C8A HUW: body dimensional data needed

[Jerry Hill]

Last Friday and today Richard welded, welded and welded a bit more, today the nose has completed an important stage and is available for final assembly onto the truck.

Pic 1 shows the drivers side viewed from the inside and the many welds. The patch at the base is from an earlier life. The top panel is new.

Pic 2 shows the passengers side, the front panel was too ratty to re-use, so Richard cut out and welded the original headlamp bowl into an new piece of 2mm zintec, this was no small feat, as it was done without any heat distortion, the top panel is also new.

Pic 3 shows the centre section and the numerous welds. resulting in a rigid structure that fits the rest of the vehicle like a glove.

Pic 4 sorry the pic's sideways, but it shows what a good result we got from what was a sorry sight at the back end of September. The centre section is welded into a tight structure from new folded centre section pieces making it stiff and strong.

Before final fitting I've got to fit new woodruffe keys to the pedal cross shaft assembly, having obtained some excellent tight fitting key material late today, so that will get done and fitted shortly. Hopefully some panel fitting caulk will arrive tomorrow ready for the next stage later in the week.

Jerry

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Excellent work, I have never seen a job so thorough as this one

H.

[David Dunlop]

So, Jerry. When are you planning to put this vehicle back into production and how big a production run are you targeting?

David

[Jerry Hill]

Hanno, thank you for your kind words. We want to do a good job.

Today we fitted a proper pair of Woodruffe keys to the brake cross shaft and fitted the assy back onto the chassis. What a difference to the pedal and its position, adjustment to the master cylinder linkage will be required to bring the pedal down to allow 1/2 inch of free travel before the brakes act and I need to refit the clutch linkage. I'll do that with the ramp up once we've done the final fit of the front panel assy.

Pic 1 shows the brake cross shaft looking through the headlamp aperture, not a good pic I'm afraid.

Pic 2 the ankle freezer door bolts have been replaced and work properly, the front panel's loosely hung awaiting the arrival of the panel mastic/caulk, which arrived just as we were packing up!! We trial fitted the bonnet and grille, the grille needs narrowing a tiny bit, which we'll do as the grille needs a bit of refurb work anyway.

Pic 3 we need to weld on the bonnet catches at some point, but it's all coming together at last.

Jerry

[Jerry Hill]

Over the last few days we've caulked all the newly fitted panels, the bulkhead and the front panel assy, nasty smelly stuff it is. As the bolts pulled up everything has become considerably stiffer than ever before.

Headlamp buckets & mounting rings were fitted, followed by the drivers floor panel and the wings / fenders. The grille is temporarily fitted and the bonnet / hood will be tie wrapped to the body ready for the drive home tomorrow from the workshop to the truck's shed at home.

Thank heavens the body's fitted as the weather's pretty wet and grizzly just now, so I'll get home soggier than I started!

A couple of pics for the record, one of the driver's footwell and one of the front end. Lots of detail work needs doing yet, including re-wiring of the front end and the last major job of straightening out the front doors before priming and painting. The latter will wait until the weather improves in Spring.

Jerry

[Jerry Hill]

An easy drive home and into the shed ready for a lot of prep work prior to painting next year. I'll take off the doors this w/e to enable us to sort them out and the replacement grille will need titivating then the bodywork's done. Only event on the drive home was one tight brake shoe, a simple fix.

Jerry

[Jerry Hill]

A bit of filling was needed on the drivers side headlight panel to get it right, I wish had replaced the panel and saved a lot of work. I'm happy with it now, but want to do a little more flatting in the top corner.

Having primed it, it won't deteriorate over the rest of the winter ready to paint it in colour next Spring.

Next I need to remove the passengers door, split the skin from the frame and press them both flat, currently it's banana shaped by about an inch.

Other than that now it's time to settle back and eat mince pies, consume the odd cleansing ale and take it easy 'til New Year. Happy Christmas.

Jerry

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[Jerry Hill]

So Christmas came & went, complete with Man Flu... well a filthy cold.

I've been putting off removing & splitting the passenger's door skin, but it was a nice straight forward job. I removed the door furniture first to get at the lower hinge, which is bent, I'm hoping it's not cast iron as I intend to gently straighten it with the 30 ton press. The door lock mechanism needs a little bit of a straighten as well.

The two skins are creased. The inner one rather more than the outer. It has creased around the door lock mechanism mounts as can be seen on the pic. A little bit of gentle press work should improve things here to an acceptable standard.

I'm told the more visible outer skin may have to be re-skinned because the single crease may be hard to eliminate. The door top strip needs a bit of knocking here and there and should straighten out nicely.

The front end now has the nudge bar refitted, along with bonnet (hood) catches and other bits and bobs. I'll not start on the wiring until some bits I want arrive in the post.

Jerry