1966 Mini Van (the rustiest one yet)

[harrymini]

Update:

Had a few days off the week just gone so put my time into prepping as much as i could ready to go back on the car.

Painted the inner and outer A panel with Mipa epoxy primer and got them spot welded:




Had some of the origional brackets / mounts to repair / bare metal:




Started spotwelding the floor to toeboard, toeboard to bulkhead and bulkhead to crossmember:



Primed the inaccessible void, inside all the sill sections and the underside of the load floor:



Fitted the spare wheel stabiliser:



Beach buggy anyone?



I next went onto sorting the brackets that hold the bonnet hinge onto the bulkhead, obviously this needs to be in the right place so:






Used the brackets from my woody to mock everything up and has worked well. I am going to be needing these again for the pickup.

More prep:



Bit the bullet and started on the sides, going really well upto now:




Pretty happy with the fit up of everything:




Got loads of welding to do now but going to be doing a few hours a night after work to get though it

[wantafaster1]

Fantastic
Wish I had the b***s to do something like this

[Costafortune]

Fantastic stuff. Roughly what will it cost to rebuild the shell out of interest?

[harrymini]

Costafortune, it does costafortune!

Luckily doing it all myself so saves a tonne of money, its around 3.5 - 4K in panels, some weld gas and wire. A fair few cutting discs, loads of p24 roloc discs, then probably around £200 in primers, filler, spray filler and abrasives and then £300 ish in paint.

Due to having a booth basically ready at home now as soon as i have done all the filler work and priming it can be painted.

[Costafortune]

Not so bad compared to a new shell then. This is certainly the way to go as opposed to spending forever trying to repair rusty floors etc. Certainly a much nicer 'cleaner' result.

[swindrum]

Thanks for the replies, another update:

I am trying to get as many panels clamped / cleco pinned / screwed in place as i can before everything gets taken off, areas where there will be welding, blasted and primed:

[Old English White]

Haha. I reckon he IS!

[harrymini]

Haha thanks.

Costafortune, for any of my personal cars i would never do 2x half floors and weld to the tunnel, just dont think i could get the finish that the full floor gets and its a hell of alot faster to just offer a floor up and square it.

[Peter Laidler]

But Harry, the tunnel is probably the best datum mark/line you could ever get isn't it? Especially doing the job you're doing

[kevs 1961 mk1]

excellent work loving this build .a true craftsman

[harrymini]

Update:

Been doing all of the difficult, boring jobs at the moment, the tricky top of the a pillar repair on both sides:







Another job, bottoms of both door frame repairs:






Done a load of welding on the front bulkhead area for wiring tabs, accelerator cable ferrules, threaded shock absorber mounts, threaded pedal box mounts, a panel stiffner, some threaded inserts etc.

But FINALLY after a huge amount of work (while working full time and only having a few days off) after 1 month after receiving the panels it is nearly ready for expoxy, i have to 180 grit sand everything (half way there) and do some more small detail welding bits:

[Old English White]

I think that is a quite remarkable rate of progress in such a short time. Great skills too
Mini Vans used to be SO common when I first started driving. EVERYBODY had one or two and they were worth next to nothing. Rare things nowadays.
I had one very similar many years ago

Minivan 6064AP.JPG

[Peter Laidler]

I bet that you still wish you had that XXXX AP registration number OEW!

[Old English White]

Yes. The things we let go eh?..........
Probably best not to dwell on it too much

[mini_surfari]

Unbelievable progress, great work!

[harrymini]

Update, body now has epoxy primer on. More finishing touches to do on the booth, painting etc but extraction and air worked really well.

[kit of bits]

I love this project there’s some seriously long hours been put in.
One question how far have you recessed the grill panel I can’t see properly from the pictures..
D

[harrymini]

Kit,

Do you want me to take some photos and measurements?

I have one for the pickup that was done by m-machine?

[jayare]

The M-Machine van/pickup front panels have the insert welded in in the wrong place - they are recessed too far into the front panel. If you have matched this one to the M-Machine one it will be in the wrong place. It's far easier to fix before paint! This is a NOS front panel showing the correct grille location - it's barely back from the front edge of the slam panel, etc. (maybe 3mm?).

IMG_0793 Small.jpg

JR

[kit of bits]

Any updates, this is an excellent project..
D