The Purple Peril and other dreadful cars I need to fix

[dollywobbler]

To make life easier, drill the spot welds out on the B post and detach the rear wing from the sill (if any connection is left at all!). You then get working space to sort the sill out without having to cut the panel. You can wedge it out with a piece of wood - just don't overdo it or you'll kink the panel. The chap who did the other side still needed to pull some of the interior out of the way so he could work inside too. 

 

You can then use pop rivets to re-attach the wing.

[mat_the_cat]

 

I'm a twat and bought 5" cutting disks

 

Ha! I'm not the only one who's picked them from the rack thinking they look around the right size, only to get back home and think "Oh bollocks!" Only you're braver than I am by using them with no guard - maybe because I had a narrow escape when the grinder once hit me in the mouth, fortunately guard side first...
 

[catsinthewelder]

Ouch,  that can't have been nice.

 

In my defence they were on special in Aldi and were all that size,  I failed to spot the 5" grinder that they were selling alongside and bought 2 packs of the damn things,  I aim to use them all a little to get them down to size before refitting the guard. 

 

I was going to drill out the spot welds on the b-post but the rust goes so far up it may well be better to strip the interior panel and weld the top of the sheet on there,  I'm going to have to strip the interior panel so I'll see what it looks like from there.

 

Sorry that the previous post was a bit odd,  I was rushing out to work.

[catsinthewelder]

Fleet update

 

Cherry is fine and working well,  clutch seems healthier or maybe I'm just used to it.

 

Disco re-assembly is going well after the spannering session. It now has the front prop connected up and the clutch slave re-attatched but not yet bled.  I need to strip the handbrake drum to replace a rounded propshaft bolt, reassemble that, bleed the clutch, fit the rear prop, exhaust system and interior and then I'll only have the rust and other oil leaks to worry about.

 

The VW is still lowering the tone at my local pub,  I'll drag it back once there is space and try to fix it.

 

I was hoping to get the Austin running at the spannering session but it seems to have chewed it's starter motor teeth which is less than ideal.  Please could somebody explain why my a-series starter looks like this

 

and most of the ones for sale look like

 

 

Ta muchley

 

Work shite is changing as both the Convoys have been condemed due to rust.  Replacement for both is one LDV Maxus.  I foresee the Discovery being used for my bus runs on a semi regular basis,  the 205 was used once when a bus got back late.

 

The Suzuki Carry met a welder for the first time today due to rusted exhaust mountings,  it and the mower also met my trolley jack.  We might be investing in some Waxoyl or similar to keep the rust at bay on the work fleet same as it's pretty solid for the time being.

 

To top it off I fixed a Mk4 Astra this morning while doing the school run,  owner had spilt oil everywhere while topping up.  His Mrs was ready to walk 4 miles home when smoke started spewing forth from under the bonnet when it reached the exhaust,  I found some rags in the Cherry and cleaned it up,  followed her home and all was fine.

[Noel Tidybeard]

the top one is an inertia type where the spinning of the motor throws the pinion gear into the flywheel

 

whereas the lower one is a pre-engaged type where the solenoid engages the pinion BEFORE the motor spins

 

theres always this place if you need it reconing http://goodwinsautoelectrics.co.uk/

[Noel Tidybeard]

they apparently have a different number of teeth on flywheel

[Micrashed]

 

Cherry is fine and working well,  clutch seems healthier or maybe I'm just used to it.

 

You're used to it, I was able to get respectable amounts of wheel spin with no slippage on one occasion so Im fairly sure its in rude health.

[Knackeredjagbloke]

Absolutely love these Purple Peril tales, so reminiscent of skint folk in the 60's and 70's desperately trying to keep rust heaps on the road through a combination of bodgery and blind faith.

Back in the day I found an ad in the local rag for a Mk1, D-suffix 1100 described as having "a little localised rust" for £65.  It was also black which was a particularly unpopular colour at that time.

SWMBO needed cheap transport so I went to view it expecting the worst and was blown away by this shiny, sweet-driving machine with pristine pale blue interior and perfect chrome.  Went through all the well-documented BMC rust disaster areas and found nothing - subframes, subframe mounts, floors, sills, door bottoms, inner wings, etc were all completely solid.

The localised rust was confined solely to the nearside front wing which - for no obvious reason - was riddled in all the usual places behind the headlight, rear seam, wheel arch, etc.  I paid the guy £50, slapped a bit of glassfibre and porridge around the wing, squirted a rattle can over it and we sold it 18 months later for £75.  

Those 18 months provided some of the best motoring our young family ever had with the little 1100 outclassing many of the much more expensive cars which came later when the pay packet started  getting a bit fatter.

A truly inspired and completely unpretentious design, the body shell of which made amazing use of space and the suspension a brilliant ride / handling combo.  Maybe the ancient A-series engine was a bit uninspiring but certainly no worse than most of the competition of the day.  I reckon the only thing that came anywhere near it at the time was the Fiat 128 but most of those had crumbled to dust within 5 years of manufacture.

So please, Catsinthewelder, keep your Purple Peril going and keep telling us how you are doing it?