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PollyMobiles Rebuild

wanna finally sort out this annoying rattling sunroof.
removed the glass. the sliding peg that moves along the profiled slot seems to have worn abit in the middle till it's sloppy. there's upto 1.5mm of clearance either side of the peg.
at the front, the pivot arm has abit too much slack

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to snug everything up, I wedged a blade under the front pivot and some washers in the sliding peg to remove any slack.

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hammered this sharp edge out of the way

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tested on motoway and on this sunny day its so nice to drive around without a single rattle :cool:

another note about stiffening up that rear engine mount, the engine used to hesitate and judder for a brief fraction of a second as the engine rocks/squats afew degrees on the soft rear mount whenever I suddenly go WOT.
but now the moment I suddenly go WOT, she immediately responds smoothly with no hesitation :D

so nice to drive nowadays
 
wanna resolve this raised bonnet hinge by moving the pivot point up rather than space the bonnet away from the hinge

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here's the spare bonnet hinge from sirchris, and some 25mm steel of same thickness

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trimmed the required pieces

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now here's the initial welds at the booklets suggested full power 2/Max voltage and 7 wire speed for 3mm thickness,
but I believe that's wayy too hot for the 0.6mm wire cos although the weld penetrates deep and flat, it's quite unstable and can't see where I'm welding and the wire very often continues to burn/blob backwards towards the contact tip every time I stop welding, so I'd have to keep wire cutting the ends.

later I tried a lower setting of 1/Max and slower 6 wire speed, and this was much more stable, controllable and could see the pool slowly fill up, which gives me time to carefully guide the pool rather than rushing/stressing to control the hot mess of too much voltage.

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here at the T-joint I began pushing the weld and with the nozzle covering the bright weld pool (so the helmet lens ain't so dim) I could now see & follow the line more clearly.
when I used to pull the weld, the bright weld pool shining at the auto-dimmer would make it too dim so I only see the pool and often wonder off-line.

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trimmed & grinded the welds smooth ready to test fit

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Max & 1 or 2 is my usual settings with mine, and wire speed around about 5/6. Not sure I agree with any of their settings...

yea their settings seem slightly off. I'm gonna go with my own insight, testing & verifying on some scrap first before the actual weld.
getting better hang of it.
 
As I said before it all comes down to practice and experience. You will soon learn the settings required for the job in hand, for your machine on 2.5mm I'd be starting at amps 1-max and a wire speed around the 5.5-6 range and take it from there.


Your welds are starting to look much neater now so your not far off. Just remember the steel needs to be clean and to push the torch not pull.
 
Push or pull doesn't matter much other than gas flow :)
I do both on the regular and have seen no issues. It's what a suitable at the time for the job in hand
 
The booklet would be correct if the wire speed was linear but it's not

I felt the booklets suggestion of 2/Max was wayy too hot cos the thin wire would burn up towards the contact tip so quickly (especially when stopping) with an unstable pool and could clog up the contact, so I moved the nozzle closer to reduce stick-out & help gas cover but it'd end up spattering all inside the nozzle.
adjusting around wire speed 7 where the speed graph begins to rise exponentially didn't help.

once I turned voltage down a notch and wire speed down to the linear range, the weld became much stabler/quieter/controllable, stick-out lengthened to a visible point without clogging the contact tip during & after welding, and spatters less.
 
As I said before it all comes down to practice and experience. You will soon learn the settings required for the job in hand, for your machine on 2.5mm I'd be starting at amps 1-max and a wire speed around the 5.5-6 range and take it from there.


Your welds are starting to look much neater now so your not far off. Just remember the steel needs to be clean and to push the torch not pull.

the steel was 3mm, which the book suggested 2/max (which is too hot imo), so 1/max with 5-6 wire speed is what I found most suitable.
always grind the finish shiny clean beforehand and use a good copper braid ground.
I'm really liking the push technique cos it lets me see more with this autodim helmet, leading to better weld.
 
I felt the booklets suggestion of 2/Max was wayy too hot cos the thin wire would burn up towards the contact tip so quickly (especially when stopping) with an unstable pool and could clog up the contact, so I moved the nozzle closer to reduce stick-out & help gas cover but it'd end up spattering all inside the nozzle.
adjusting around wire speed 7 where the speed graph begins to rise exponentially didn't help.

once I turned voltage down a notch and wire speed down to the linear range, the weld became much stabler/quieter/controllable, stick-out lengthened to a visible point without clogging the contact tip during & after welding, and spatters less.
It's way off on voltage
Wire speed it was usually pretty spot on
But nothing beats what you see out the screen.
3mm I use Max+1, Speed 5/6. On 0.8mm wire. Very rare I touch the settings on mine at all. It's an almost universal setting for what I do

Like Sat Navs they're directions are usually spot on, but uf there's a cliff drop out the window you question their integrity
 
It's way off on voltage
Wire speed it was usually pretty spot on
But nothing beats what you see out the screen.
3mm I use Max+1, Speed 5/6. On 0.8mm wire. Very rare I touch the settings on mine at all. It's an almost universal setting for what I do

Like Sat Navs they're directions are usually spot on, but uf there's a cliff drop out the window you question their integrity

hehe exactly, it's just good as a first guide to safely start from (not set too extremely low or high) but you don't follow the instructions quite literally to the letter (or you Will drive into a river or off that cliff), you use ur own intuition. common sense :cool:
 
hehe exactly, it's just good as a first guide to safely start from (not set too extremely low or high) but you don't follow the instructions quite literally to the letter (or you Will drive into a river or off that cliff), you use ur own intuition. common sense :cool:
Common sense ain't common
 
assessing the rusty wings.
the LH wing ain't too bad, just alot of pitting surface rust along every crater edge

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the RH wing is slightly worse

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front bumper screw mount has a slight hole, gonna rebuild with new sheet

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A rusty hole in the lower section, will have to cut & fabricate this section

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with just over a week to go, I got alot of work to do. not sure I'll have time to rebuild the sills so I'll just grind it smooth & repaint.
 
LED welding helmet

before welding, I wanted to resolve an annoying issue: good lighting.

for yrs I've used my inspection lamp clamped in some odd corner to try light the joints to be welded but the result was either it's poorly lit or too much shadows, so I couldn't see where I'm welding (especially under a tight wheel arch).

so rather than rely on a bulky dim lamp, why not fit bright LED onto my welding helmet?

cleaned the helmet lens and had lots of this adhesive LED strip as spare

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stuck the LED onto the lens holder and wired it up to a 12v supply

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hey presto an LED lit welding helmet and it works soo brilliantly. the very bright top & bottom LED lights the work area clearly with zero shadows so I can now see much better before, during & after welding

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the lower LED was glarely badly off the front shield so created this cardboard barrier

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cut off the rusty section of the RH wing

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made the replacement

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testing the weld settings on the cut piece.
the wing metal is 0.8mm so manual suggests 1/Min with 5.5 wire and although it doesn't blow through, the spot weld seems abit cold and too tall.
tried a hotter quick spot weld of 2/Min with 6 wire and it gave good penetration with a flatter looking weld, so I'll use that

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welded the new piece on.
I found that although the hotter quick setting gives a better looking & less grinding weld, it's more likely to blow through, especially if there's a gap.
whereas the cooler setting is good for filling holes and reliably joining without blowing through but the heavy buildup requires more grinding.

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cutting the rusted front corner

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replace the lower piece

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weld this backing plate on

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here I found that the cooler 1/Min setting was actually correct and could weld the thicker 1mm sheet onto the 0.8mm wing no problem, even with some gaps :cool:

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and now I can fill it with bodyfiller and shape it into the curve

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LED welding helmet

before welding, I wanted to resolve an annoying issue: good lighting.

for yrs I've used my inspection lamp clamped in some odd corner to try light the joints to be welded but the result was either it's poorly lit or too much shadows, so I couldn't see where I'm welding (especially under a tight wheel arch).

so rather than rely on a bulky dim lamp, why not fit bright LED onto my welding helmet?

cleaned the helmet lens and had lots of this adhesive LED strip as spare

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stuck the LED onto the lens holder and wired it up to a 12v supply

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hey presto an LED lit welding helmet and it works soo brilliantly. the very bright top & bottom LED lights the work area clearly with zero shadows so I can now see much better before, during & after welding

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the lower LED was glarely badly off the front shield so created this cardboard barrier

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One thing you'll find annoying here is the reflection of light off the steel you're welding triggering the dimming of the helmet
 
One thing you'll find annoying here is the reflection of light off the steel you're welding triggering the dimming of the helmet

been fine so far. don't think it's intense enough to trigger the sensor as compared to say a normal filament lamp bulb. else I could just look away or turn down the brightness.

should've made this mod wayy before I was welding the rear end so that I could see where to weld in those dark wheel arches rather than guessing with a candle.

wonder why a small battery powered lights ain't featured on masks to help visibility?
 
It's something I've meant to do for years but never got around to as my garage is dark even when fabricating on the bench.
I think I'm right in thinking that the auto dark is triggered by UV light? Which would explain why a filament bulb/ fluorescent would trigger it but the led doesn't.
As you said I don't see why manufacturers don't offer it as an option, it can't be cost as it would be literally a few pence per helmet and they could charge many pounds more.
 
It's something I've meant to do for years but never got around to as my garage is dark even when fabricating on the bench.
I think I'm right in thinking that the auto dark is triggered by UV light? Which would explain why a filament bulb/ fluorescent would trigger it but the led doesn't.
As you said I don't see why manufacturers don't offer it as an option, it can't be cost as it would be literally a few pence per helmet and they could charge many pounds more.
No idea what wavelength powers it but its got the middle solar panel and two little light sensing holes on either sides. Aye, you can get led torches for a pound so it would be just pennies to integrate and add value to a product.
 
this front corner has fatigue cracked from the vibrations, so welded it up

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applied filler

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flattened it with a straight file initially and then smoothed with sanding block. it took several layers & hrs of filler to get a smooth surface

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can see why resprays are so expensive, it took me several back breaking dusty tiring hrs of sanding to simply smooth & key up every inner/outer contour surface of both wings.
the rust pitted areas were treated with rust converter.

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so tired of sanding. cant be arsed with 1200 wet dry so just gonna prime & paint it tomorrow
 
this front corner has fatigue cracked from the vibrations, so welded it up

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applied filler

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flattened it with a straight file initially and then smoothed with sanding block. it took several layers & hrs of filler to get a smooth surface

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can see why resprays are so expensive, it took me several back breaking dusty tiring hrs of sanding to simply smooth & key up every inner/outer contour surface of both wings.
the rust pitted areas were treated with rust converter.

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so tired of sanding. cant be arsed with 1200 wet dry so just gonna prime & paint it tomorrow
I know what its like, i did the whole car, all the supermarket dings on the doors, took me a full week day and night to prep. For spraying if your gonna clear after 600 grit is enough.
 
I know what its like, i did the whole car, all the supermarket dings on the doors, took me a full week day and night to prep. For spraying if your gonna clear after 600 grit is enough.

I can't imagine the amount of labour required to sand & paint a whole car let alone just a panel
 
I just applied primer, finish looks abit rubbish tbh but will smooth it over quickly with 1200 before base coat (I only have some 400 and a roll of 1200).
painting & aesthetics ain't my strengths or importance and my current patience is at the "meh that'll do" stage.
she's for having a fun daily ride and not a show car :p

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I just applied primer, finish looks abit rubbish tbh but will smooth it over quickly with 1200 before base coat (I only have some 400 and a roll of 1200).
painting & aesthetics ain't my strengths or importance and my current patience is at the "meh that'll do" stage.
she's for having a fun daily ride and not a show car :p

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Dont know if im late but primer should be prepped for paint with 400 grit for solid colors and 600 for metallics to mantain optimal adherence. To get it completly flat, youd paint clear and before last coat of clear, flatten with 1200,1500,2000 grit. When u spray the last coat it should look like glass
 
I love reading your blog Paul and I know you like doing stuff yourself and tinkering, but it's just not worth the time doing all that prep work and fixing the wings. I got new ones for around £30 and had them professionally prepped and sprayed for £60 each. I couldn't buy all the gear needed for that price, let alone my time. Anyway , keep up the good work, and hope the job hunting is going OK.
 
Dont know if im late but primer should be prepped for paint with 400 grit for solid colors and 600 for metallics to mantain optimal adherence. To get it completly flat, youd paint clear and before last coat of clear, flatten with 1200,1500,2000 grit. When u spray the last coat it should look like glass

just letting primer cure overnight.

so tomorrow I smooth out the rough dried primer with 600-1200 wet,
clean & dry,
dust over & dry base coat for 15min,
1-2 base coats till I can't see primer,
cure overnight,
smooth with 1200 wet,
finally lay enough last coat of clear till it looks glossy using specular reflection off a lamp?
 
just letting primer cure overnight.

so tomorrow I smooth out the rough dried primer with 600-1200 wet,
clean & dry,
dust over & dry base coat for 15min,
1-2 base coats till I can't see primer,
cure overnight,
smooth with 1200 wet,
finally lay enough last coat of clear till it looks glossy using specular reflection off a lamp?
Are you spraying proper 2 pack paint or from a can?if its the proper stuff you dont wanna wait more than 24 hours between base and clear. And yeah basically if your not gonna sand the clear before one last layer, do one or two medium wet coats and then 1 or 2 wet coats.
 
Are you spraying proper 2 pack paint or from a can?if its the proper stuff you dont wanna wait more than 24 hours between base and clear. And yeah basically if your not gonna sand the clear before one last layer, do one or two medium wet coats and then 1 or 2 wet coats.

From a can. Ok I'll try that ;)
 
I love reading your blog Paul and I know you like doing stuff yourself and tinkering, but it's just not worth the time doing all that prep work and fixing the wings. I got new ones for around £30 and had them professionally prepped and sprayed for £60 each. I couldn't buy all the gear needed for that price, let alone my time. Anyway , keep up the good work, and hope the job hunting is going OK.

thx agent sm1th. as you say I prefer doing stuff myself since I already have a wing that only requires just a tiny repair, a MIG, spare sheet and paint and it's more practice learning about how to repair, and this skillset will help when I next goto repair the sills and many other things.

I'd consider buying & painting a new panel if the old one was so poorly rusted that it's faster cheaper to get it replaced provided the panels available.
 
something I learnt about wet sanding rough primer.
when I first apply a wet 1200 over freshly cured primer, the microscopically rough texture of the primer is actually hydroscopic so you notice on the left that the water doesn't bond to the surface and just beads up.
on the right where the 1200 grit has flattened smoothed all the rough hills valleys, the water now clings solidly to it so I know visually where I've sanded enough. sanding any more will begin showing bare metal.

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dried with kitchen roll.
initially dusting of the base coat.

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finally a thick wet coat of base

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the fillered section here is alot smoother than bare metal

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the other wing looks abit worse with all the dimples & pitting from trying to sand off the melted old paint where it was overheated from wirebrushing the rough rust off the underside. ah well.

after few hrs the base coat feel smooth enough and don't think I'll bother resanding it and just laquer it tomorrow.
 
laquered the wings in the morning

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completed wings

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you can see the badly dimpled spots on the left wing

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the underside was painted black

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applied some underseal inside the wings for extra water protection along the edges

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all reassembled and looking stella :cool:

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from far away it ain't so bad

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the raised hinge works nicely

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removed this rubber weather strip so it doesn't block the raised bonnet opening

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vacuumed the office

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replaced the left catch can so they're both equally red now. replaced the suspension top covers

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aligned the bonnet straight and repainted the tyres. thought bout respraying the sills but meh. just needs a wash polish and ready for japfest.

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ok so the other day I went to the local NHS mental health place for an initial assessment. explained all my situation to the lady, talked about childhood, family, bla bla.

said she could refer me for diagnosis to find if I'm autistic but would take a long time upto a year and tbh it doesn't change who I am. imo it would be nice to know whats going on to explain past experiences and help plan how to go about life with these difficulties, what I should be concerned bout/look out for.

considering my situation in trying to look for work currently but anxiety is stopping me, the more productive effective way would be to examine what is exactly causing these deep anxietys and plan some form of therapy (relaxing techniques, thought process training, gather missing info bout careers advice & how to rent etc that was causing the anxiety) to reduce the road barrier of chronic anxiety so I can resume progressing in life. she'll have a think and get back to me.
 
ok the rusty sills is an eye sore and annoying me so decided to paint it

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wirebrush the rust off

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treat the rust

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filled the craters. geez these sills really needs redoing soon cos it was such a rushed botched job back then when we tried to rebuild it back at andys :p
but now I have a MIG, it's possible :)

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Conditions weren't ideal shall we say
Poor weather, poorly machine, cramped space. I think we only left it as was in accordance with the fact it was temporary

---

Paul, the mental health thing is a big complex space, like space itself. There's so many unknowns, so many combinations.

To put my view on it from the time I've known you and making assumptions on your past
Let's take university for example, I doubt you felt this way back then. Where you were surrounded by those who used complex logical thinking and "big words" to explain their thought processes. I'm always feeling like I have to dumb things down for people, it's the curse of knowledge. I like to pre-plan, organise, detail it out. Doesn't mean you're autistic, it means you're precise and your peers merely dont understand because they don't know. I feel comfortable talking to someone like yourself, you understand my attention to detail, the use of vocabulary in descriptives just mine and your natural way of doing things
For you it's only now after a long bout with putting off the inevitable that you're starting to pick at even the minute detail. Depression is an evil monster but not unbeatable

Don't change who are and don't pin so much hope on some mental health assessor giving you a categoric label. It doesn't help. I've been there and whilst I admire your courage in speaking openly about it here I won't share my story here, I'll share with you sometime. Its a voice of hardy experience believe me, and I'm far from recovery unfortunately I'm going backwards. So believe me when I tell you, a professional may be able to label it for you but it doesn't change anything, at least for me it didn't just gave me words to google. There's a huge difference between a mental illness and a mental injury. An illness is diagnosable, treatable. The latter is me. The causes are known, there's no treatment, no cure only learning to live with it and slight negativity can completely change my recovery path

What helped me was working out what caused me to be down in the first place.
For you I think this is your business investments/jobs. Putting in a lot of effort, financially & emotionally, to get little to no reward. That beats a person down. And to do it multiple times, well I reckon that was tge beginning of your downhill slope.
The relationship side of it hasn't helped either its another effort input for no output. It's frustrating and leads you to believe you're doing something wrong. When you're not.
I'd say I'm on the right lines at least?
You need reward, those engine mount stiffeners, perfect start. That's your time and effort actually reaping what's due. It may not be the dream job but as I say its a beginning. We all start small. I began my journey 5 years ago and despite a huge change 2 years ago and going solo, I'm on my way up business wise. Which will eventually affect me mentally if it cracks my stubborn skull

Take those opportunities Paul, please do. I guarantee I'm not the only person sat here wishing we could dig you out.
I've ignored friends help and advice before as I saw as it as nagging and it became a nuisance to me. And I've done it a lot. Now looking back I appreciate that. That help put my financial train back on its track. I'm the closest to being debt free I've ever been in the last 5 years. Experience trumps opinion. Every time

Apologies for the long post but I believe in you Paul even if at the minute you don't. I've seen people like yourself go downhill unnecessarily, I'm not too dissimilar from you. Except I didn't listen, unfortunately anger precedes logic because I didn't want to accept it
I'll throw opportunities at you. I'll nag the crap out of you to sort that portfolio. I'll throw work at you consistently. I'll irritate you to crap and you'll hate me for it but I'll see it you succeed
 
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Conditions weren't ideal shall we say
Poor weather, poorly machine, cramped space. I think we only left it as was in accordance with the fact it was temporary

---

Paul, the mental health thing is a big complex space, like space itself. There's so many unknowns, so many combinations.

To put my view on it from the time I've known you and making assumptions on your past
Let's take university for example, I doubt you felt this way back then. Where you were surrounded by those who used complex logical thinking and "big words" to explain their thought processes. I'm always feeling like I have to dumb things down for people, it's the curse of knowledge. I like to pre-plan, organise, detail it out. Doesn't mean you're autistic, it means you're precise and your peers merely dont understand because they don't know. I feel comfortable talking to someone like yourself, you understand my attention to detail, the use of vocabulary in descriptives just mine and your natural way of doing things
For you it's only now after a long bout with putting off the inevitable that you're starting to pick at even the minute detail. Depression is an evil monster but not unbeatable

Don't change who are and don't pin so much hope on some mental health assessor giving you a categoric label. It doesn't help. I've been there and whilst I admire your courage in speaking openly about it here I won't share my story here, I'll share with you sometime. Its a voice of hardy experience believe me, and I'm far from recovery unfortunately I'm going backwards. So believe me when I tell you, a professional may be able to label it for you but it doesn't change anything, at least for me it didn't just gave me words to google. There's a huge difference between a mental illness and a mental injury. An illness is diagnosable, treatable. The latter is me. The causes are known, there's no treatment, no cure only learning to live with it and slight negativity can completely change my recovery path

What helped me was working out what caused me to be down in the first place.
For you I think this is your business investments/jobs. Putting in a lot of effort, financially & emotionally, to get little to no reward. That beats a person down. And to do it multiple times, well I reckon that was tge beginning of your downhill slope.
The relationship side of it hasn't helped either its another effort input for no output. It's frustrating and leads you to believe you're doing something wrong. When you're not.
I'd say I'm on the right lines at least?
You need reward, those engine mount stiffeners, perfect start. That's your time and effort actually reaping what's due. It may not be the dream job but as I say its a beginning. We all start small. I began my journey 5 years ago and despite a huge change 2 years ago and going solo, I'm on my way up business wise. Which will eventually affect me mentally if it cracks my stubborn skull

Take those opportunities Paul, please do. I guarantee I'm not the only person sat here wishing we could dig you out.
I've ignored friends help and advice before as I saw as it as nagging and it became a nuisance to me. And I've done it a lot. Now looking back I appreciate that. That help put my financial train back on its track. I'm the closest to being debt free I've ever been in the last 5 years. Experience trumps opinion. Every time

Apologies for the long post but I believe in you Paul even if at the minute you don't. I've seen people like yourself go downhill unnecessarily, I'm not too dissimilar from you. Except I didn't listen, unfortunately anger precedes logic because I didn't want to accept it
I'll throw opportunities at you. I'll nag the crap out of you to sort that portfolio. I'll throw work at you consistently. I'll irritate you to crap and you'll hate me for it but I'll see it you succeed

ur like a real Ben Kenobi or yoda. such wise words that makes sense and makes me feel better, thanks :)

indeed I was never like this in school/college/uni cos there was a certain pre-determined path to follow through my education and had security of living at home and was young and focused on work/grades and social stuff like clubbing & women etc weren't of importance, priority or interest (not that I had a chance anyway).

difference nowadays is that I've completed my education path, still have an uncertain career path, an uncertain home coming up, have been stubborn in hanging onto 3 local risky startup companies that's repeatedly crashed & burned and stung me, leaving a very bad taste and loss of trust in myself & others, I'm almost middle aged while similar groups are already dating few times/married/kids.
basically alot of uncertainty = anxiety, danger, the rug underneath has been tugged afew times, so brain tries to protect by emergency brakes.

cos my mind works more visually & imaginatively, it's advantage is gr8 for systematic attention to detail, simulating/planning/predicting scenarios, mechanisms, systems etc but at the other scale when it's not used for work, it's a disadvantage always trying to sim/plan/predict my own life, panics over the results as anxiety and tries to self preserve.

yes I may not be high on autistic scale (everyone is autistic but on different scales), perhaps its just I'm a stubborn introvert, the past failures & mistakes build up "general anxiety" & frustration and the brain tries to pick at my every fault putting blame on some condition to explain the results and regret turns to depression?
aye letting an expert put a label on me won't help.

agree bout the investing high effort/input into work & relations but lack of return/reward beating me down down down.

using my usual roadtrip metaphor: seems I've just took a wrong turn through some rough dodgy neighbourhood where I've been deceived/robbed so I veered off-course in hopes of finding that luvely safe motorway to paradise. but now that I'm lost & broken down, blaming my tools/map/car, the local garage only works once a week and only now that I'm considering asking for directions.

think once I have the right guide, persuade myself to carry on driving through the unknown roads and eventually go back on that rosey motorway with similar ppl, life will be better.
gawd this reminds me of my first solo roadtrips :p
always wished there was a tomtom / google map satnav to life rather than word of mouth, whispers and the old atlas maps.

thanks to you & everyone for being in my life, believing in me and helping me up after falling ;)

regards to the sill repair, aye twas a quick fix in not ideal cases but it certainly did the job it was meant for (to pass MOT). now I have tools/skills to do it properly and in my own time. the new MIG is the start of something.
 
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