Friday 11 January 2013

Catch up post 5

Next stage - underside floor panelling... (if I never see another piece of sheet aluminium...)

Chassis turned upside down and work started on marking up and drilling the remaing floor panels (the chassis already has lowered rear floor sections which are welded in steel panels). Worth noting that having two different drill bit sizes, pilot and final, along with two drills makes things alot easier (along with 'unpaid help').

Decided to have one of the two front floor panels re-made since it wasn't quite large enough and the overlap with the chassis rails was a bit limited (looking for a good watertight seal).

O/S panel being lined up:
 
N/S panel lined up and 4 corners drilled :

O/S fillet piece, not originally supplied, but decided was worth doing. I'd seen other builds, without the lowered floor, where the large floor panel went all the way back and this included support for the side pods that far back:

N/S fillet piece - same story but caught in the act of domestic activities...

Once drilled, holes deburred (with a 13mm drill bit), pop rivets trial fitted and then all removed again the panels were then put aside for safe keeping (and to await painting or powder coating - inside of floor panels).

Chassis put back the right way up and O/S outside panels to look at. After much adjusting, fiddling, masking tape, marking, measuring and general mucking about the panels were where they seemed okay (note: need to buy shares in masking tape company...):

Where the two panels meet I decided not to overlap but instead to fit a trim piece over the join and seal it as well as the panels:

Need to get a picture of the overall effect but this shows the front panel (note: need to buy shares in pop rivet company as well):

Another trick that was figured out was to use a piece of wood on the drill bit. With the correct thickness this stops the drill bit hitting the inside of the chassis rail when it bursts through. It also stops the chuck of the drill marking the aluminium panel (if you're are bothered about that):

This is the final 'Catch up' post so as long as I keep disciplined then further 'as it's happening' posts should start to appear.

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