GALLERY 6

We are getting towards the final stages of the welding process now, Bob has done all the structual work and is now concentrating on the doors.This will be the last job he will do then he will have a good check round before i collect.

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	Boot lid on after Bob had cut away half the floor and welded in new metal. Quite a job with all the chassis work and strenghthening strips.
	Better view of the floor, you may just see the join ?
	Underneath now protected with Zinc paint and stone guard.
	The chassis / strengthener piece was made by Bob, the old one had rotted and had been repaired poorly.
	The other side rail again replaced.
	The nearside front door getting the Bob treatment. All old metal was carefully cut away after new panels had been made up. The car looks like it has had a scrape all down the nearside at sometime, there is a dent line running from front to back.
	The outer skin panel tacked into place, looking good so far.
	All 4 doors are now finished so its a matter now of checking over the car to see if anything has been missed.
	Meanwhile i am getting stuck in on bits and bobs in the garage. Here i have been cleaning up the gear linkage and welding on some new metal to the linkage pins to take out some of the play.
	1st gear was awkward so hopefully this process will help, there was a grommet missing from the linkage plate so this wouldn't have helped.
	Here you can see where the gommet was missing from, i have some new bushes for this so that should sort out the gearchange problem.
	The big move back to Lincoln, i took advantage of the good weather to get the old girl back to Lincoln to a garage belonging to a good Samaritan that i know (thanks Ady & Rachael) The next stage will be to get the car painted, any offers?
	I have had the bell housing vapor blasted (Thanks to my brother, Brian) which has made life easy for me. Here you can see the release bearing fork. The fork pivots on a ball, the ball stud is threaded into the bell housing which can be removed with a narrow spanner.
	All nice and clean ready to paint.
	All nice and shiny, how long will it stay like this i wonder.
	I have cleaned down the gearbox externally, i do not intend disturb the inards as it is a good box.
	Moved the car to the sprayshop a week last Friday (21/05/05) Joe detected slight bulges in the rear wings, he set about shrinking the metal with a special heat gun.
	Joe and Bernie have adjusted the doors and wings and got the gaps looking really good, well pleased with results. The boot was difficult to shut, the closing bracket was moved to overcome this.
	Joe & Bernie have been busy with the bonnet, it had been shot blasted in the past and then left to rust. Thankfully all the rust was removed ok and plenty of work was needed to get a good profile. Joe pointed out that if the shot blasting is done too much it can distort the steel. In this case it cetainly had, you could make out the strengthening metalwork on the bonnet surface.
	The roof has been stripped which is a good job done, there were small rust spots on the surface of the steel, could this be evidence of the substandard steel that Vauxhall used during the 60's ?

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