248: Sunday 5th May 2103

Started on a beautiful Saturday morning by removing the inner door panel. I had about 10 or 11 holes in the door where the clips for the old trim panel were. As this was not needed and would look silly now I had to fill these. With a fresh mix of fibre glass, I took my plastic scraper with some fibre glass on it inside the door and covered the holes from behind. While this was drying I went out to the summer house at the back of garden and got the other side skirt. I took off the old side skirt and trimmed a strip from it with the clips attached, fitted the strip back on then offered up the new panel. The panel would not go anywhere near the body with the clips strip attached. I took the clip strip off and offered the panel up again and checked the gap. It was a good fit, much better than the other side. By this time the fibre glass on the door was dry and I ground back the excess and spray painted with primer to stop any rusting. Then the rain came, and then the Hail came. So I went indoors and Twister was on TV, so I sat and watched, and that was Saturday.



----
Sunday was a beautiful morning, the sun was shining and I got reasonably early start (10 am). I filled the holes in the door that were fibre glassed ground back and primed the day before. I also filled the rear bumper panel as there was a dip where I had got carried away with the sander machine. I carried on with adjusting the clip strip on the other side skirt while the filler was drying. I cut more off the strip and made it so the clips were only secure on one side and could be bent in. I took one clip off altogether and cut the strip into 2 parts. The rear part was still too big, so I decided to just have one clip at the rear. I reworked one clip so it would fit under the trim, then drilled holes to mount the panel with screws. With the side panel nice and secure and fitted generally I marked the top of the trim where it meets the door ready to be trimmed later. This is necessary in order to make the door open without catching as the panel needs to drop down a few millimeters. The process was mostly the same as the other side except I kept some of the clips together on a strip of plastic to make is easier to mount them. The filler on the door dried and I rubbed it down to make it smooth. It took me 2 goes to apply the filler as it was so hot that it was going hard quite quickly. I sanded it back smooth, but the rear bumper needed another layer, so I mixed some more and put it on. More sanding and then  was ready to mask up the windows and other trim so they didn't get painted. I put primer over the bottom half of the door, generally covering my work and the rear bumper repair. A light sand by hand and I was ready to prep for painting. This involved a quick dust off with a dry micro-fibre cloth and a tissue wipe with white spirit to remove any trace of grease or other chemicals. I also sprayed a bit of the rear bumper where it had picked up some over spray of primer from another day. I sprayed the repair on the rear bumper and the rear quarter panel. I sprayed inside the edge of the door over the polyurethane sealant and then the outside of the door. I didn't have enough paint in the can to finish the door, but I got most of it done and it is not super important to be finished at this stage as  have plenty more painting to do and I can go over it again then. It is starting to look better and better.

247: Saturday 20th Aprl 2013

So on with the bodywork. The weather was good all day and I got a lot done today.

I finished up the filling of the holes and smoothing off. I had also painted the rear tailgate. It really shows up the pinkness of the rest of the paintwork. Even though this paint work is only temporary, it looks so much better than before.

----
I masked off the surrounding area to prevent over spray going on the trim or anywhere else then sprayed the repaired parts so when the side skirt goes back on then it can stay on.

----
After the preparation yesterday, I came out to a freshly primed side skirt today. I gave it a good rub all over to flatten out the finish. Then on with the red paint. It took a good few coats to get it all covered as there are quite a lot of details on this panel.

----
Fitting the side panel was challenging. I had filled over one of the holes for a screw in the body, but I was able to drill it through from behind. I had to drill some fresh holes in the front and back under the wheel arches. One of the screws was cut off too short, so it would not reach the body and I could not pull the panel in tight. I also removed the styling line from the side. This gave me a sore thumb as it was fixed on with foam double-sided tape. The easiest way to remove this was to roll it off and this hurt even with leather palmed gloves.

----
I put a paint scraper between the body and the screw and hammered a socket over the screw head to push it through the filler I had used to hide the screw head. I forgot there was a nut on the back and that came through too. So now I had a bigger hole than the screw. I got a bigger screw, but the head was now too big and would stick out, so I put the screw in my pillar drill and filed the head to a counter sunk cross section. Once this was fitted the panel pulled in nice and tight to the body.

----
Finally I put some fibre glass over the screw head so it would be dry for tomorrow and I can sand it down and fill it and paint it etc. There were also another couple nicks where I caught the side skirt that need touching up.

----
Tomorrow I need to track down some more red paint as I bought the last tin from my local shop. Then I can paint the rear quarter and start on the door. Loads of holes to fill in where the clips for the old panel was removed. Then repairs to the rear bumper before starting the other side skirt.

246: Thursday 18th April 2013

I managed to get a few sessions recently to get the side skirts mountings sorted out. I decided to put some extra screws through the rear bumper to secure it better as well. The fibre glass fixings 'popped' off when I caught a speed bump, but they were weak anyway and needed improvement. I used M4 brass countersunk head screws, drilled holes through and countersunk them. I have made the holes and loose fitted the the screws, but I went back to the side skirt fixings as I had good weather. Using the same technique of screwing through, I made a few fixing points and drilled the holes for the other fixings then took it off again. Now the clocks have changed and I get some time after work and the weather is holding up a bit I can get the side skirt finished and painted. Yesterday I mounted the screws with nuts on the back of the fibre glass and then put fibre glass over the screw heads. I also ground back some rust spots on the car body and applied Jenolyte rust treatment, then primed the treated areas. Today I put some body filler on the treated areas and rubbed them down when set and primed them again. Now the rusty areas have gone. I also rubbed down the fibreglass over the screw heads and applied filler and rubbed down smooth. I painted these with primer. They are also invisible now. I shall fibreglass the side skirts to the body eventually before the last coat of temporary paint. While I was doing these repairs etc I also fixed a rusty patch on the rear tailgate. There isn't much rust on the car considering how old it is, I am impressed. I now need to give the side skirt a complete rub over, re prime and paint red. I need to take the rear bumper off, secure the screws and fibre glass it back together, then I need to hide the screws and repaint the areas where they were drilled in. Then I can think about fitting the other side skirt and finally the front bumper. Lastly a new paint job all over.

245: Tuesday 19th March 2013

Nothing much happening at the moment. I shall be finishing the right side body kit skirt when I can get some time and good weather and still no fresh batteries. My MOT has run out, but I have still got insurance and road tax. I shall not bother with a new MOT until I have some fresh batteries. I have a range of about 4 miles now, so this is more or less useless. I also want to get the body kit finished off in red then save up for a paint job all over. I am only doing a temporary paint job.

Recently a had a Facebook message from Martin Rogers who has been converting an Audi TT ( http://electrictt.blogspot.co.uk/ ) to Electric about getting the tax changed and renewed. He wanted to know about the letter I used to get it approved. I have now added this to the side panel as a link. I have put the bits that need to be changed in Bold Italic on the letter so you can put your own details. This only applies to cars in the UK. I hope this helps someone else in future. I got the guy who did my MOT to write this letter and stamp it. It is vital that you include the chassis number as DVLA refused my letter at first until I put the chassis number on.

244: Saturday 23rd February 2013

I had a friend come round today to help load the rear bumper carefully onto my car. We caused a few minor pint chips that I will need to touch up at some point. I took it for a little drive and hit a speed bump too fast and caught the rear bumper. It made an awful racket, but only a tiny paint chip right at the bottom. It did pop the side fixings right by the wheel arches on both side, so I need to fix them again. The colour match is good though I think it looks cool, can't wait to get the side skirts and front bumper on now. The photo does not do it justice.

243: Friday 22nd February 2013

The new grille material arrived Wednesday, and it was my daughter Sydney-Ann's 17th Birthday yesterday. So armed with her provisional driving license and some insurance we went driving. She has driven at a closed driving centre many times before, so she knows how to handle a car, but this was her first time on the open road. She did really well on her first drive than had a driving lesson with an instructor later in the afternoon. This was a bit of a shock to her, but she didn't really like the instructors teaching style so now we are looking for a new instructor. Day 2 of her driving and she has calmed down a bit more now and I had time to go fit the mesh on my rear body kit bumper. I put the bumper face down on some trestles (with padding), offered up the mesh to the holes to be covered and marked them about 15mm larger than the hole with a red marker pen. I took some electrical cutters and nipped along the marked lines to get the general shape. I offered the mesh up the bumper and generally bent the edges over carefully. Then I took a small hammer and gently tapped the edges of the mesh. It felt soft like shaping lead, and it was easy to work. I then mixed up some P40 fibre glass and applied it below the mesh and then pulled it up onto the edges. When it was dry I could turn it over to take this photo. Everything is nice and solid and it looks really neat. Next is to fit the bumper on the car, hopefully for the last time, then I can put the wheels back on and get him back on the road.

242: Saturday 16th February 2013

Finally the rear bumper from my body kit is painted. It is not a fantastic job and I will have it done again along with the rest of the car. However it is not white and will look like it belongs on the car even though my painting skills leave a lot to be desired. It took me a long time because there was loads of blemishes and small cracks along with some nasty chips that I had to repair and finish. I am not very good at this so it took several attempts to get it right. The finish of the bumper is good, but the paint has orange peel on the red. I have tried to polish it out, but stopped as I could see the paint wearing through before I got a nice smooth finish. Fortunately this was a test area behind where the number plate goes. The black has some pin holes in it but shines real nice. Before it goes back on I need to put some stainless steel mesh behind the exhaust pipe cut-outs. The tiny cut outs will have ultrasonic parking sensors mounted in them (another project for later). So once I have some mesh mounted, it can go back on the car. Then I can put the wheels back on and put him back on the road. I also spoke to my battery salvage supplier and he may be getting some new (salvage) batteries in soon and I should be able to pick 15 good ones to run again. I have 2 duds on the car and 13 in my garage, so this should give me a good stock of spares for the future. Also I have seen a brief video of the battery monitoring system working, but it was done on a mobile phone and not very clear. It had a bit of a slow display refresh rate and my friend Ray said he can make some changes and get it fast enough that the eye won't see any changes. It was something to do with refreshing the display for each piece of data instead of refreshing it for a block of data. It should be about 10 times faster in future. The refresh rate was about 0.5 seconds initially. So we should be able to fit this on soon. Then this can be upgraded to display in different ways and then add a rear view camera to the system and ultrasound sensing to measure distances for reversing. This will ensure I don't damage my beautiful new bodywork...!

241: Saturday 15th December 2012

Not much to report at the moment. Sparkie has been parked up and on stands since September as I have slowly been getting the body completed. I have been re modelling my garage, so now it is a garage with a wall about 2/3 of the way along. If I took out the work benches I might just get a Smart car in here ( the 2-seater). We get a laundry room into the deal and more space in the kitchen to practice my new found love of cooking. Anyway, I have fixed the holes and chips in the rear body kit and fitted one side skirt panel roughly. I need to get this fitting better then I can move onto the other side before tackling the front bumper. This is probably my least favourite part of this project, but it will make the biggest difference to the car's appearance. To start with I shall prime and paint these new panels with spray cans just to get the right colour before going back on the road. All the panels are dull and need painting, so I want to give it to a professional when I have the money. For now though I don't want white panels on a red car, so I shall give them a quick blow over. Still no more recycled batteries, so can't get any decent range. I shall start converting to Lithium before long, but I believe it will be a few at-a-time. My friend and partner for the battery monitor system, Ray, has done a great job so far developing his range of modular boards. They are now approved for sale and CE marked. He is working out a few bugs with the CAN system settings, then should have an example running on the bench soon that will display 10 battery voltages. As this has a touch screen we shall develop a system where touching any one bar shall show greater detail of that particular battery or battery group (depending on the measuring points) including the actual voltage in large numbers.'+' and '-' buttons on the screen can select the next or previous battery, and touching the centre shall return to all 10 bars etc. Also when I select reverse, I want the screen to show a rear view from a colour camera. Now this bit I like.... Hopefully I can get back onto the bodywork again soon, but I still have a load of plumbing to do in the laundry room, move the boiler and install a downstairs toilet. Too much to do, not enough time. I am not in a great hurry, but I do miss my electric drive.

240: Saturday 29th September 2012

I have been having a lot of battery problems recently and been swapping batteries around to get the most from them. I have not been able to get any fresher ones as the battery recycling yard have not had the right types coming in. I ran a seperate pair of wires from the back and mounted a meter on the side of the bracket for the motor controller programmer so I could monitor a single battery. I was surprised to see one of the batteries (the suspect one) go as low as 4v when loaded under heavy acceleration.  So I decided to park him up for a while and work on the body.

 

So far I have been working on the rear end body kit. It comes as a moulded glass fibre skin. I have removed the structures from the original bumpers and there are foam blocks and an impact bar too. You can see these all in the photo below clamped to the new bumper.

----
The foam blocks were cut to fit as the contours were different.

----
The old sub structure was applied to the new bumper.

----
Then I applied some Isopon P40 glass fibre mix to fix the substructure in place.

----
I used more fibreglass to fix the other brackets in place too.

----
I added some aluminium angle section to the tabs on the new bumper to re-inforce and strengthen the fixing point. This was drilled in many places to give better adhesion.

----
I still need to do some adjustments to the fixing on the side by the wheel arches as they are sticking out a little, but no too much.

----

I still need to add the license plate lights and the license plate itself. There are a number of scratches and a couple of chips that need repair. At this point in time I am not sure about the finish. I shall add some mesh to the holes for styling as well after the finish is done. I have ordered some red chrome vinyl wrap from eBay to try out on the sunroof panel. If this works out o.k. then I shall do the rest of the car using the same wrap. This has 2 factors; is it easy to apply and is the finish like a mirror? If it is easy to apply, but the finish is not like a mirror, then I shall use a gloss red wrap instead. If it is too difficult to do then I shall go for a paint finish and my brother will help with that.

239: Monday 23rd July 2012

I had a good drive to work and found the battery level to be about the same now that I am not using regen braking. It was comparable with the lower readings that I had on previous runs. I guess if I start hooning a bit more then it will go down, so I have lost a bit of capacity through no regen, but not a lot. It is easier to adjust driving style than refurbishing the motor. Next time something so drastic happens it would probably need a rewind or replacing (I fancy a Warp 9). Today my next project donor arrived (ZEN), a 2004 Mitsubishi Pajero. Now need to source a manual transmission and a few other bits to get started. I have a motor sources and I have spare batteries to test with. I hope to get these replaced for fresh ones some time soon. I am going to run a separate blog for this and have already started.

http://www.zen-ev.blogspot.com/

Check it out. I have one post from April that describes how I got the glider and another from today when it arrived at my house.