ongoing build

Managed to get hold of a lock up over winter and as the old girl is getting a bit tired thought it would be a good time to strip her down and have a tidy up.

Although the floor plan is solid it has never been under coated fully (only seals).

So plan is to drop the rear sub frame, powder coat and replace the bushes. same with tie rods

Replace leaky gasket on rear diff and clean it up

Drop and clean fuel tank and replace fuel lines

Replace the exhaust and bushes

Replace the lower arm bushes.

Leaving the engine in situ for the time being as its got 120k on the clock and bound to go bang in the not to distant future so will do the front end then.

thats a pretty straight looking car on the underside mark

what kind of lift is that the cars on? not seen one like that before

Yeah I am really chuffed with how straight it is underneath apart from some clown jacking up on the floor plan when I broke down 2 years ago. I have been really lucky with rot but think that's mainly thanks to an oil leak I had which treated the underneath.

Friend of mine works at Audi southend and they don't mind him doing a few cheeky private jobs

Managed to picked up a decent second hand exhaust last week to help tidy up the underneath of the car, plus my flexi has seen better days. Turbo back exhaust for £115 was only on the guys car for 6 months and was only used on weekends and in the dry.

Though I would start working on the car now the weather has brightened up a little bit. Opened the boot and realised there was water in there, ripped all the carpet and speakers out and found this little patch on the drivers side suspension turret



Passengers side looks fine

common place for rust on that arch, I have it on 2 of my cars, I thinks its from stone chips off the wheels stick plenty of underseal around the suspension I did about 6 coats

I was wondering why it would go there and not higher up on the join, not looking forward to dropping the sub frame and fuel tanks now though, god knows what I'm going to find

I would take a pop as you drive forward the water crap and mud will flick off the wheel up that side so most exposed... at a guess

yeah is a combo of everything, if the factory underseal (if any) has dropped off etc then water, stones and mud and hitting the most exposed parts of bodywork.

seems funny though how the drivers side is sometimes worse than passenger, considering most of the crap is on the vegre not the middle of the road

wouldn't think theres much over the fuel tank as its covered by the tank, subframe and splash pan, if you cant see any rust in the boot then its not bad underneath, give it a good wirebrushing and zinc priming before a couple of coats and it will last another 20 years

Boot floor appears to be solid inside, underneath still has the original exhaust heat shield so asking as that's not holding water I should be good



Bit concerned with where the water is coming into the boot, so guess me and the hose will be busy next weekend

Was there actually water inside the boot then bucky ?

Yeah mate, carpet was soaked. Wasnt sure if it was dampness where the cars been sitting outside the last 2 months without being opened. But dryed it out on Saturday and lifted the carpets up and when I checked Sunday (rained over night) there was a puddle of water in there again

Theres a few places really for in the boot i would say get at it with the hose ...spoiler rubber seal for the boot .... around the lights sunroof if you have one and its parked on a hill may run downwards or rear windows oh and ariel think thats about it mate

just make sure thats all bone dry before undersealing car marky
if theres any dampness or condensation it will trap the moisture in the metal and if anything make the problem worse

Well as the weather has been ok today thought i would get back on with stripping the car down. After seeing another project on the OC, i thought it be a good idea to remove the rear bumper and check for rust down near the drainage flaps as the one i see had a fair amount down there, i didnlt have to look too hard.

offside


nearside


both sides will need to be cut out and replaced, just trying to find a replacment panel and thankfully is in a nice easy place to begin learning how to weld (and will be hidden once the bumper and splash guard is back on. (got to love all the hidden water traps)

also last time i discovered this in the boot, but wasn't brave enough to attack it, in the hope it was just a rust scab on the inside... couple of stabs with a screw driver and i soon realised it was more than a scab and that both skins were rotten.





bit of krust treatment

As i was feeling brave i thought i would remove the side skirt to see what horrors if any this was hiding and to my relief the outer sill was rust free (on the outside anyway)

its not too bad mate, seen much worse

Thats not that bad and atleast its on the inside so you havnt got the arse ache off having to paint it and blend it in .

yep no biggy mark, easily sorted

I do hope so, as me and a friend will be doing the work, got to cut it out and see how bad it is on the second skin, but yeah thankfully inside the car and I have all the carpets fitted so wont be seen

Finally pulled my finger out yesterday and dropped the sub frame to have it powder coated and rebushed, been lining the nuts and bolts the past few weeks and have to say every nut came undone first crack and the hardest part was the bloody abs sensor.

Next job is to drop the fuel tank, give it a clean and replace the fuel pipes

Have a leaky diff to deal with aswell, but Nissan don't sell the seal any more so anyone know where I can get them from?

Does it say the size on it? Or carefully remove it and take it to a place that does bearings/transmissions etc and they can measure it. Me and my company use essex bearings, never had a problem with them and if they havent got it 99% of the time it will be with them next day.

http://www.essexbearings.co.uk/about.php

Are you polybushing the subframe? Wanna treat mine to some tlc and run the fuel lines i replaced properly.

Cheers mate will strip it down and see what they say. Yeah Ive got a polybush kit from vssirvine although I'm still waiting for some of the bushes to turn up