A Sentimental Honda Civic Restoration

[Roverjoe]

23 hours ago, KruJoe said:

You're doing an amazing job with this project young sir.

After doing so well with everything on the passenger side, I don't know how you mentally deal with turning the car around and setting about the whole job again, just a mirror image. If it were me, it would screw with my head too much and I'd struggle big-time with motivation.  

Though the winter. On a driveway. In North Yorkshire. Truly admirable. Keep going!

Cheers! I Appreciate it

[Roverjoe]

Over the Past two days ive been doing a few more jobs, Good news is all the Rear Control arms for the Drivers side are now complete! I installed new bushes for the Lower Control Arm, but kept the ones in for the others as they seemed okay, and to be honest, when they do eventually go ill just replace the arms as you can get them much cheaper than the Lower Arm. I did a bit of Tallying up on cost. If i bought all the Genuine Arms brand new they would have cost me around £700 for both sides. Lower Arms brand new are around £250 a piece. 

 

In other news, I started to prepare for the Drivers side welding and stuff, I had to first clear out a load of crap that was in the car though. So today was mainly gutting out old crap and making things more organised so when i come to work on the other side it will be all nice and tidy. I even pulled this out of the shed today as tomorrow i will be cutting it up into sections which i will be needing for the car. Im going to cut the same places where they would if it were to be done at a proper honda place thers a few notches on the panel to indicate these cut lines so they will be cut Down the middle of the rear door and a cut just top of the C Pillar. Then it should be in two halves so that i can store it inside the car as it was taking way too much room in the shed. 

 

Do note i wont be using the whole panel, only the required bits. this just being the sill and rear arch. 

[Roverjoe]

Been a while since the last update, been busy and the weather has been crap so didnt get much done. Really hoping the weather clears up so i can crack on with more welding but for now ive been on with refurbishing the Rear anti roll bar grinded all the rust off got it primed and painted, Chuffed with the result. Bought some extra tools recently too to make my life a bit easier. Managed to get myself a Belt sander to get into the tight areas and such so fingers crossed i can use it soon

[Roverjoe]

Another Update on the Civic!!

With this little dry warm spell of weather that is happening i decided to get a move on and use it to my advantage. The Drivers side was desperate to be repaired and i finally took the angle grinder to the rust and started cutting. 

Heres a Before photo just to give you an idea on the rust situation:

 

With this being the worst side, the whole sill needs to be replaced. which seems rather daunting as ive never done something like this before. Although using the skills ive picked up from the previous side it should be a challenge which will be worth well doing for the final outcome. Im probably going to have to Brace the car as im unsure if im going to have to cut out the area where the floor is spot welded to the bottom edge of the inner sill. If so ill weld in some pieces from the floor to the upper portion of the inner sill to give the floor some strength and if needed a  bar will be welded across the pillars just in case. 

But for now im currently just focusing on the rear section of the sill. I Ideally want to get the rear of the car welded first, then progress to the front of the car where the rest of the sill and jacking point need doing. The Rover 200 and 400 Owners Club are reproducing the Front Jacking point panels which will come in handy as the Civic and 400 are the same car. Saves me making it all myself. 

Like the otherside the backside of the sill was covered in that black underseal which i rubbed off using thinners and it came up pretty well again which is great!

Unfortunately the rust on this side goes from the rear arch to the front jacking point. So i intend on getting the  Rear Arch done once the rear sill section is complete. thankfully i have a rear inner closing panel and some metal left over from the other sides closing panel which i can modify and fabricate in order to fill in the rest of the inner arch as it will have the same profile.

Thankfully it doesn't look like it has gone too far up into the inner wheel arch. the worst of it is probably where the bumper bolts up into the arch. 

 

So i got an area cut open to inspect the rust, and thankfully the upper part of the inner sill isn't as bad as i thought after a good clean up with some thinners to reveal the original Coating of Primer. 

 

I opened it up a bit more to reveal more rust. and as you can  see the sill gets worse as you work your way to the front, and Rust has crept up between the Rear and Middle section join. Which resulted in me drilling the spotwelds out and peeling back that skin of metal to see how far it had spread in that join. If im going full on with this i may as well get rid of all the rust or it will just come back resulting in more repairs years on down the line. 

So i cut a bit more out to reveal the panel behind and thankfully the rust hadn't spread too far up that seam. As you can see this is where the floor starts to be spot welded to the sill. 
This seam will be all cleaned up and treated or replaced if needs be. it was also nice to see that the Floor Lip isnt rusty. 

 

The idea will be to get all the area prepared and cleaned up ready for welding. I still need to cut out the bit of rot on the inner arch where its welded to the back of the sill, Which can be shown on the photo below.

Once thats all cut out i will then Trim up the repair panel i have made for it. This side i messed up a bit with the measurements and its about 0.5mm too big so im going to have to cut it and trim it down so that the inner sill will sit flush with the inner sill not much of an issue but still kind of annoying. 

 

Here is the Panel i have trimmed up to put in Still needs some fettling and cutting down in some places with the finger sander so that its perfect. But i aim to get this all welded up in one piece rather than tonnes of little bits. I had to cut the lower bit of the inner sill due to my measurement cock up, 0.5mm will then be trimmed off the other piece to get the profile right. 

 

But for now that is where i am up to, hopefully tomorrow i can get some more progress done and perhaps even some welding if all is good!

[2flags]

This is looking good. Hopefully the weather will stay dry for you. 

[Roverjoe]

On 12/04/2024 at 17:37, 2flags said:

This is looking good. Hopefully the weather will stay dry for you. 

Cheers and Yes Hopefully the weather stays good this week

[Roverjoe]

Today was a Welding day! and i have done the small section at the back of the sill shown on the previous post with the last photo. 

A Fabricated a new Lip for the little box section where the trailing arm bolts into and got it welded up. 

 

Next up was the little piece that is welded from the Reinforcing plate inside the box section to the lip. 

Once that was alll welded and ground flat, i then worked on getting the inner sill panel that goes over this box section. I did a few modifications to the panel i made to make it fit right adding some release cuts at the top so i can bend it into the shape it needs to be. 

I got that all welded in and flattened the welds down. I also did the plug welds around the lip of the box section. 

All Grinded Flat:

Thats it all Zinc Primed and protected! 

 

[Roverjoe]

More Welding done recently, Thanks to a Dry Spell of weather. I Was struggling a bit with getting the lower section of the inner sill welded onto the car. i as i had pretty much no reference to go from, thankfully in the end i did manage to get it sorted then i ran out of Gas lmao. 

 

Safe to say im satisfied with how everything is lining up

At this point i had Ran out of Gas so i need to get some more tomorrow so i can finish this bit off. 

 

I also did some work to these Front Fog Lights that needed a bit of a clean up. They were starting Corrode and i wanted to make sure that they were all okay inside. Heres a Before and After:

Still need to get some new screws for it then once thats done they should be good to go!

 

[RoverFolkUs]

Incredible work, wouldn't like to think how much it would cost to have that lot done "professionally"!

[AnnoyingPentium]

9 minutes ago, RoverFolkUs said:

Incredible work, wouldn't like to think how much it would cost to have that lot done "professionally"!

[Roverjoe]

31 minutes ago, RoverFolkUs said:

Incredible work, wouldn't like to think how much it would cost to have that lot done "professionally"!

In fact the quotes that i received when i went round places is what made me do it myself. I was Quoted around £4500 to 5000 for the Welding alone. And i dont know if thats a Normal Price these days or if that was Just a CBA to do it quote. But, im glad i took it upon myself as i would not have learnt all these skills along the way and i will have done it to a degree in which i am happy with as i know more about the car than the people at the restoration places. And them skills will most certainly come in handy when i get round to Sorting out My Triumph Vitesse.  

[Roverjoe]

Ayup Guys Another Update!! Got some more gas today so i could finally finish off that last bit of welding on the sill. I also just decided to plough through and bite the bullet and cut the rear arch out. The Job which im not looking forward to. But it may not be as bad as i thought!

so the Lower part of the Inner Sill is now on Terrible mess as ive only half Grinded it down for now lmao, but i will get round to cleaning up at a later date. Ideally it was to fill in the gaps where the porous welds were due to running out of gas.

 

Next up i cut a bit of the arch out to see how bad the rust was on the lip. Thankfully its not that bad at all really i think it just looked bad when it was still all in tact. 

I then Decided sod it ill cut the rest out making sure i dont go over the line i drew. 

so it seems to be much worse at the top of the arch at the back where the bumper mount is, Makes sense as water ingress through the hole which the clip sits in probably caused it to rot out there first then spread. Something which i need to improve on from factory standard. perhaps lots of cavity wax, some seam sealer and a stainless steel bolt so it doesn't rust. Its nice to see the Reinforcer is all well and Solid. i will have to cut around that when replacing the inner arch, im sure i will come up with something. 

 

Here is a more further back image just to show you the extent of the metal/rust that has been cut out of the car!! As you can also see the black panel on the floor is a New old Stock Inner Arch Section which i was insanely lucky to find. I Decided to use the Entirety of that panel as it will be much easier, quicker and neater rather than cutting and seam welding it in. 

 

Not the Best photo as i forgot to take a before so this was taken from a Video but Heres an image of the arch before it was cut out.

So thats what i did, Removed the spotwelds and as you can see it looks pretty good behind the seams! A Few Scabs which i cleaned up and got primed. 

 

 

Out with the old, In with the new!

I got the inner section all Keyed with 80 Grit and put 2 Coats of Electrox on to fully protect it

Yet again another Crap photo taken from Video, I cleaned up the panels behind, removed any traces of rust and coated it with some Zinc Weld Through Primer.

 

Got it all Placed in and Plug Welded. Do note I have no idea why but the MG Rover Panels Are absolutely Horrendous to weld to, I think that and also the fact i struggled to see due to it being dark up in the arch led to me creating some Rather interesting Pigeon Shite welds, I think maybe 2 Plug welds were decent and the rest were crap lmao, at the end of the day, i made sure theyre strong they have plenty of Penetration so i think a grinder will sort out that issue

And i dont like hiding the bad bits from you lot, I think its good to show the crap parts as well as its being transparent. Good thing is, It lines up bloody well! 

 

And here it is with the door on! Although some of welds were poo Im really glad how well the alignment has turned out, I reckon grind them plug welds down, get it all painted apply some seam sealer and stonechip and itll be good to go! 

Here was a photo i found on one of the MG Rover Groups on facebook, This gives you an idea on how it should look like. So Pretty close i reckon, Just need to fabricate that little panel that goes in that gap

 

The Next Jobs will be to fabricate the Upper section of the inner arch then once thats all done, The outer arch can go on!

[Roverjoe]

For anyone who is interested in Following this project, i have also done a few videos which show the work done more in depth. Feel Free to watch

 

 

[Roverjoe]

Sorry for the Lack of Posts Recently so i thought id Catch up with what i have done. 

Ive been busy cracking on with the inner wheel arch, Id probably say this was the most challenging part of the project so far as i did not have any panels to go from, nor did i have any decent reference as most had rusted away on the car. 

 

It doesn't look terrible but it lost its shape the further back you went on the inner arch. 

 

 

I accidently cut a bit too much out, However the rust behind the Underseal did creep quite far up so i wanted to make sure i got all of it removed otherwise it will just come back and a Converter will just temporarily stop it. 

 

I Made a Panel from sheet steel cut some slots in it to allow for bending. I slowly over time trimmed it down so it would fit. I Also decided to just do it in sections so i had more control over the panel. and that allowed for easier shaping and manipulating in order for it to fit, as i have very limited fabrication tools. All Panels were created with an old Bench Vice. 

 

As you can see here the first section is now welded in. That big hole was left over from a factory spotweld which can be later filled in. 

 

I then trimmed the section section and welded it in. It is by no means perfect however it can be later trimmed and neatened up before the outer goes on. 

 

Here is me Just testing the outer arch making sure that it lines up with the lip, In which it does! 

The inner Arch lip will be welded on once all the inner is complete. I decided to just do it in sections due to the limitations of the tools i have. 

Next up was to Fabricate the Lower Rear section of the inner wheel arch where it juts down. This had all rotted on the Drivers side for some reason. Possibly due to all the stone hitting it. The Passenger side remains intact as it has an Arch liner there.

The Rust had spread All along this seam at the back. I Drilled the Outer arch out, This was spotwelded to the Boot Floor. And as you can see that Lip is all corroded. 

This was the amount of rust cut out. Quite crazy considering it was mostly hidden!!

 

Not Perfect but a little panel was fabricated in order to make a new Lip so the new outer can be welded it it. I Managed to fabricate the Ribs in the panel which i was happy with as that should look hopefully all original once stonechip is applied. 

Another little section repaired where the Inner Inner arch comes and meets the Inner Outer Arch. Its quite confusing to explain but the inner is in two sections and is joined together in the middle. This picture below makes it easier to understand:

 

The Next section was welded in This is the Outer Inner section that sticks out at the bottom The reason i did it this was was to allow me to create a shape which i can fill so that i get the inner arch accurate. 

 

Thats the lower bit all welded in with the lip welded to it. The lip butts up to the outer arch and is spot welded along the edge. As you can see doing it like that is now creating a hole where i can then fill the rest in with another panel. 

Here is the Final section welded in. 

 

 

This is the Before:

This is the After with the Bumper On

Other Side for Reference: 

 

In Conclusion to the Wheel inner Wheel arch, It just needs some cleaning up, Welds flattening etc, It was probably the easiest way of doing it with the limited tools that i had at hand however the main thing is that the welds are strong and plenty of penetration was present and should hopefully look good once its sealed and stonechipped. Ill also be using some Dynax S50 for the Seams to keep rust out! 

[Roverjoe]

I also did some more Fabrication work making a new Jacking point for the Rear:

The Jacking points on these civics are quite crap as water just sits in the seam as they are literally just plug welded at the back of the sill, so what happens over time theyll rust and weaken then you go to jack your car up and it will quite literally snap off or bend. So when i get this welded on i will do some reinforcing welds around the edges to keep it in place, alongside putting plenty of wax between the seam once welded and hopefully that should stop it. 

[Roverjoe]

Oh and Heres an Idea of all the crap/rust ive removed on this side so far 😳

[shampooefficient]

This is absolutely brilliant! Great to see the progress and how neat it is.

[Roverjoe]

On 21/05/2024 at 20:52, shampooefficient said:

This is absolutely brilliant! Great to see the progress and how neat it is.

Cheers!

[Roverjoe]

More work been done recently, I managed to get the Jacking point and Reinforcers welded in. 

The Work is currently quite messy but it wont be left like that, there will be a big clean up once all the welding is complete to make things nice and neat. A lot of the bits have been covered in wax, as you know working outside is not the best for this type of work so it just acts as a barrier against the weather in case it rains.

Heres the Jacking point all waxed up and welded in. i tested it out by jacking the car up and it seemed totally fine and did not snap off. 

I also got my side panel that i bought prepared for when i get it welded on. I cut off what i needed for the rear section of the car and did a test fit to see how it looks. 

 

Here is the Inner Arch Reinforcer all fully welded up now. A Few welds still to grind down but ran out of sanding belts!

 

I got the Reinforcer for the Rear sill welded in too, Gave the seams where its plug welded a good coat of wax too to prevent water creeping in and rusting it. 

Finally here is the Piece that connects the Arch to the Sill. not the best bit of welding as it was a tight area, but it does the job and is nice and strong. Gave it plenty of wax once again as this is another big water trap area. 

as you can see from this photo thats what happens inside the sill, it rots out at the seams. 

 

Here it is from the other side, The outer Arch is not on just placed over it hence why its not lining up as best it could be but that can be all sortable. 

 

Heres a Genuine Closing panel section for reference. Im pretty pleased so far with how its come out. Ive tried my best to make it look as Original as possible and so far its looking pretty close!

[bezzabsa]

looking good there, are you going to do the paint yourself too?

[Roverjoe]

9 minutes ago, bezzabsa said:

looking good there, are you going to do the paint yourself too?

Yeah im hoping so this summer, A nice dry day will be great i can get the car rolled out into the front garden to do it. Ill have to try and blend it if possible, im not expecting my paintjob to be the best but as long as its silver and a good match ill be happy with it. I will try to get a full respray later on down the line when i can afford it. 

The last paint job i did was on my 25 repairing the bumper and wing from deep scratches. i had to fill the bumper as it was really quite deep. but that should give you an idea on the level of work i did regarding paint. 

[Roverjoe]

Sorry for the Lack of posts, I just got back from France recently and only just managed to get some more work done on the car. The good news is, The Outer Wheel arch is now all fully on!

Its the first time ive ever done a Wheel arch so dont expect it to be amazing. There is a bit of warping which i was going to expect, but a bit of filler can sort that out, the more important thing was to get the body lines to line up with the door gap and bumper. 

Heres the Quarter without the wheel arch, i had sprayed some cavity wax in there in the tight areas where i may not be able to reach once on.

Here i started to do some test fitments, making sure that everything is lining up to get ready for cutting. 

Here is the arch fully tacked in place. i used them little clamps to make sure it was all lining up and also the butt weld clamps to make sure the panels are mating together evenly. 

 

A While later and the arch is fully welded in. The hardest part of the project probably done now. I was quite apprehensive about getting this on due to messing up the cut but thankfully i did not. 

 

 

The welds were then flattened down as you can see its not an invisible repair as the outlines of the welds are still present but im happy with it. I did not want to grind too much off as you find that the material will get too thin. Same goes with the pin holes. I filled some of them in but left some alone as i did not want to start making larger holes and chasing it to fill it in. 

 

Thats the arch all painted with electrox zinc primer. I had sanded the arch down with 80 grit to give it a good key then degreased it. I also did some work to the inner closing panel and also the sill.

 

Heres  the sill all tidied up, welds flattened and painted with zinc primer. 

A Before to compare:

 

 

So that leaves, not much left to do now in regards to welding. Just the rest of the sill and finally the front floor and jacking point area. And Very luckily the Rover 200 and 400 OC Got these panels remade for the 400/45 and ZS and they look top notch. Theyre made from 2mm steel too so good and strong!

 

 

 

[rusty_vw_man]

I’ve just read all of this thread, as somehow had missed it.

Its this sort of content that I come here for - someone doing high quality restoration on a vehicle they love, but doing it outside dodging the rain. 

Keep up the great work! 

[2flags]

You are doing a cracking job there. Keep at it and you will have a lovely little car. 

[Roverjoe]

7 hours ago, rusty_vw_man said:

I’ve just read all of this thread, as somehow had missed it.

Its this sort of content that I come here for - someone doing high quality restoration on a vehicle they love, but doing it outside dodging the rain. 

Keep up the great work! 

Cheers! and yeah the weather has been against me a few times lmao, Before i went away the whole quarter was exposed and the forecast was rain, so i quickly drilled the drain holes in the sill and covered the whole repairs in wax. safe to say no rust formed while i was away 🤣

If youre following along i did some videos that go more in depth, For some reason a lot of the photos deleted themselves on here. Not sure why but heres a video of some of the rear arch fabrication work

 

[Roverjoe]

5 hours ago, 2flags said:

You are doing a cracking job there. Keep at it and you will have a lovely little car. 

Thank you! I Appreciate the kind words! Not long left to go now for all the welding to be complete. This dry spell of weather is a blessing so i may even be done for July!

[Rusty Pelican]

Top job right there , well done on keeping it going 

[Roverjoe]

Hi Guys another Update! I have not done much over the past month as ive got a new job. however it means now i can start getting more things together now i can afford it. I recently bought some shock absorbers and springs for the rear suspension. only cost me £130 and the shocks were genuine! I had a hard time finding a set of springs so i had to resort to ebay, i  bought some Kilen Springs, not sure if theyre any good but i heard they make them to OEM spec and reviews have been good so hopefully they're quality.

 

 

Next up is the Sill. I finally managed to fit the rest of the inner sill as it was bugging me seeing the car with no sill on. Im pleased to say that its a huge difference before and after!

 

Tomorrow i will probably get the drain holes drilled and ill fit the outer sill on. Hoping it goes all okay  

 

Another thing was i managed to get my Jacking point panel ordered, and its very good quality pretty much a 1:1 replica of the factory panel so very pleased about that!

[Matty]

Epic work. Should be very proud 👏 

[Roverjoe]

1 minute ago, Matty said:

Epic work. Should be very proud 👏 

Thank you Matty!