"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Got out today again for a bit.
Worked on the passenger side A post, unfortunately it's rusted slightly higher than my repair piece, so I'll need to fab up a little piece for in here:

Clamped all the bits together:

Trying to figure out how to align the repair- are both vertical sides just in a straight line with the A post?

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Got back out there today, decided to have a look at the driver's side A post, as the dogleg and more of the old A post remains there, so I thought it would be easier to figure out how they should align.

Strangely, the gap between the headlight support panel and A post flanges is different on both sides:


Passenger side has a gap:

Driver's side overlaps, or at least butts right up against it:

Dodgy previous repairs on the driver's dogleg:

Hacked out:

I think I'm going to attempt to repair this side, as it seems to just be the flange/lip that's missing, although the inner dogleg is missing down the front here - another thing I missed when I bought it, hah!

The triangular surface at the bottom of the valance/ A-post bracket should line up with the bottom of the A post flanges, right?

Here it is on my other bus:

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Some measurements from my other bus:

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Looked at the little A post gap.
Measured how much I need to add:

Adding some of the original metal I cut off from the front panel back in to make the patch. This always feels very satisfying, doesn't it?

There we go:

Was feeling pretty happy with my repairs until my wire wheel caught the edge and bent it all up:

Knocked it back into shape, though:

Checked how the A post aligns on my other bus:

From behind the hinge, the edge seam is totally straight, parallel to the front door edge

Popped a hole in the reapir piece so I could cleco it to the little closing panel inside the A post:

Also clamped the outer valance on, as the edges *should* be a good indication of where the A post flanges need to be. It's lining up well!

Drilled holes for clecos and calamped them together:

zapped a couple of tacks in:

(Excuse the blurry pic, the light was against me)

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Hopped over to the driver's side - my dogleg is still in place over here, so I have that flange as a guide to where the A post should sit.

Lots of tacking, using a straight edge to check alignment, cutting tacks, re-aligning, etc, but I feel like I've got it nice and straight:

Noticed the wire clamp on my welder had come loose (the brass threads have burned away) so that might explain why I've been havving trouble recently. New clamp ordered.

[70bus]

Whil I admired your pogress, I noticed a detail on the Mcode plate.

Gonna put M415 extended load bed back on?
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Craig K
70 Neunsitzer
65 Pritschenwagen
"If Von Dutch was alive, he'd walk in there with a pistol and shoot these people." - Robert Williams

Raoul the 65 singlecab

Karl the 70 nine-seater

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Had a delivery from Spain...

So seeing as the weather in the UK was relatively nice today (not raining, not windy, above 5 degrees C - my standards are low!) I popped out for half hour to check the fitment - looking pretty good:

This helps me line up the A pillar, too
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1966 Deluxe 21 Window Shamba
"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

A nice sunny day here in the UK today, so I got out there again to try to distract myself from a slight hangover from last night's work's xmas party.

Bit of a revelation with regards to the A pillar alignment - using cleco pins to attach it to the A pillar/front valance bracket just made everything so much clearer:

Next job was to form the angled section under the bottom hinge.

Cut the inner face to make the angle:

Clamped a bit of angle iron to help me bend it over:

Felt like the bend was a bit sharp so used a drill to smooth it out:

Went back and forth trying to match the shape on my other bus:

Eventually ended up here:

Wanted to get the corner welded but ran out of light. Hopefully the weather tomorrow will have a decent dry spot...

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1966 Deluxe 21 Window Shamba
"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Picked up a new klassicfab floor and B-Post from ebay:

Almost big enough to make a new bed for the Kei truck!

I did ask before, but what changed for the 66/67 year? I know the lock/latch is different...

What is this sticking out flange for?
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1966 Deluxe 21 Window Shamba
"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Got out there for a few hours a day this weekend:

Got the A post welded in:

Welds aren't pretty but hopefully fully penetrated and strong. I'll grind them back a tad and get some light inside to check for pinholes when I take the door off.
In terms of getting it aligned, basically, having the A post bracket cleco pinned to the inner A post, and then the outer valance cleco pinned in place with pins going through the A post panels and dogleg really does make all the difference in making it pretty clear where everything should sit.

Moved onto getting this repair piece let in for the headlight support panel, using Fitzee's 'cut'n'butt' method:

(See his video on it here:
Link
)
Worked pretty well:

apart from accidentally welding my hammer to the bus at one point:

Inside:

Outside:

I accidentally cut a big gap where I coudn't get the grinder in snug against the edge of the panel:

Used a piece of copper to fill the hole:

Filled in the tacks:

Welds ground back slightly and lit from the inside I could see many pin holes - need to get my welding technique/machine setup dialled in before I attempt the long panels on this and my 1966 deluxe:

Fixed as many as I could spot before deciding to call is a day:

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1966 Deluxe 21 Window Shamba
"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Moved onto the driver's side the other day:

Firstly this little corner bit:

Cut'n'butt again:

Ran out of gas at that point, but managed to get some more yesterday and made a nice early start to get back out there today.

Seeing as having the outer valance in place made the A post fitment so much clearer on the passenger side, I decided to chop through the tacks where I'd attached the front half of the driver's side A post:

Got it cleco pinned to the valance bracket and the dogleg, but with the correct 195mm gap from hinge to bottom of the A post bracket it left me with a fairly hefty gap to fill:

Nothing a bit of copper can't fix:

Filled in, along with the repair on the driver's side of the headlight support panel:

Sprayed some zinc primer to give it a bit of protection:

Hapopy with the position of that, I decided to get the other half of the driver's side A post tacked in place:

Completely butt welded:

At this point I made the decision to cut off the lower dogleg for a couple of reasons:

1 - it gives me access to do the A post repairs and dressing back the weld much easier

2 - although i am going to attempt to repair the dogleg, it's going to be a lot easier to do it off the bus rather than in situ.

Anyway, marked the cut with masking tape:

CHOP!

Definitely the right choice - lots more room to get the grinder in and get the A post welds dressed back:

Had to zap in a couple of pinholes:

Fighting the light as usual out in this part of the world, but that rounds up today's nudge!
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1966 Deluxe 21 Window Shamba
"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Spent the last two days reworking the driver's side dogleg.


Going to use the inner dogleg I removed from my '66 deluxe - I'll just need to repair a few holes and replace the missing front section where it attaches to the A post:

More classic late 90s inch thick bondo repairs:

the rear:

Going to use the rold lower front panel to make a patch:

Curvature was about right:

Using Fitzee's cut n butt method:

Not too bad:

A bit of hammer and dolly action (And a whole lot of chasing pinholes) and I'm at this stage:

Definitely not worth the time and effort (The Autocraft replacement panel is only £40, and I've sunk about 10 hours into this so far), but I need to practise as much as possible.

I'm still not there with my welding - on the minimum setting I'm not getting very good penetration and end up having to chase pinholes and weld again from the backside, and at the next highest setting I'm burning through.
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1966 Deluxe 21 Window Shamba
"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

As a quick 'before it gets too dark' job I got the panel off the airbox:

Had to dremel a slot in a few of the screws to get them out with a flathead screwdriver, but luckily I was able to removed all but one of them - that last one I used a finger file to grind all the way down, and then I drilled the head to almost nothing which allowed the panel to pull off

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1966 Deluxe 21 Window Shamba
"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration

[Buggeee]

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

So, continued today with adventures in sunk cost fallacy:

Repairing the top face and flange of the dogleg:

Trying to make it all from one piece:

Tapped the flange over:

By bending the top surface upwards I can get the flange to curve inwards:

The plan here was to weld it in place, then stretch the top surface, but in hindsight, I should have done it a different way, more on that later.

A couple of measurements:

Decided to pie cut this edge to get it to flow round rather than try to stretch:

In hindsight, I could have just cut the upper face curving inwards instead of straight along and that would have been the correct shape. I'm going to see how smooth it ends up after filling in the gaps, and if I'm not happy with it I'll chop it off and make another piece to go in there.

Last little detail before calling it a day:

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1966 Deluxe 21 Window Shamba
"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Cold day here in the UK today - drill shattered!

Spent a bit more time on the dogleg:

Pretty happy with that!

Got it filled in, and had better penetration but was getting dark.
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1966 Deluxe 21 Window Shamba
"Negative Nancy" - 1967 Single Cab Restoration