Lil Red - SJ restoration - Welding has started!
The restoration has turned a corner, things are starting to go back together rather than come apart.
The welding has started with patching/repairs of holes.
NOTE: These pictures show work in progress, not necessarily completed,
The most common place for corrosion on both SJ and later Jimnys is around the body mount behind the front seats.
The bodywork here is a sandwich of steel panels. Here the top panel has been cut and removed to reveal the rust in the panel behind which has then been cut out and removed (you can see the body mount!)
The holes are then plated over, closing them up.
The outer panel is then replaced with the welds ground down to create a smooth finish.
Over on the other side a panel is welded into the floor below where the speedo cable passes through.
Underneath, one of the floor crossmembers needed a repair to rebuild the box section where it rests on the chassis.
Inside again and the drain holes have been plated. These normally have rubber bungs in them but they had completely rusted out. After much discussion it was decided to plate them flat rather than restore them. Restoring them would leave the holes there and they would be a future rust point, flat plating them stops there being a water trap.
Around the front of the drivers footwell were some minor perforations, these were plated.
Here you can see both the inside and outside of the repair.
For the outside there is a replacement panel to fit over this repair as well
Down by the accelerator another patch repairs where there is a seam between the panels.
For the rear floor corner, right at the back of the car a replacement panel has been manufacturered
These pictures show the outside of the first repair shown above where the body mount area was patched,
On the left you can see the body mount again,
Not sure what part this is on the right :)
