Hi all!
Following on from advice in this thread, I phoned round some local fabricators with no joy. I then discovered I could hire an AC TIG machine for a reasonable cost so decided to have a try myself.
I've never welded Alu before and only have a little TIG experience on mild steel so I'm...
Have you guys considered using rent free gas? £100/year would soon add up to the cost of a bottle deposit
@Barking Mat - Free gas is indeed the stuff dreams are made of! :)
Wow, loads of responses in a short time. Thanks for the input everyone!
Sounds like like MIG is a no-go and TIG is obviously an expensive option. If I do buy a TIG welder then it will get used for other projects but only one I have in mind would be in Alu so perhaps buying an AC TIG would be...
... that is the question!
I have an Aluminium intercooler with a cracked mounting bracket which I'd like to repair.
The bracket is around 2-3mm but I would guess that the wall thickness on the intercooler is closer to 1-2mm. I can't be certain of the intercooler wall thickness as I don't want...
@Dcal I hear you! I was trying to get the car finished ready for my parents to use on the 2019 London2Brighton.
I didn't get the car rebuilt in time unfortunately but did get the welding done so that my brother can have a good shell to build up.
My part is all done now so I can relax :)
Sill stiffener (aka the most fiddly bit of welding in the known universe!). Helps to have long arms and probably a flexi head MIG gun. I have neither.
Another quarter panel repair:
Re-did the patch in the wheel arch (waaaaaay better this time):
Repaired the boot floor (starting to...
Like a sucker... I started on the other side.
Oh dear:
New front floorpan (but bigger this time):
Another jacking point:
Patched rear floorpan (bit of a big gap this time):
Another doorstep. Not sure if you can see the hammer marks bbut I had to refold all but one of the returns...
Made a repair panel for the rear floor:
Fitted the jacking point (not easy to get lined up properly!):
Made a jig to line up the heelboard ends (my first decent bit of stick welding here):
Attached the doorstep:
And got a cool artistic shot of my plug welds:
Fitted the heelboard...
Hi All,
It's been a while since my last update and the welding is now complete so I thought I'd give you all a quick summary...
Basically I decided to get the car on a spit and assess the situation. So the car got stripped:
And I built a spit out of wood (drew some concerned looks from my...
Hi All,
I recently wanted to run a 5kg spool on my Migmate. Not wanting to shell out a ridiculous amount of cash for a proper spool adapter, I discovered that my old 0.7kg reel could be easily re-purposed by cutting it in half!
Ta da!
The O.D. of the old reel fits perfectly in the I.D...
Thanks Dcal! That looks really useful.
I haven't been able to get out to measure this week as I've been busy mountain biking & climbing in the evenings.
I'll try to get some measurements this weekend. I also want to weld in my inner sill patch to get a bit of strength back and then plan the...
Thanks for taking those measurements :)
My "dash rail" measurement was actually under the windscreen rail and is only 3mm different from yours at 1148mm (mine) vs 1151mm (yours).
I wonder what could be causing the lean on my door then? Perhaps the door or hinges are the problem. I somehow...
Also please can you guys give me a cost guesstimate for getting a Mini shell sandblasted? I just realised this is another item to factor into my costs.
Thanks :)
Thanks Kemppi - I'm also looking at second hand minis & unfinished projects to weigh up the cost. A new shell these days costs £8.5k unpainted!
In my opinion, the problem with second hand is that I'll just be buying a car with more unknown problems - although likely less drastic than mine!
Thanks for the words of caution :)
Just to clarify - I made the sill and jacking point repair parts back when the plan was to simply patch the car up without going too mad and carry on living with it as is. That was meant to be the plan before this thread!
The plan now is to do lots of...
Thanks @Popcorn! Gotta love project binky.
I've done a bit of CAD already to make a new jacking point and inner sill from sheet which I'm rather pleased with :)
I'll add scuttle closing panels to the list .
Thanks everyone :)
@gaz_moose - Regarding competency:
Mechanically I would say highly competent. I've done two engine changes, major overhaul of front & rear suspension & brakes, subframe mounts, timing belts (obvs not on the mini), megajolt setup on the mini and much more on the mini and a...