Chappys S13

[chappy]

Hi all!
It's taken me a long ass time to work out how to become a member, and I only become a member to write a thread about my car! Thats a bit weird because normally you couldnt pay me to read a book and now I'm paying £21 to write one!
But enough of that, it's all about the car!

So last September I decided it's time to move on from my old project car, one of the original 3 1.8T MG ZRs, hand built by yours truly, it was the 'modder prototype' (MGR did build one in the factory which is owned by the now MG tuning company ZandF tuning, they use that to write the maps for us. Mine was the first of the 3 modder prototypes setting me back around 8 grand in total over the years I owned it (nope it didnt have headgasket failure once) A fair chunk of that was on supporting mods for the turbo conversion like uprated brakes, KW coilies and OZ Superleggra wheels, but heyho, I helped pave the way for the MG tuning world.

Heres Sparky; (I seem to have misplaced the finished pic but heres an unfinished pic, incomplete mk2 conversion)



Right enough of that! I doube any of you really appreiate MGs anyways, especially not the newer Z range anyways, I'd be surprised if you dont apprecite the classics though!


So after the shell was gone of Sparky I decided that I would use that money to clear off my credit card. But I was in Germany on an exercise, surfing the web on DW forum, and a few days later I had bought my next project. So my credit card is still pissed at me, and now so is the mrs because I bought a car and didnt take her away on holiday. I got back from Germany 2 weeks later and got told I'm redeploying there again a week after that, so I had from Sunday to Sunday to organise collection/delivery of the car. Got that sorted thanks to my best mate doing this stuff all the time, a nice chap carted my rusty shed from Kent to Warwick for me, at the bargain price of £99.
We got her off the trailer, I paid the man and he left. I was left with this;


Really surprised as all I needed to do was hook it up the the BMW for a bit of juice and it fired into life, drove forwards drove backwards... Then reversed onto my drive. It was the scariest 10m drive of my life as the front drivers wheel was held on my 1 wheel nut, the other 3 had decided they didnt like being part of this car so wondered off somewhere

Then I got on google and tried to find the most common places for rust, arches sills and turrents...




Drivers side front arch doesnt look too bad! Winning!







Pass side front arch isnt that bad either. Still thinking might tub them though..






i took these pics so long ago I cant actually remember where they are but I think thats the back of the headlight? Either way its not the right colour!!




I don't know how hard it will be to tackle these spots of rust!? They dont look too severe, only surface looking (atleast thats what I think? Im not very good with rust!) so hopefully some crust, a clean up and some protecting and they should be fine?




The dreaded spoiler rust... Is actually much worse than it looks! I'm probably going to have to replace the boot but I'm gonna see if the metalsmith here can cut out the rot and weld some new metal in. Probably not but worth an ask!










SILLS! Or lack there of in some places! Already got some replacement sill of Spiced on here though so thats the worst of it sorted on the drivers, the pass side didnt look too rusty although it looked like the sill had buckled a bit so I may attack that with a hammer and see if its weak or anything... Nothing the metalsmith cant strengthen though I hope!


Ohhh I forgot to mention the car come with a few spares... A whole new set of suspension and most of a manual gearbox conversion!

[chappy]

So! This is pretty much how the car sat from October to last weekend. I spent a lot of time working away and then when I finally got some leave in December it was faaaarrrr too cold and wet to do anything to the car, plus it was christmas... I have to spend some time with the family in the year so this time was fairly appropriate for that!

So I decided that I'd need to get the car down to camp if I was ever going to get any work done to it, I knew I couldnt keep paying outside companies to kart it around for me as that would cost a fortune. I need to get a trailer and make my daily tow it! Now as brilliant as my 320d was on economy, it wouldnt have the power to tow 1.5T around (inc. trailer weight) so I had to chop that in and got myself a 3.0 CDTI V6 Vectra. Can tow 1.5T, and can tow it with ease! So got my Vectra, hooked up a tow bar, and borrowed a trailer (for now) off a chap at camp!



Shes on and ready to rock and roll! 200 miles from Warwick to S.Wales, up and down some wonderful Welsh hills. I was impressed to be honest as the Vectra at a total weight of probably over 3T did the journey on 3/8ths of a tank and didnt even struggle, 60mph the whole way, no matter what hill Wales through at it. Not bad considering the trip normally takes just under 1/4 a tank!



Just after arriving back at camp about 5pm, thought I cant be arsed to unload it tonight I'll do it in the morning. So 10am the next morning me and Josh come out to offload her,. Untie her, prep the trailer for offloading, turn the key and VROOOM she fired up, was well proud! haha

Got her off the trailer, handed that back in to the ownwer etc... Got a car pass so she wont be taken away by the scrap men and left her there for the rest of the day.
Tuesday comes! Fortunately work seems to be having a power cut day so we all got knocked off, I used this time to get her inside and put her over the pit. I found some scary stuff! Also more of that orange stuff that I dont like (and I dont mean my hair, I like that)Put her on the pit on Tuesday, but wasnt allowed to work on her as there was still people in work and I wasnt allowed to work on her in work time... Even though we were knocked off?! Go figure....

So today I had a quick look under there, with the pit lights turned on... Power makes a real difference I saw the car under a whole new light haha

The first thing I found was;

Hoooollllyyy crap. I've drove this car! Granted from the car park to the workshop but still! I spose its my fault for not checking it over properly but I never expected this!!! I knew it had no brakes but jeeeeez!

More underneath pics;
















Sorry about the last pic, Josh thought it would be a good idea to start flicking the pit lights on and off to the beat of the music... Peenarse.

But yeah! So theres more rust than I thought.... A small hole is appearing in the Pass footwell, needs a new section of chassis rail and it looks like most of the drivers sill instead of just some of it! Plus to fist sized holes in the rear arches and some touching up here and there elsewhere...

Why do all the parts go that horrible colour though? They're not proper rusty but they look god awful in that dirty white/yellow/orangey brown colour... I know most of the under the car will need replacing or refurbishing which doesnt bother me this is going to be a long term project, hopefully resulting in a show car standard S13!

But lets not get ahead of ourselves... First things first I need to get this rust sorted. My metalsmith is going to become a very rich man. Or very drunk if he keeps asking for crates of beer instead of money......



Sort rust
New windscreen
Service engine
Tax/MOT road legal
Manual conversion
Vertex bodykit (or cheaper rep)
Paintjob
Then in many many moons, potential RB swap.


But for now, rust. I'm having nightmares about it now haha

[Chriscooke]

Good man, good to see these cars getting saved Project threads are great to read back through as the years pass

[chappy]

Haha I wouldnt want to break this, I've had the Vertex S13 as my computer/laptop wallpaper for as long as I can remember... Since I was about 13 I think! It's gonna be a long hard slog but it'll be done... But as I deploy so much and I'm also looking for a house with the mrs (must have a garage for this though lol) she is gonna be a passtime project rather than one of the ones on here where it goes from Rust to bare bones to fully rebuilt RB or SR or CA weapon... This will literally take me years I think. But a dream car is a dream car right

[2oo]

Haha I wouldnt want to break this, I've had the Vertex S13 as my computer/laptop wallpaper for as long as I can remember... Since I was about 13 I think! It's gonna be a long hard slog but it'll be done... But as I deploy so much and I'm also looking for a house with the mrs (must have a garage for this though lol) she is gonna be a passtime project rather than one of the ones on here where it goes from Rust to bare bones to fully rebuilt RB or SR or CA weapon... This will literally take me years I think. But a dream car is a dream car right

Wow, we're literally in the same spot! Haha!
Got a little project on my own, living with my mrs tho in a small flat, but I'm also looking for a place with a garage, or a place to lease a warehouse/workshop.

I'm gonna stay tuned on this project, it'll be interesting to see how you handle your car problems!
- But a dream car is a dream car So are my thoughts.

[chappy]

So I've been away working for the last few weeks, but the metal bender at work got to have a quick poke around my car.

I asked him all happy and excitedly if he picked up anything other than the 1 chassis rail, the small hole forming in the pass footwell and the fist sized holes in both rear arches
He replied in his gloomy way
Both sills need work, as do both footwells, the roof is starting to bubble around the windscreen, the boot needs a lot of tlc and I didnt even check the rear arches because of the rest of the clip of the car. Either way its a lot of work.

It's almost like he thinks I'll give up on it? He doesnt seem to understand that whether I pay him to do the work or I pay some randomer in a garage down the road to do the work, someone IS doing the work. Hell I'd like him to teach me to weld so I can give it a shot myself.

He does make a massive meal of everything though. I asked him to cut the silencers out of the exhaust for Veccy and weld some pipe in place and then the hangars back on and that was too big a job!!
The rust on the roof is just started to bubble so I can treat that with some crust and sand it down paint it up when the windscreen is out... The boot will be replaced thats too far gone, the pass side sill could use some TLC but it didnt crumble when I attacked it with a decent hammer so I have faith in it still.. It's just the little lip bit at the bottom has seen better days... I dont know what hes on about rust on the drivers footwell I cant see any...

So when I go back into work on Monday I'll be speaking to him about it, but if anyone knows anywhere in S.Wales that can take care of rust? I heard theres a Jap specialist in Bridgend I wanted to try but I cant find it on google or anything!! That said I spose theres also the RAF I could ask on the other side of camp! I'll have a busy week next week!!

[2oo]

So I've been away working for the last few weeks, but the metal bender at work got to have a quick poke around my car.

It's almost like he thinks I'll give up on it? He doesnt seem to understand that whether I pay him to do the work or I pay some randomer in a garage down the road to do the work, someone IS doing the work. Hell I'd like him to teach me to weld so I can give it a shot myself.

There's loads of videos on youtube on how to weld rust, prep your car before painting it, sanding it down, etc..
If you want to contribute on the body work yourself, that is.

[Neelie]

safe to say, you have a bitta rust going on there ha
good to see ppl taking these on! stick with it! it'll be a good investment

[chappy]

Spent all morning watching people mig weld on youtube. I sit here on my sofa and think 'that looks easy I could do that' but when it actually comes to taking a grinding or cutting disc to my car I will be crapping myself haha

Although it looks fairly easy if your patient! Anyone know where I can buy some patience from? Either way looks like I'll be spending a few weekends at camp

One thing I noticed that everyone seemed to spot weld the lower lip bit of the sills, but no one shows how this was done? Is it just a case of drilling small holes in the outer sill and filling with weld? Then grinding back to look pretty

But who am I kidding lol the first bit of welding Im going to try will be the chassis rail... Atleast that can look like crap but no one will know! haha

Also any ideas on how to get rid of that horrid yellow colour from the whole of the bottom of my car? I was thinking shot blast it all to be sure theres no rust and then just undersealing it but surely that will take ****ing ages and will make a huge mess? Must be a quicker way?

[2oo]

Spent all morning watching people mig weld on youtube. I sit here on my sofa and think 'that looks easy I could do that' but when it actually comes to taking a grinding or cutting disc to my car I will be crapping myself haha

Although it looks fairly easy if your patient! Anyone know where I can buy some patience from? Either way looks like I'll be spending a few weekends at camp

One thing I noticed that everyone seemed to spot weld the lower lip bit of the sills, but no one shows how this was done? Is it just a case of drilling small holes in the outer sill and filling with weld? Then grinding back to look pretty

But who am I kidding lol the first bit of welding Im going to try will be the chassis rail... Atleast that can look like crap but no one will know! haha

Also any ideas on how to get rid of that horrid yellow colour from the whole of the bottom of my car? I was thinking shot blast it all to be sure theres no rust and then just undersealing it but surely that will take ****ing ages and will make a huge mess? Must be a quicker way?

Puncture welding is fairly easy, by being caution enough you won't be able to do much damage.
The main important thing is to run the right setup on your welding machine compared to what kind of thickness your metal is. Since body parts are fairly
thin metal parts, I'd run low feed and electrisity/power (dunno how to translate it easily). Just test on a similar plate before you start on your car.

When it comes to the grinding with a grinding disc that's even easier. Have you never used a cutting/grinding disc before?
Post some pictures of the work you got and send a message if you got any questions Just make sure to have a bare metal surface that's 100% clean before you start welding.

Good luck

[watson]

Fair play for saving this! Just started working on my S13 and it doesn't seem half as bad Keep at it though, I'm sure it'll be rewarding!

[chappy]

I still dont think my cars that bad. I've seen people on here replacing entire floor plans and choosing to go tubular fronts, replacing all the boot, the boot floor, hell I've even seen one person replace their roof! Haha I've just got a few bits and bobs down below that need some TLC, I really dont think it's that bad at all haha

Just that you guys got really lucky with yours thats all

[watson]

Its good that you have that attitude towards it ha! Mine was ruined by some idiot who decided to bolt plates over rust... Its nice to see you saving it since you see loads of people crying over a ropey sill and scrapping their shells

[chappy]

Haha I wish mine was just sills!!

[joeshaw123]

I would say that's quite an extensive amount of rot, but fair play for doing it! If you've got some space and some time, you can sort anything out - it's only metal! I'm doing some repair work on mine at the mo and I didn't have much previous experience! It's not quite as extensive as this mind... I'll be keeping and eye on it!

[chappy]

This update is coming from a tablet so please excuse any typos or various other mistakes!!

So today we got the car on the ramps so Matty could start metalwork, he said hed sort it regardless of me wanting to learn on it as he said he will teach me to weld in hs workshop rather than on my dream project car

We found yet more metal cancer too?!
But heyho more on that later. Today we decided to start the chassis rail.
The chassis rail looked like it was mostly made of body filler (I think I have pics posted previously). After we chipped the filler off we were left with


Not a great deal!

So we decided to cut it out


After this matt made up a template using cardboard and tomorrow in work time he will make up the new bit, and we will weld it on tomorrow after work. Ill put those pics up tomorrow. After this its 1st major work done though after this the sill and arch rebuild! Then the rest is all aesthetic. I need to get new fuel lines that run along thr back of this rail though, I dont know how they dont leak theyre so corroded! Can I get plastic replacements?

So after this Matty went to play squash so I decided to try make the car watertight

Soooo this had to come off!


Daaayyyymmmnnnn!

Think this boots gone. Need a new one..

I forgot to take a pic of my temporary waterproofing bodge but youll see it later in the video anyways when I noticed something else that's not quite how the car was described in its for sale ad.

Also poked a hole in the rear quarter near the bumper


It got a decent size, and then we found stuff inside there too


So after this took it out the workshop to park it up for the night but before I started I thought id check its coolant as I noticed a lot of white smoke coming out the back of it the last few times I drove it

Sure enough it was dry.... so this was a strong engine with good compression apparently.. not I need to get it compression tested! Oh well no biggie really just an inconvenience.
Also who needs a carbon fibre boot when you can have a rust and black and nasty bootlid! Not thst much weight difference as lets face it theres not much metal there haha

Tomorrow ill update with the finished rail and next week hopefully start the sill job! Apparently its going to be a nightmare!

[chappy]

I dont know if the video worked but its on photobucket if you can follow its link or anything. Stupid tablet making this harder than it needs to be!

[2oo]

The video works fine!
She idles well though, stabile and smooth.

I guess you didn't pay too much for this considering it's body damage(?).
Pretty bad rust indeed, but nothing is impossible!

Looking forward for the updates on how the welding went along
Once you start fixing it up you'll get motivated, I bet!
As long as you keep your positive attitude towards this car and put some working hours on it, it'll turn out great

[chappy]

£800 last year which was alot more than its worth imo ive seen less rusty ones sellimg for 2-400 in the last month

[2oo]

£800 last year which was alot more than its worth imo ive seen less rusty ones sellimg for 2-400 in the last month

Ah :/ o'well!