Sill Replacement - 1988 Daimler XJ40

[MattTodd]

Woosh, looks like plenty of work to keep you busy. My mate Ben lives in Blyth, he's building a Pilgrim Sumo Cobra replica at the moment.

Hopefully another update soon, I've got an end cap to weld in on the back of the passenger side, then I'm cooking

Matt

 

[MattTodd]

Working on the end caps tonight, I've been working on something a little less "hands on" lol.

if anyones interested, I'm keeping track of progress with the car on a website I built, so take a peek if you like.

http://www.daimlerxj6.co.uk

The contact form emails me directly, so if you think the site sucks, that's an easy way to tell me ;-)

Back out to the garage tonight!

Matt

 

[Drains]

The site's great Mat, but no link to this forum... bad lad!

 

[MattTodd]

The site's great Mat, but no link to this forum... bad lad!

Sorted :P

 

[Tim]

great little site Nice work too, shame about selling the V8... that looked well sweet, gotta love that interior...ooooh!!!

 

[MattTodd]

great little site Nice work too, shame about selling the V8... that looked well sweet, gotta love that interior...ooooh!!!

Moreso because it was my grandads car as well, he'd been into Jags all his life, and this was the best car he'd ever had really, but sadly he only had it for 2 weeks and passed away, so I paid off the finance and bought the car. Even as an extra driver though it still cost me £2300 a year to be insured on it, and I couldn't justify it in the long run. I sold it to a personal friend of a JEC chairman, so it has a good home, and I know where it is. I'd love to buy it back in a few years time.

 

[Tim]

If it's due to come back to you one day, then it will...just a matter of when

Insurance sucks rhino, in a big way! now, big bucks to insure a 450BHP twin hairdryer supra you can 'sort of' get..

Infact a 1200cc Nova should cost a fortune to insure...hey, no pidgeon holeing going on here!!

 

[Lippyp]

Getting older has some benefits, it costs me about £200 to insure my 5.7L chevy pickup fully comp!

 

[MattTodd]

Getting older has some benefits, it costs me about £200 to insure my 5.7L chevy pickup fully comp!

Insurance baffles me. I just got quoted £1100 to insure my Daimler 3.6 this month, yet if I wait until the start of June, when I turn 21, it's only £485 for the year. I'm guessing I'm not going to wake up on my 21st with a new philosophy for driving, or leave my car anywhere different to normal, nevertheless I won't complain, it just seems very strange!

Bet that Chevy V8 sounds nice.

 

[Spot the welders dog]

Originally Posted by Lippyp
Getting older has some benefits, it costs me about £200 to insure my 5.7L chevy pickup fully comp!

Yep, I'll have to agree on that: £165 beer tokens to insure a 3.1 Granny & a '61 mini, both with agreed values; AND I live in South East London

I'm guessing I'm not going to wake up on my 21st with a new philosophy for driving

Of course you will, It all starts when your parents buy you a matching set of driving gloves and cap for your birthday

Paul

 

[Spot the welders dog]

Hi Matt,

Have you finished all your welding - Soon be time for the MOT I guess?

Do you have an estimate on how much the ( ) repairs would have cost you against having the repairs done 'professionally'.

ie: Cost of your consumables (wire/gas) used. Hours spent on the work, including prep, plasters & beer....etc

I know you cannot put a price on the satisfaction of doing the job yourself: Do you have any 'insider' tips to offer; with hindsight - would you do anything different to the steps you took?
Did you have enough clamps - would you have bought any other tools (I'm thinking 'joggler') to assist with the job?

So many questions: so little talent.....

Well done again.
No doubt I'll see you parked on various petrol forecourts sometime this summer.

Paul

 

[MattTodd]

Hi Matt,

Have you finished all your welding - Soon be time for the MOT I guess?

Do you have an estimate on how much the ( ) repairs would have cost you against having the repairs done 'professionally'.

ie: Cost of your consumables (wire/gas) used. Hours spent on the work, including prep, plasters & beer....etc

I know you cannot put a price on the satisfaction of doing the job yourself: Do you have any 'insider' tips to offer; with hindsight - would you do anything different to the steps you took?
Did you have enough clamps - would you have bought any other tools (I'm thinking 'joggler') to assist with the job?

So many questions: so little talent.....

Well done again.
No doubt I'll see you parked on various petrol forecourts sometime this summer.

Paul

Hi Paul,

I've "almost" finished all my welding :-) Tip number one is not to rush it! I've still got the rear passenger end cap to weld in place, and then some finishing off to do. If I hadn't had to rush the last side to give my borrowed door braces back, I think it would have been all done, instead it's back together and I'll have to jack it all up and dismantle things to weld it again lol. This week though I think, I'm preparing the sills to be painted as soon as I can.

I think realistically, the welding at a garage would have been very expensive. I don't know a definite price, but I've been keeping an eye on a Range Rover classic at my local garage that has just had the boot floor replaced, a new rear crossmember and new upper and lower tailgate, and one rear wing to the tune of nearly £3000. I also feel I know a lot more about my car. I'm happier with the drivers side than the passenger's side, but I also know it's all been done well, I'm by no means a professional welder, but I've taken my time to do the job to the best of my abilities, and now I have confidence in it.

With regards to gas, I set myself up with a gas contract and some argon mix, it made a big difference to my welds, I found it a lot easier to use. I chose to rent a bottle for a 12 month period, rather than a short term lease. It cost me roughly £90 for the 12 month period, including set up charge and handling etc, and gas refills are £18. I've not quite used a quarter of a bottle yet.

My welder was probably the biggest cost, it set me back £300, including a reel of wire. I also bought a light reactive mask for £40, despite being a "cheapy" it's done very well so far, and I'm not blind yet. I've bought a large tin of polyester body filler for skimming and tidying, which was about £15, and 3 cans of primer, and 2 cans of Hammerite Underseal. All in all I reckon I've spent around £560 including sheet steel and cutting discs, and both my new sills as well. I've also now got 3/4 of a canister of gas left, and a great welder for future jobs.

Speaking of which, I've just taken delivery of my dads mates Land Rover Series III. It's having some plates welded on underneath to pass it's MOT, and I'm getting £200 for it. So that brings the cost of doing my car down to £360 ish!

I had enough clamps for the job, and I don't think I'd do anything different really, but I'm lucky there as I took a lot of advice as I progressed, from other welders, mechanics, jaguar enthusiasts and my MOT tester, so it was fairly well planned out.

I don't know whether it's a good time or not, but I think it roughly took me between 5 and 6 days so far to get to where I am, and a case of well chilled Carling That may be diabolical, or too short and I should get back in the shed and weld some more, I've not really got anything to judge it off!

As far as tools, I'd have loved a 4 post lift!
The car was fine to work on where it was, but ideally it would have been a little higher, that's just me being picky though. Also, buy a good grinder, the switch on mine sucks and you've no idea how annoying it got!

I'll do my best to get the end cap in this week, and put some pictures up, but I've also got more piccies of the passenger side sill during replacement which I've not got off the camera yet.

Sorry for the essay, I'm away now honest!

Matt

 

[Spot the welders dog]

I've still got the rear passenger end cap to weld in place

I was going to ask about the 'end caps' as some of your previous posts mention it as 'jobs to do'

Really, a big thanks for the reply. That's exactly the response I was after.......

Not so Paul

 

[MattTodd]

Some progress....

Well, I've got some more done recently, not really welding, but progress on the overall thing. I've got the bonnet back on, the drivers door frame and glass back in, drivers wing mirror on, drivers side chrome trim replaced, rear bumper back on, lights back on and a few other bits and pieces.

Rolled it outside for some pics the other night, then decided I'd back it into an overgrown corner of my drive for some moody looking shots lol.

Anyways, feels like I'm making progress! I've managed to get it booked into a bodyshop on monday which feels scarily close now to have the sills painted, so I've got till sunday night to get the sills finished, reskimmed and sanded so I'm happy, and then sanded back again. Figured I may aswell pressure myself into it!

 

[MattTodd]

Well I've pushed myself into it, I'm now getting changed and going out to weld on my end caps. Piccies later!

Matt

 

[Mgazb]

I'm really interested in the turnbuckle thingies I saw in the early pictures. I'm working up to replacing sills on my MG Magnette and would like to reinforce the door gaps before I begin cutting the rot out (actually cutting the holes out!)
I'v googled a bit for turn buckles and even looked at the snap-on site but not managed to locate anything.

thanks

 

[MattTodd]

With regards to turnbuckles, I've now established that the ones I used were Sealey products, and were also 15-20 years old. That said, apparently they're still in the Sealey catalogue, so it might be worth trying to get hold of one, I couldn't find them on the web.

Cheers,

Matt

 

[Spot the welders dog]

FYI

http://www.justoffbase.co.uk/Door-Restrainers-Pack-of-2-Sealey-DR66?sc=9&category=227

and

http://www.sealey.co.uk/PLPageBuilder.asp?gotonode=ViewProduct&method=mViewProduct&productid=6657

 

[MattTodd]

Nicely found! They're quite expensive arent they, I'm pleased I managed to borrow some!

Matt

 

[MarkMG]

You could make some..

I made these cost a couple of quid, not as strong as the sealey, but do hold things in place so long as you don't move the car around.

http://www.mig-welding.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=1588

Mark