81 HL Resto

[danotje]

Hi all. I just recently ran across this forum and am glad I found it. I just returned from Okinawa and am planning a restoration of my 81 Mini that I bought in the UK. It looks great on the road, but unfortunately I found a lot of rust underneath, particularly on the right side. It breaks my heart because I love driving it, but it needs to be fixed. Plus, I've always wanted to try to restore a car. This site has given me a lot of insight and right now I'm trying to plan my approach/set up my garage. I think I'll be ready to physically start in Dec. Any hints or tips are greatly appreciated. I tried attaching a photo of the car as it sits now--we'll see.

Cheers,
Dan

[94touring]

Welcome to the forum.  The car looks pretty good in that photo!  Get some photos of the rusty areas and we'll have a better idea how you may want to tackle the job.  It may be as simple as patching some rust or replacing a few panels in your case.   

[danotje]

Thanks for the welcome. Unfortunately, it does look pretty good. I'd say great, actually. That's the heartbreaking part. If the right rear WW (which wraps into the boot) wasn't rusted so bad, I wouldn't mess with it. However, where the WW meets the body is completely gone except for by the sill--not good for the shock tower support. Also, the back right corner in the boot is also essentially gone. Someone had "patched" it with some thick plastic stuff, then painted over  11.gif. I'm bummed, but it is an excuse for some new tools and some new bits for the car--just have to go through the work. Anyway, I'll try to get some more shots up soon once I begin my photo log. Cheers.

[MiniGene]

Good luck with everything.  This is a really good site to get inspired at.  Dan does some awesome work and will make you feel like a shmuck for not touching your mini in a year...oh wait, that is me. 

As far as you situation, a lot of us have been there or are there now (me).  I'm looking to get rolling on my mini after a hiatus.

Where were you at in Okinawa?  I spent three years on that island in the early 00s.

[danotje]

Thanks for the words of encouragement. It does seem like a daunting task at times, but my plan is to be slow and methodical to make sure I get everything covered (and correctly). The scariest part is I'll be learning to weld and need to weld in quite a few panels underneath--the reason for the resto. This site inspired me to give it a go, though, so I am excited to try it.

I was at Kadena from 07-10 with the tankers. Good times 20.gif

[94touring]

I taught myself everything, so I'm sure anyone else can do the same.  When you get to the welding part, practice on some of the old scrap, play with power settings and feed speeds.  You'll quickly learn what works for you.  Since its body work it doesn't need to be pretty, you end up grinding it down.  Same goes for the paint.  Get a piece of sheet metal and practice prepping and spraying till you get it dialed in.  I can give more advice on that once you get closer. 

[danotje]

Finally ready to start, so thought I'd post a couple of my pre-leap of faith pics. One is the car at the local car club show and one is my new shop. Still have a ways to go with tools (don't we all), but I'm going to begin teardown this week. I'm going to start with pictures and will post more as I go. Wish me luck!

[94touring]

 4.gif  I still don't see any rust on this car!  Can't wait to see what you do. 

[danotje]

Yeah, I know. Even in person it presents pretty well. I'll get some shots up later this week of some of the bad spots. The worst of it is in the boot and right wheel well. I can see the ground while sitting in the back seat! The previous owner "repaired" the boot by covering it in some kind of hard plastic and painting over it. That finally cracked and broke which is how I found out that it needs some major work. I'm planning to build a rotisserie and totally strip it down/rebuild it. Any preliminary advice?

[94touring]

I think i'd take the interior out, take off the flares, ect... and poke around a little to see what areas are bad.  It may just be a matter of patching up what you already know is bad and painting the necessary areas.  Is there any visible rust on the exterior of the body?   

[danotje]

That's what I thought, too. There are a few rust bubbles in the usual areas--wings, scuttle, sills. I'll have to sand it down to see the extent of the damage to the metal. My real concern, though, is the right sill and aft wheel well/boot area. As I mentioned, the WW/boot is completely rusted through and will need replacement. I just need to figure out how far it extends. The sill is very weak (I put my finger through it!), so that will be replaced as well. The front end might just need a clean up, but the back end is going to need some welding for sure. I'll try to get some pics up soon.

[94touring]

I just replaced the scuttles on my pickup...well the whole front end actually.  That corner where it meets the wing can be tricky. 

[danotje]

Here are some shots of the more troublesome spots of rust on the car. The last two, in particular, are pretty bad. The boot floor is completely gone on the right side and repaired with some kind of hard plastic. The wheel well is cracked almost all the way round and you can see my garage floor through it. I didn't get the sill in there, but it is pretty shady right now, too. The other pics show some rust bubbles on various parts of the body. Some of these might be correctable without replacing the panels, but I won't know until I take the paint down. All in all, the car really needs to be stripped down in order to get a good assessment of the damage and what needs to be replaced vs repaired. Great chance to learn how to weld!

[94touring]

Ah I see now.  Well the scuttle and wing are both bubbling along the seam, which means you should replace both.  Kinda hard to do one without the other and once it starts rusting in that seam its not going to stop.  From the factory they did a horrible job of providing protection in that area underneath the panel and in the seam as you'll find when you cut it out.  Same goes for the front end around the headlights.  Once it starts in between the overlapping seams you're better off replacing it.  You might be able to salvage the front end panel since you can clean it up along that seam once the wing is removed.  Buy an air chisel to remove the wing but be careful and work slowly around the front end panel, otherwise you'll tear it to shreds.  Looks like bondo in the rear was used for a quicky patch job.       

[danotje]

Started tearing things down today and found a few surprises. The front of the car seems to have not been squared up properly and has about 20 pounds of bondo on it to smooth it all out. Looks terrible in the picture, but the panels seem okay with just some surface rust--the metal is still there and holding up. Unfortunately, I'll have to separate all the panels and realign them even without rust issues. Good news is that the scuttle seems to have only minor surface rust at the moment. Hopefully that will hold true and I can re-use it. We'll see.

Not so lucky on some of the other spots. Just scraping with a screwdriver to see what was under the paint, I put no less than 4 holes in the car. I'm almost afraid to go underneath, because this isn't the worst of it. Well, I wanted a project  ::) It is kind of exciting getting started, though. I'll have to re-look at this post in about 6 months.

[94touring]

Some people really go crazy with the bondo.  That wing looks like toast to me.  Have fun! 

[MEhinger]

Oh my!!! here you go. Don't look back.

[danotje]

Seriously! It is kind of overwhelming, but I'm excited to put it all right again. I figure I can't really make it worse! Got a lot done yesterday afternoon. Stripped off the lights, marked a bunch of wires and removed the exterior brightwork along with most of the interior. So far it looks like the wings, nose, driver's floor, driver's sill, rear wheel well, boot floor, rear valance and possibly the panel next to the rear window. Seems like a lot, but I really want to be sure to get rid of the rust. I still haven't removed much paint or flipped it over yet, either. I figure I'll get a lot of practice welding  ;D Next up I plan to remove the dash, heater, associated stuff, the glass and gas tank. I work with a guy who knows someone looking to get rid of an engine hoist, so once I manage that, I'll pull the motor and subframes. From there, I'll start stripping the body and build a panel list. I'll keep updating as I go. For now, here's a few pictures of my progress.

For the first pic, I think the caption should be "This can't be good..."  -- notice the non-standard "handle" in the floor.

Cheers.

[94touring]

Interesting how that wheel well rotted out like that.  I would expect the floors to be just as bad but they really are in pretty good shape aside from a few needed patches. 

[danotje]

The only thing I could figure is that the quarter window leaked. I know this because I unfortunately had the original owner's manual in that pocket for a while and it looks like I tried to plant on herb garden on it. Since the well sits directly below, I imagine the water dripped onto the well and went fore and aft to the sill and boot. This car came from the UK about three years ago, so it spent most of its life in the wet. They also use salt on the roads sometimes in East Anglia which might've helped the well rot from the outside. I also think that panel has been replaced at some point. The left side is super solid and still has sound deadening. The right has a sticker like repair panels often have and overspray only. One other curious bit is that the bottom of the quarter is completely detached from the car. There doesn't seem to be any rust there, though, it just isn't attached. Maybe they forgot? This might also have contributed--maybe more to the sills.

On a side note, repairs on this car have obviously been shabby. In the picture below, this is a chunk of bondo I pulled from the trunk. Bad enough, but underneath there is a patch panel that was spot welded in, then lathered in bondo. Seems like they wasted more time and effort doing it wrong than they would've doing it right  :(

[MEhinger]

You bring up a good point aboutthe damage from leaking side window seals. Are decent reproductions for the swing out windows available? Do they fit and seal properly?

[94touring]

I had a car where the seal was a little short and had leaked in on the swing out windows.  I tend to use silicon around nearly all the rubber seals on the car to help with water leaking in.   

[danotje]

Been REALLY slow going as I'm finishing my Master's, teaching a course and trying to get through the honey-do list. I did finally get the welder out and shot a couple of spots on a candle holder, though. I got some scrap steel to start learning on, too. Welding is more fun than I thought, so I'm pretty excited. Also called a guy about an engine crane last night, and he said he just got done with it and will sell it for $70! Only been used once. Once I get that in the garage, I can finally pull the motor and subframes. I was planning originally to build a rotisserie, but the logistics of it make it a little daunting. Plus, with no hole in my backseat panel, I just decided it would be more trouble. Looking through Duchy's photos though, I decided to build what amounts to a huge furniture dolly. Looks simple and effective. So with all this going on, I'm hoping I'll have some productive days soon with some more pictures  ;D

[MEhinger]

Ahhhh!!! Cars from England. The sagas about MOT inspection and slapping on repairs to pass are legendary. Even as bad as yours seems, it is a creampuff to many of the minis that are still in Great Britain. Whenever I get depressed about what I am fixing, I go to the website:

www.theminiforum.co.uk

actually, more specific the forum section that deals with complete mini rebuilds:

http://www.theminiforum.co.uk/forums/index.php?showforum=62

Seeing what those guys do when they finally rescue an MOT refugee is truly inspiring.

So take heart. You may not have seen the worst yet, but you will get over it and to the finished product. We've all been there before.

[danotje]

Thought I'd post some more recent shots. I've been working on the car about as much as I've been posting (life just keeps getting in the way), but I've made some ok progress for the amount of time. Anyway, pulled off the left wing just to kind of get a feel for how that process is going to go. Kind of tough going, but I think if I take my time it will go alright. Also managed to get the motor out (finally). A friend of a friend just finished putting his motor back in a 65 Mustang and had a one-use, foldable HF shop crane for sale at $70. Worked great and I pulled my first Mini motor. The only snag I ran into is the driver's side ball joint will NOT let go. My forearms look like Popeye's now after beating on that pickle fork. I also had an air hammer working it along with some WD40, but no joy.  50.gif I managed to get the engine out anyway, so I'll deal with that little guy after I get the subframe out.

I also got my first shipment of panels in from MiniSport. It is pretty cool to hold the solid panels up next to their rusty counterparts and think of how much more solid the car is going to be. I particularly like the rear quarter as right now it is barely hanging on. At least it will be easy to remove!

Finally, I also built a mega furniture dolly for the body once I drop the subframes. Stole the idea from Dutchy as I saw his car sitting on something similar. I was going to go the rotisserie route, but sourcing, transporting and ultimately storing the materials just seemed a bit much. I've seen a few of these dollies on this site, so it must be a workable solution. Anyway, here are some updated pics!