Project Zippy (Midas Mk1 Coupe) Engine In!

[MrBounce]

I have had a delivery. I will just leave this picture here...

[Horney]

You'll love those. I had their dampers on the mini and run their coilovers on the MX5.

[MrBounce]

I am SO chuffed with their service Nick. I emailed both Spax and GAZ - GAZ replied and showed real interest whereas Spax's emailed was non-committal and gave an impression of a "couldn't care less" attitude. I rejected Pro-tech as they appeared too expensive.
Instead I had a few emails back and forth with Dave at GAZ discussing spring rates and shock & bush dimensions, then chatted to him over the phone and placed the order. He said it'd be "about 4 weeks" as they would have to be made, then 3 weeks later they turn up. And they were REALLY good value - about £100 less than I had expected. Still need to buy my front shockers, but no prizes for where I'll be getting mine from... 

[MrBounce]

I got the doors down as I needed to a) clean them, b) sand them and c) repair them if there were any cracks. Stupid question, as this Midas appears to have all the cracks in the world. So it was out with the orbital sander and some bits of 150 grit, and each door was cleaned then sanded. I spotted several cracks in each door and, Dremel in hand once more, I set about dealing with them. I ground out each individual crack, then filled them with P40 fibreglass filler. Once dried and sanded down, I gave each bit a skim of body filler.

I wasn't happy with the paintwork on the shell, so I firstly removed the bonnet. Somehow I had missed a shedload of cracks on the very front. My mate the Dremel came out once again and the process was repeated. I then took a long look at the shell out in the daylight. Apart from being filthy, there were parts of the paintwork which could really do with reworking. As a result I have spent a great deal of time today sanding and flatting back so I can start again. I then pressure washed the shell too. I am determined to start putting things back together very soon so will be working hard on this over the next few weeks.

Halfway through sanding door number 1.



Were there cracks? Don't be stupid - of course there were...



...In fact they were all over the place! I ground them all out.



...then I filled them with P40.



How did I miss this load of cracks???



Skim of filler over the top to finish off.



Shell now not looking quite so "finished"...

[MrBounce]

It's been a frustrating couple of weeks, mainly with having very little time to get into the garage. What time I have had has been taken up with sorting stuff that hasn't been car related. Not helpful. When I have managed to get out there, I have mainly been doing filling, sanding and priming - slightly different from just sanding so I do at least feel like I am getting somewhere. The nose is now almost 100% smooth as are the bonnet curves (accidentally "chunked" by my over-enthusiastic use of the orbital sander) and the bulkhead is looking ok too. There are certain bits which will never be great (such as the battery tray) but most of these places will be covered by items such as lights, washer bottles and the battery, so it's not too bad. There are still a couple of places that will need a little more attention, but I am getting there.

Door hinge area on door - now with no cracks!



Bonnet curve mid-sand after filling.



Nose area looking a LOT better than before.



Bulkhead "buttress" - needs a small amount of work on the right hand edge.

[MrBounce]

Had an hour or so tonight so popped back in to do a few more bits. I bought an oil cooler so spent a bit of time cleaning that, then finished off the spare wheel "hump". I hadn't managed to completely cover the plate with the captive nut so out came the fibreglass resin and I cut up some matting to fit. It's now much tidier. Talking of tidying, I also mixed up some filler to use in the small areas where not all was flat. More to follow.

Spare wheel hump now finished. Fibreglass is drying. Paint yet to be applied.



Small smear of filler on the front wing to cover a small indentation.



And likewise on the buttress area.

[MrBounce]

It's been a little while since I updated so what have I been up to? Well it's been lots of incredibly dull filling, sanding and priming. In fact it's been so depressingly dull I have taken no photos at all as it's just repeating the same thing on different parts of the car. The garage was also an absolute tip, so I have had a big tidy up.

I came across the bumpers in the tidy up, and I remembered that I wanted to change the way they mounted to the body. When I first bought the car, the bumpers were full of expanding foam and rotten wood. They were also fixed to the car using wood screws. This simply would not do, so I thought about different ways to mount the bumpers in a more stealthy and more secure way. As I had removed all the foam and old wood, the bumpers are now much lighter and of course hollow. My solution is quite simple: make a u-shaped bracket at each mounting point out of sheet steel, weld a captive nut on the inside, fibreglass the u-bracket to the inside of the bumper, then drill a hole in the bodywork to bolt the bumper on from inside the engine bay/boot.

So it was out with the old CAD (cardboard-aided design) - I mocked up the brackets then re-made them in steel. I then drilled holes for the bolts and was getting ready to weld them up. Then the welder wouldn't feed the wire through, so I gave up and went inside.

CAD templates made...



...and replicated in steel.



Holes drilled and nuts ready for welding, once I can get the poxy welder to work...

[MrBounce]

Have not had a lot of time this week so this is once again a short update. More sanding, more filling and I was able to get the captive nuts on my brackets welded up round at Tink's. I gave them a coat of paint and have started to make the brackets for the rear. I have made sure that the new brackets will not coincide where the old rusty wood screws once were. More soon.

Brackets looking all shiny and nice.



Cunning use of Sharpie pen to show where to site the brackets at the rear.

[MrBounce]

More bracket work has been going on. Andy mended my welder so I made more card templates then used the majority of the steel I had left to make up the brackets for the rear bumper. I drilled them and welded on some nuts before spraying them up - the first one looked a little bit splattery but I soon sorted that out. Whilst these were drying I mixed some epoxy resin and stuck in the brackets for the front bumper. I shall fibreglass over the edges as a "belt and braces" approach. It should be dry tomorrow so I will mix some up in the morning.

Brackets made up (before drilling).



New brackets in primer.



Front bumper brackets stuck in with epoxy resin.

[Wazzzer]

be careful as certain epoxy resins will eat away at cured polyester resins (I assume this is what your parts are made from)