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Rear Underseat Restoration

In 2004 the car failed its MOT (annual inspection) on inside the rear arches, and around the jacking points. We took it along to Defcon-3 to have the work done. When he started cutting out the rust, Alex found a bit more rust than we bargained for. It was so serious we had to decide whether to scrap the car or keep pumping money into the work. Because we'd already had a fair amount of work done to the front, we felt we had to carry on. In the end the whole of the rear end bodywork was repaired, plus the heater channels, sills and floorpan edges.

To make the rear underfloor work easier, we had to locate a section of donor car. An email to the T3UK list turned up the remains of a late fastback rear end at Paul "Botch" Venners. So we took a day off work and drove up to Goosey, spent the morning wielding a mighty cutting wheel, dumped the still smoking trimmed down section into the car, and drove it all the way down the A338 to Poole. The donor section was pretty intact, although the outside seatbelt anchors had gone. This picture shows the important structural features, which had rusted out on our car. The full list of work done is:

This work was done by Alex Taylor at Defcon-3 in the autumn of '04 and into early '05.

Pictures

Donor section
Before
During
After

Donor section

The donor
Structural points
Underneath showing
structural points
Underneath
Ready to go ...
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Before

Right hand corner
after preliminary
cuts
Left hand corner
with old 'repairs'
removed
Right hand outside
showing heater channel rot
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During

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After

Shiny, shiny, shiny ...

Under right rear seat
showing subframe
mounting bolt
Under right rear seat
Under left rear seat
Rear of left rear arch
Rear of right rear arch
Closeup rear of left
floorpan and arch
(looking up
under rear seat)
Front of left rear arch
showing suspension
subframe
Front of right rear arch
showing suspension
subframe
Looking up behind
left rear wheel
Rear of left floorpan
with subframe in foreground
Left side of cleaned
gearbox and subframe
Gearbox nose and centre
of rear subframe
Left floorpan edge
and jacking point
Left hand arch from inside
Front of left
heater channel
Left rear bumper mount
and inner wing area
Right rear bumper mount
and inner wing area
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Very work in progress.
Last updated on Wed Jul 13, 2005
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