.  For now I just want the car reasonably solid, tidy and reliable again so I can use it.  Ideally I want to at least drive it legally on the public highway before the end of the year.

[MarvinsMom]

hey vulg, great to see you back and full of enthusiasm, and even better to see that this grand old lady is getting a tickling with the electric glue stick.....

[Skizzer]

Thing is, as you've more or less said yourself, ugly + invisible = not ugly.  Plus the welding itself looks pretty tidy actually, certainly strong, and that's a what matters about the workmanship.  I'd just be basking in the glory of a properly solid car, me, and not think twice about the aesthetics of the hidden bits.

[derskine]

Nice work man.

[vulgalour]

Cheers everyone  It feels good to be making the old girl better.  I'm really looking forward to getting the interior back in and cleaned up this weekend so she looks like a car inside again for the first time in forever.

[cort1977]

Excellent work, as said above I think you have exactly the right attitude to welded repairs, it it's solid and won't be seen then it doesn't have to be too pretty.   I take my hat off to those perfectionists who get it all perfect but it's more fun driving than welding.

[JohnDeere]

Looking great. The lack of Princess thread updates has been leaving a rust-sized hole in my evenings, so fantastic to see it taking shape so nicely.

[Forty-two]

Hey Vulg, I enjoy reading your updates, keep at it!

[Noel Tidybeard]

dont be too harsh on yourself re weldage cos that serpently aint no pigeon shit not by a long chalk

[Bren]

So glad your mojo has returned. The site was missing something.

[purplebargeken]

Vulgs mojo has re-entered the building. Yay!!!!!!

 

Just try and vary what you are doing so that you don't get ground down by the same'ness of it all. Variety is the Old Spice of life and all that. 

[jonny69]

Definitely don't be too harsh on yourself about this - we've all seen a LOT worse from people even on this forum.

 

You need to look at it this way: you're restoring a car so that it can be used, not so that it can live in a garage and occasionally go to shows. The sort of repairs you're doing are the best for this because you can make a useable car that you don't have to worry about all the time.

 

Glad to see you've got some motivation back on it!

[oldcars]

Great work, my skills would have ended at fitting the windslammer. That is a thing of beauty.

[Angrydicky]

You've picked that up quickly! Top work.

 

Just* needs some better doors and a respray now

[vulgalour]

I've dug out the Tara Green bootlid and found it's in better condition than the beige one on the car, so that's going on this weekend and I'm not respraying it.  Then the orange donor car's doors will go on and they're only getting painted where I repair them.

 

I'm not too bad at welding really, it's a lot like painting.  It helps when the kit you're using actually works, which it didn't when I made the first attempt to sort that floor out.  I can even do welding that dresses back to invisible sometimes, though usually only with brand spanking new bits of metal on a nice work bench so that doesn't really count.

[Ghosty]

A usable classic - you're living the dream, Vulg.

On the first drive, know you've earned every yard.

[vulgalour]

Like delicious bacon, I am on a ROLL.  Had some free time and some motivation post work hours today so got myself over to the unit for a few hours to try and get the Princess sorted out a bit more.  With the exception of the rear seat and inner sill trims (I don't actually have the latter, I need to make them) all of the interior can be refitted now without fear of welding damage.

 

Scooped up the remains of the knackered foam that used to be against the bulkhead and traced the pattern onto some new matting, it's essentially bubble wrap sandwiched between tin foil and can tolerate under bonnet temperatures, ideal for this application as it cost me precisely £0.

 

I didn't want to go mental sound and heatproofing everything and besides, I've still got the soundproof mats and foams that the car came with and they're perfectly fine.  The foam on them also helps make the carpet feel a little more plush which modern matting probably wouldn't.  The other benefit to using this stuff is that magical £0 price tag.

 

Then fit the carpet, which is easy peasy in the Princess.  This is the interior I liberated from the orange donor car.

 

I couldn't fit the centre console so it's just dropped in place.  Locating the screw holes for the centre console is difficult in good daylight in a brown interior, trying to do it with artifical light in a black interior is just rage inducing so I didn't even make the attempt.  It also meant I couldn't fit the front seats either but they're easy to put in.  All the door furniture was reinstated including the black grab handle someone in the owners club kindly provided.  I did find I was missing one window winder fixing screw, a grab handle fixing screw, a door seal, an aluminium tread plate and a door seal protector/clip all on the same corner so I'm hoping they're in a box and I've just not found them yet.  These aren't items I removed so they could well be lost forever.  Back seat plonked in place to keep it safe.

 

I finished cutting the holes for the speakers in the parcel shelf trim board.  The board is not in great condition and the vinyl cover was badly damaged from having holes put in it for wiring and stuff but it was complete enough to be retrimmed.  I used more of the space age matting I used on the bulk head as you do get a little bit of boom from the parcel shelf and then wrapped it in some black velvet I happened to have in a box.  I was going to go with black vinyl but since I had no use for the velvet and it's a really good match for the seats I decided pimping was the better option.  I've got to wrap the edges and cut the speaker holes in the cloth the put speakers in I liberated from another Princess' door cards so I'll have a four speaker system in the car that looks factory.  There seems less glare from this than the vinyl too.

 

Finally, I got the posh flocked glovebox liner fitted in place of my plain plastic one.  This is something I'd meant to do ages ago.  Does need a dust, as does the whole interior, but then this has all been in stasis for a year so it's to be expected.

 

Of course, while I was doing all this black velvet, velour and vinyl stuff I had The Cure playing in the background.

[purplebargeken]

Taking shape nicely. It's good doing stuff that gives you an instant positive result for little outlay. 11/10

[Anglevan]

Good to see some grafting. The repair to the lower wing is the same as my marina needs. However I've not even touched mine. Sat on the drive a year now.

Regards the windslammer, that wants swapping to the rear of the roof rather than the front (unless that's the look you're after)

They were put to rear of roof to deflect the air over the roof of the van. Very popular in the eighties when slab fronted caravans were around.

[Largactil]

Of course, while I was doing all this black velvet, velour and vinyl stuff I had The Cure playing in the background.

 

Surely this would have more appropriate?

 

[vulgalour]

@Anglevan:  With the roofrack fitted, WINDSLAMMER works* best at the front.  Without it should be at the back.  It's not a permanent fixture.

[Noel Tidybeard]

@Anglevan:  With the roofrack fitted, WINDSLAMMER works* best at the front.  Without it should be at the back.  It's not a permanent fixture.

you sound like a brochure!