Irish Mini Owners Club

Plenty of tin worm to cut out there, surprised its not spread to the upper section of the bottom frame...

Boot looks like new! Have you folded the lip around yet?

Haven't folded it over yet Colin, going to wait until I epoxy both pieces first before I fold over the edges.

Started repairing the driver's door



Replaced the first bottom corner of the inner panel



Sizing up the patch for the other corner



I will have to replace the complete bottom lip too

Finished the other corner of the driver's door inner panel. Just the long lip between the two corners to complete

Picked up a spare engine today.

It's an early 998 A+ block, it is exactly the same casting as my mini has. This can be identified by the coolant drain plug on the back of the block. I believe these were early production A+ castings. While the engine was seized there is zero wear on the bores.

It also came with a DAM5626 gearbox. While mine is a DAM2886 with original mini gears and ratios, having a spare gearbox of the stronger variety is great too.





A couple of boxes of ancillaries came with it. HS4, pre-verto flywheel and back plate, inertia starter, alternator etc.

I took off the flywheel without issue and the taper is very clean on the crank. A good afternoon's purchase.

Repairing the bottom of the driver's door inner panel.



Most of the effort goes into cutting and tacking the repair section in place.



Happy with the finish. Now to knock down the welds on the inside.

Removed the inner sill and the jacking point, started repairing the section where the floor meets the inner sill

Good to see you still going at it Conor, I do like the red oxide primer, seems to be protecting it quite well!

Yes, that bodywork primer from Novol is really good. It's designed for 6 months protection while you do the metal work but it works way longer than that. It is easy to sand and it acts as a weld through primer too. I see that Waterford Motorfactors stock the full range of Novol products too which is great because I plan to use their epoxy on the work as I progress.

I've been looking at Novol epoxy primer too. It seems to be fairly safe to spray at home with the correct full face respirator and PPE. Good to know its available online, plus doesn't take long to get over €100s for free delivery!

Started removing parts of the driver's inner door frame. Rust looks worse than it is.



The door check is much thicker steel so it cleaned up well.

One of the common issues with Minis is when the door check bracket gets bent. It's a pain to straighten because it is quite thick steel and the surrounding metal is only body panel thickness.

I machined two 1/4-inch bolts so they fit into the upper and lower slots. It's worth putting something into the gap in the middle so it doesn't bend with the turning force that will be applied from behind. I used the head of an 8mm spanner.



On the back of the bracket, insert a suitable thick steel plate which will fit in through the hole and is placed flat against the bracket edges. Drill two holes that will line up with the bolts and tighten accordingly until the bracket straightens out.

A bit of a trial fitting of the doorstep this evening. Getting there...

Even with Heritage panels, there is quite a bit of fettling to be done

Some work to get the A-pillar side to line up correctly.



Visited the Portlaoise Classic and Vintage Car Show today. Met a few members from the IMOC and they were very helpful with my questions.

That looks pretty much spot on, be good to see it all welded in place!

Next, I need to source a spot welder. I would be interested to hear what works best for preparing two panels for spot welding. Do you use a zinc weld thru primer or bare metal? What is your experience Colin with the Vevor one?

Lining up the outer sill, inner door frame, and door skin to check all the gaps before welding. The front outer sill bracket and jacking bracket are straightforward to line up, but I need to figure out how to line up the rear one as it's completely blind.

ctwomey wrote: ↑Tue Nov 01, 2022 6:56 pm Next, I need to source a spot welder. I would be interested to hear what works best for preparing two panels for spot welding. Do you use a zinc weld thru primer or bare metal? What is your experience Colin with the Vevor one?

I had a reply typed last night but must of forgot to hit submit...

If the panel is new to new, I zinc primed both mating faces. If it was new to old, I primed new face and left old face clean.

The silver magnum panels with the zintec coating can be spot welded without any prep, but the black magnum panels and heritage panels need to have the mating faces clean on both sides to allow the circuit to complete.

I've sent you a PM regarding the Vevor spot welder

Show me a mini that doesn't have some sort of corrosion in this area of the flitch panel

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nYXBtv]

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nYSi1H]

While most people don't jack up their minis by the jacking point it still serves as a significant stiffing of the outer sill.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nYSi1n]

Trial fitting the rear bracket is completely blind so it's a case of using magnets to line it up, put on the sill gently so it doesn't move to ensure it lines up with the hole of the outer sill. Before plug welding it needs to be tacked in place because there is no otherway to hold it in place.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nYXcPU]

Door step before

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nVWTPP]

Door step welded in

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2o1ofSA]

A-pillar before

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nWfoqG]

A-pillar welded in

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2o1pFnE]

Tweeked the spotwelder and got some nice results (thanks Colin!)

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2o1pFir]

Very good Conor, nice seamless finish! Hopefully the spot welder helps you along the way a bit quicker...

Spot welded along the doorstep

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2o1R8Nv]

Plug welded the areas that I can't spot weld. It's only when these two panels (door check and A post) come together is there any strength in the door frame to hold the door up.

I still have to clean up the plug welds and I have 4 more plug welds to do where the door check opening meets the A post. Then I can move on to repairing the passenger doorstep.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2o1QLAN]

Completed the door step

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2o2j5np]

Plug welds nice and flush

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2o2ffZn]

Starting to clean up the corrosion on the passenger side door step