TR2/3/3A back half to chassis questions

[sp53]

I think it is amazing how you approach your fixes. I do not have the experience working with fabrication. My tunnel was off like yours, and I slotted the holes in the tunnel, 3 of them, and now wished I would not have. My welding skills are not that good either, and it never accrued to me to just move the caged nuts.



Now I have a tunnel with ugly oval large holes. The sad part is it was a great tunnel and they are getting hard to find. Anyways, I found the paint to build up and take more room because both sides of the doors got painted in a restoration. That could be my imagination because I fought for ever fraction of an inch trying to get the doors to open and close. It is interesting to me how the factory never painted behind the hinges or the catches. Plus the large chrome pull latch on the door never fits tight to the door from the factory at least that is my experience, so I lost some room there. The way you are doing your car Frank and your skills with metal, I am sure it will fit together nice. you are essentially
building a hole car


I guess the MGA had wooden floors, and I could have handled that most likely. Frank what did you use for sandblasting media? Around here they do not sell silica sand anymore, but they do sell marble sand, but again the chunks are too big for my blaster. I need a good welding teacher, so if you are ever up this way bring a hood and stop by.

steve

 

[Frank Canale]

Thank you Steve, Jodi on welding tips and tricks has the best videos for all types of welding. Give Harbor Freight a try for glass bead blasting media. 40 years of custom fabrication has made me pretty picky about fit and finish. This will make my car better but it will make the project take longer also. I can live with that. Frank

 

[CJD]

Very nice. It must be a relief getting to work with a few pre-formed parts after so many you had to fab from scratch. I like that you left the doors un-skinned...as that will allow you to not just adjust gaps. but fine tune the twist and bends in all planes!

 

[sp53]

I think it is amazing how you approach your fixes. I do not have the experience working with fabrication. My tunnel was off like yours, and I slotted the holes in the tunnel 3 of them, and now wished I would not have. My welding skills are not that good either, and it never accrued to me to just move the caged nuts.



Now I have a tunnel with ugly oval large holes. The sad part is it was a great tunnel and they are getting hard to find. Anyways, I found the paint to build up and take more room because both sides in the doors got painted. That could be my imagination because I fought for ever fraction of an inch trying to get the doors to open and close. It is interesting to me how the factory never painted behind the hinges or the catches. Plus the large chrome pull latch on the door never fit tight to the door from the factory on my car, so I lost some room there. The way you are doing your car Frank and your skills with metal, I am sure it will fit together nice.



I guess the MGA had wooden floors, and I could have handled that most likely. Frank what did you use for sandblasting media? Around here they do not sell silica sand anymore, but they do sell marble sand, but again the chunks are too big. I need a good welding teacher, so if you are ever up this way bring a hood and stop by.

steve

 

[Frank Canale]

Thank you John, glad you feel it was a good idea to leave the skins off. I am in uncharted territory as far as my experience with a restoration so always good to get your opinion. Frank

 

[DavidApp]

Around here Northern tool sells a crushed glass blasting medium which seems to be of very consistent size.

On the door latch I think I carefully filed the staked pieces till I could get it apart then when I reassembled it I just did a bit of restacking with a small flat punch. It is amazing how many things that did not get photographed or I can't find the photos.

David

 

[CJD]

The entire latch doesn't have to come aprt, just one leg. Post #84:

TR2/3/3A - Recipe for a TR2

The heater is hung, although not fully secured yet. The last couple days were frought with problems. This is the original stator tube on the right. David sent me to Grainger, who carries the similar stainless 3/8", .035" walled, 61.5" long tubing. The original is not stainless, but oh...

www.britishcarforum.com

 

[Frank Canale]

Thank you John, Always great to see cars in progress as it helps to keep me motivated that some day I will be able to start calling mine a car also. My latches will need to be re chromed so I will need to take them apart. I have one that is in really bad shape to practice on. I may end up with reproductions if the plating ends up being goofy expensive. I don't need show car chrome, looking more for it to look like original. Down the road. It is grass season again so weekends will be tied up cutting grass at my moms house in West Tennessee. Bonus, she is a great cook and sends me home with left overs. Frank

 

[CJD]

We are finally getting longer stretches of decent weather, so getting projects done over here. I am amazed that you didn't miss a tick, even with all that nasty cold weather you got. If you have one of the older latches, you may not need to modify the springs. It's all the newer repros that started using springs that are just too stiff to close the doors.

 

[Frank Canale]

Up date: not much to photograph driver side shortened almost 1/8”, very happy with door frame fit. Latch works very good. The passenger side sticks and need to figure that out. I am going to start looking at replaying cost vs reproduction. Rear body mounts are much better now. I looked at the frame and the imprint of the rear body mount rubber packing indicates that the body mount was to the rear of the slot so that helps with that question. Rear section has come off twice and back on and lined up each time no problem. Now to focus on rear closing area again as it is getting warmer so I can get this area blasted and primed before finally getting it all closed back up. Frank

 

[Graham H]

I think I would be happier to have the door skins all fitted and finished to measure the gaps, there are so many variables to take into account, just a thought.

Graham

 

[Frank Canale]

Thank you Graham, Normally that is the way to do it but my car was in such bad shape that I can not trust any part of it to be correct. Once I have the tub together and as correct as possible then I can make the doors fit the openings. The door frames have had a lot of repair work done to them and are sound but will need some adjustments to get the fit correct. Once the frames are the correct shape then I can adjust the skin to fit the frames and hopefully I won't need to do any welding to the edges of the doors. I know this will take longer but a way to challenge myself and improve my metal forming skills. Frank

 

[Frank Canale]

Not much progress to post. There has been a lot of measuring and preparing to sand blast the rear closing area. Since I did not remove the rear valance of the car, welding the closing panels will be a little more difficult to clamp in place before it is welded but I think I have that solved. I am planning all the holes for the plug welds and getting all the panels ready to be epoxy primed before I do the sand blasting. waiting on the weather to warm up a little more as I don't have a good way to keep the back half of the car warm enough for 24 hours so the epoxy can cure.

Passenger side boot closing panel welded in place

Things like this drive me crazy so took the time to fix it while I am working on the distance tube hole location in the rear valance.

I marked out a piece of steel to fit the entire hole, welded it up and then laid out the hole location and re drilled the hole.

The back half is on its side, I rotated the picture so it looks a little skewed. I do not know if the horizontal closing piece at the lower back of the valance should be flat or should it be bowed towards the middle. There is a drain hole at both ends and one in the middle. The gap at the ends is 3/8". The original vertical closing panel that attaches the horizontal panel to the spare tire floor was in such bad shape I can not tell if the bow is from time and deterioration or if it is correct. Any input will be a big help. Frank

 

[Graham H]

I believe the drain holes under the valance and also under the sills were to drain the paint when the bodies were dipped but whether that area should be bowed I don't know. Getting the cover to fit in the hole was my main consern also those little cutouts along the bottom edge are where the bumperette bracket sits without touching the panel.

Graham

 

[CJD]

My closing panel is flat on the bottom. If they get hit they tend to bow downward.

 

[Frank Canale]

Thank you, John. I made plans to deal with this panel however it turned out. I can easily shrink the flange and straighten the bow. The bottom of the valance is flat and makes sense that the closing panel would be flat also. Great to have confirmation. Frank

 

[CJD]

I'm just enjoying the posts...you're getting close to the end!

 

[sp53]

Frank here are some pics of the little underside end piece. You do great work, and I thought you might like some pics.

steve

 

[CJD]

I knew you were holding out on the pics, Steve! What a difference from where you started...I especially like the beige frame. Very different, and I assume the way your car came.

 

[Graham H]

Steve, you can get the little plastic plugs that fit in the drain holes from the usual suspects, they will keep some of the elements out?

Graham