FOM The Clubman Estate

[Tupers]

are you putting anything on the new floor to stiffen it up, as it will probably make a right noise at certain speeds

I'll either be rolling a few beads into the bottom of it or making a couple channels to weld underneath and act as a brace/skid guard.

It'll be like painting the Forth Bridge, once finished he will have to start all over repairing his work which has rusted through from rotting with age

I'll have none of that thank you very much.
I'm aiming to have the floor done but the end of this week and all the structural welding/fab finished by the end of the month.

Harsh! He's making much faster progress with his than I am with mine!

What about rolling a bead into the floor? That plus sound-deadening panels like Dynamat will probably be enough.

I might to a few bead running length ways but I'm not sure yet. Once I'm into body work the entire inside of the shell will be sprayed with a sound deadening product that looks a bit like plaster.


Here's a bit more progress from this afternoon.

I joggled the tail of the floor so it would slide under the step sill and put a load of self tappers in to keep everything in place.

The end plates were easy to knock up but I'll need to pull the floor out to get the connected up properly.

There's plenty of room for the exhaust with the new floor.

I started on the passenger side of the floor before I went home. This one was a bit simpler to fold.

It fits like a glove, just need to cut the profile of the wheel arch into it.

 

[Tupers]

Back at it, I popped the floor out and screwed the sides on.

Then back to cutting the shape of the wheel arch into the floor. Fortunately we already had a template of an arch that I could use as a starting point.

It took forever to get it properly trimmed but it's 99.9% of the way there now.

 

[FJ12jagman]

Stunning work. Love this thread. I'm replacing most of the boot floor in my 1977 saloon and am spending hours nibbling, filing and grinding to try and get a fit around the wheel arch. Still got some gaps.

How tight a fit are you aiming for?

 

[Tupers]

Stunning work. Love this thread. I'm replacing most of the boot floor in my 1977 saloon and am spending hours nibbling, filing and grinding to try and get a fit around the wheel arch. Still got some gaps.

How tight a fit are you aiming for?

Thanks Jagman, getting a good fit is certainly time consuming although having the templates saved me a couple hours on each one. It doesn't need to be hugely tight I'm adding a lip to the edge of the floor.

The rest of the floor's in now. It just needs a few minor adjustments and then it can get get welded up.

The 50 1/8" Clecos I ordered arrived as well, these should help hold the floor in place when I weld it.

 

[Tupers]

So the floor's not welded in yet due some other commitments but it's on it's way.

I cut an inspection hole into each of the side sections of the floor. These will allow me to get at the captive plates that the rear of the subframe bolt to.

I wanted to make sure the front of the floor stayed stiff so I knocked up a few gussets to be welded in underneath.

The new section of floor needed a lip adding to connect it to the wheel arch. I made this up out of three pieces using the shrinker stretcher.

All held together with lots of Clecos, this side should be welded in tomorrow morning.

 

[Robotstar5]

I like the "inspection hatch" idea, I did a quick fix on a mini once, cut a hole in the floor with a tank cutter to get to a siezed handbrake cable quadrant

 

[naughtyboy]

those clecos are brill kit, used about 200 whilst doing mate's locosl for him.

 

[Tupers]

those clecos are brill kit, used about 200 whilst doing mate's locosl for him.

They really are perfect for this ind of work where a piece has to go in and out multiple times. I'm probably going to our a few more soon.

So another morning of work, I fired up the mig and welded the lip on to the floor section.

The floor need a little shaping due to the step in the cross member that it is welded to.

I decided the best way of shaping it was to Celco the floor in place and whack it with a piece of wood and hammer.

With that done I could finally move onto getting the floor welded in but as my luck is I ran out of shield gas after 18 plugs.

 

[Robotstar5]

With that done I could finally move onto getting the floor welded in but as my luck is I ran out of shield gas after 18 plug

and it's Friday

 

[Tupers]

Yep sucks to be me.

 

[Tupers]

We finally got a fresh gas bottle so I popped down this afternoon and got the floor welded up.

Slapped some primer on it before I left, more tomorrow.

 

[Tupers]

I did get more work done than I've got pictures off but this'll have to do until tomorrow.

The first lip I'd made to wrap around the arch went a bit wrong so I started again and came up with this.

I welded the rear section of the lip and then got the front piece sorted. I also got the underside of the panel zinc primed and 50% of it welded up.

 

[Terrapin]

View attachment 28032

Have you though about picking up on these points ^^ alongside the use of the rose-joints & a bit of 'creative metalwork'?
It would make a stronger steady not relying on one single load point

Bracing the mini engine - yep I've use rose joints in the past as well as machined nylon bushes. With the mini you can never have enought bracing on the engine. Go for double shear brackets where you can - a couple of photos of a terrapin racing car - braced on both sides at top, and also to the gearbox at the bottom

 

[Tupers]

Mmmmm I love to have a crack at building a Terrapin one day.


Back at it, I finished welding the drivers side floor section in this morning.

Once it had cooled I got the plug welds ground down and added a few coats of zinc primer.

Everything Celco'd back in for the last time.

I got the back section welded up but my knees were killing me so I'll finish it tomorrow.

 

[Tupers]

Chucked another couple of hours in this afternoon and got the rear section of the floor completely welded, ground and primed and the front section welded.

I should be able to do a few more hours tomorrow and get the sides on then I'm done.

 

[Tiggy_dorset]

Tidy job there mate

 

[M@tt]

I love this build

top work mate!!

 

[Fergus]

Looking superb!

 

[Tupers]

Got the tank box 99% fo the way there now, just a few plug welds left that I'll do when the shell's bare again.

 

[Angusdog]

They could have done with you at Longbridge back in the sixties - that looks better than stock! (Although I do like the original fuel filler on ours). Unfortunately you've also shamed me into getting something done on ours, plus I may take some holidays so I can get it finished.