my project car...maybe, if i can get the pics to load!
Turbo Mini Forums

Hi all. I have been a member on this site for several years and have gained much invaluable information.

I have finally painted my car today, so have decided to attempt (if pics will load!) to post a build thread on here.

It’s a reshelled mk1 saloon, to be turbocharged. It has been a long hard project up until now, with much hard work to be done!

I work and live away from my parents, therefore finding time to work on the car is difficult.

A bit thanks to my dad and brother for the help. There aren’t may pics of the car in the early days, as I sometimes thought that it would never get done! Also I couldn’t bring myself to take pics of a rusty heap!!




thats my daily drive, thought id use it as a test pic to see if the pics can actually be uploaded!

Edited by welshdan on 3rd Sep, 2009.

My dad has done most of the welding for me. I have done the rest of the bodywork including painting. The shell has inner sill repairs, heritage outer sills. Mk1 rear light plates, repaired rear wheels arches/boot floor. Rear arches have been tubed ready for lowering. It has new a panels, new door skins, turbo box, new wings, new front panel with s diagonal, new scuttle, new mk1 boot lid, bonnet lip removed for mk1 grille.

As mentioned, I unfortunately didn’t take any pics of it in whilst this work was going on.

Couple of pics here when it started to look like a car again.









welded up the spare wiper holes. also added the 'S' diagonal - though il probs end up choping this out again to fit an intercooler





engine block - Living out my hammerite fetish to the full

The engine spec isn’t to keeping with the car (I want much more power, but I have built this for now, due to finances and making sure we can actually get the car going! Will be converting from an spi loom to run turbo SU carb plus MJ

Rough engine spec:-

Low mileage non mg metro bottom end
Block drilled for 11 stud fitment
Standard crank
Main centre strap
SW5 camshaft
Duplex timing gears
High capacity oil pump

Head –

Austin 1300 gt big valve head
Valves reground
35mm inlet (original), 29mm exhaust (a+)
lightly ported and polished.
Cr of around 9.25:1
Cooper S rockers, bushed to aprox 1.4


Gearbox

Straight cut close ratio
S/c drops
4 pin diff (all tran-x)
centre oil pickup
long magnetic sump plug
2.9 final drive

Clutch/flywheel

Minisport ultra light flywheel
Grey diaphragm
Ap fast road/rally clutch plate

Once I know that we can get this to run, I will be building up something a little more performance orientated. Will be limiting boost to 10psi on this one though, and hoping for the best!



a lot of rusty panels were removed!

Edited by welshdan on 3rd Sep, 2009.

Looks good to me !

Funny how the engine colour looks orange in the 2nd photo.

Whats the colour scheme for the car ?
(please dont say red and a white roof !)

"So wat we gonna do tonight Brain?"
"Same thing we do evernight Pinky!"
"Try to take over the world!"

I continued my hamerite fetish underneath the car, and inside every panel that was replaced (bar door skins)

The underside was cleaned, by the time we cut out and replaced some of the metal there was no rust left.

I hammerited the complete underside of the car, then undersealed the lot, followed by another coat of hammertite – I want it to last!

The pic doesn’t show clearly. The pit light were reflecting off the underside by the time id finished, hence the poor pic quality!


Filler time! -

Tubing the arches. The rear arches were left intact, though cut from the outsde panel, and ‘V’s welded in once the arch had been tapped up flat. The outside was cut accordingly. Once welded back together, the rear ¼ panel had warped quite a lot. Nothing a bit of filler and a few days hard work couldn’t sort out though.

It was made much easier with the purchase of an orbital sander from Frost.






we welded the turbo box in last winter.

Just a quick pic of the complete job, primed




prepped shell, with bodyowrk nearly sorted.

the rear light conversion plates were a pig, what a nightmare. it took weeks and weeks to get there with them. i had it right one time, only for reactions to appear right down to the metalwork, due to shite halfords paint (namely filler primer)








next was to get the shell in high build primer.








I spent many many hours rubbing down the shell, prepping it prior to the primer. Also spent hours on end flattening the primer down again

Only problems were a couple of hairline reactions to the rear 1/4s. I sorted these after a few more days hard work








also drilled right hand side for a right hand tank. also cut out a whacking hole in the roof for a full length electric sunroof. i am getting this trimmed in black mohair. you can see the middle part of the roof cast aside in a couple of the photos!

Edited by welshdan on 3rd Sep, 2009.

Next was getting some colour onto the shell. The engine bay, boot and underside of bonet/bootlid would be done. The original colour of the shell was hideous rlame red 89. I decided on tartan red.





…then the roof, or what was left of it!

It’s a pearl VW colour

Due to working away, and my brother sorting his car out, this had been a long time coming. Car has been in corner of garage under dustsheets for quite a few weeks.

Photos were taken last night. Finished off last prep work, masked up and degreased ready for today

Spent a few hours in garage today. This is the result. I was confident it would come out well, and it did. i have spent hell of a long time getting the prep right. Was a little worried about reactions, but the paint behaved itself. Maybe because I degreased it last night instead of prior to painting today?

I got good coverage, just gota get round to flattening back and machine polishing to finish.








Couldn’t wait to get the masking off!





in daylight - looks pinky in the pic, but really is red - no doubt my dad and brother will rib me over this, aparently my volcano orange cooper is a girls colour. lol



















Thanks for looking at my build thread (to date).

This is how the car stands at present. Over the next few months I will hopefully be flattening the paint back, painting the subframes again, and waxoiling the car.

Long term plans are then to sort out the running gear, and start to put the car back together. Will try to get to the retrim guy tomorrow to see how long he is going to be with my sunroof, as this is what needs to go in first.

Most of the real hard/dirty work hasn’t been covered here;-it was depressing to take pics of rust etc! have been working on this on/off for about 2 years, am aiming to get it back on the road next summer, but Im not holding my breath! Theses still hell of a lot of work to be done. Worst part im looking forward to is getting the megajolt sorted.

Will try to keep this thread updated over the coming months. Comments/advice ect welcomed!

Cheers!

Edited by welshdan on 3rd Sep, 2009.

looking good Dan - thats a mighty big hole in the roof though!

lol, it is rob! cheers for that sunroof!

The finish looks really good. I'm getting ready to replace my roof skin as it has a hole like that in it

Looking good!

http://www.jolyonway.com

pinky, the engine is red, looks orange in the pic because of poor lighting.

will paint the next one green, will have to live with losing the few hp that the red paint gives.

Nice aleast it doesnt have a white roof ! (Sorry got a thing about red and white minis)
The finish looks really good and your workshop looks awesome ! Nice and big !

"So wat we gonna do tonight Brain?"
"Same thing we do evernight Pinky!"
"Try to take over the world!"

yea, its my parents garage. its pretty cool. they had it built a couple of years ago. its a bit of a mess at the moment!

Looks great, bet youre pleased after all that prepping

internationally known as "big" swede

Spent a few seemingly unproductive hours in the garage today. Fitted hinges to door. Couldn’t fit the doors though due to losing the oval washers to retain the door. That’s the problem with taking a car apart over a year ago!

Will look to fit the doors using large stainless washers tomorrow.

Made up some rubber gaskets for the boot hinges, and fitted the boot.

Got a bit fed up with the door situation so sodded around and took a few more pics.

Also painted the subfames with black hammerite again. Will be changing a lot of the suspension components over the next few months.







genuine sportspack arches - will have to cut some from the inside as i will be lowering it quite a bit.






Old stock red continental indicator lenses… they need a good clean. just a trial fit






its friday night im off to the pub!

not posted on here for a few weeks, time for a quick but short update! not had chance to work on the car itself recently. need to get my arse into gear though. sent my webasto sunroof to a local trimer to have it trimmed in black mohair. also a bottom dash rail to be done in leather. will get some pics up when i get them back in a few weeks.

in the meantime i really need to make a start flattening the paint off ready to machine and then hand polish. cheers

Looking good. Did you have to modify those rear lamp adaptor plates? The profile of most adaptor plates I have seen are too flat around the amber part of the lamp compared to a pukka Mk1 shell and dont look right.
Daz

Yea crap fit think they all are.especially the pas side.built them up with filler took ages 2 do.had to walk off and leave it when i got pissed off with it.

keep it up , looks great heres my old mk1 replica only had 5000 miles on the clock and mini mag featured
from this
to this

Good stuff.i remember reading that feature.got a centre speedo etc?

thats the one .

hi, its been a long time since iv touched the car have been pretty busy recently. pulled the car out today, started to flatten off the paint with 1000 grit wet and dry.got the roof, a panels, doors and bonnet left to do. looking all matt and pink at the moment. will then get the machine polisher on it. hopefully will have made some progress within the next few days. will keep posted








got the polisher out for a couple of mins on this one, gave it a quick going over with g4. needs quite a bit more work though

done a bit more polishing. hopefully will get the doors and a panels done later.

Edited by welshdan on 7th Nov, 2009.

Looks nice Dan

I seriously doubt it!