4/75 Datsun 280Z; Leaf Green, CA market, 250K miles, Long Term Project 03/2023-

[HusseinHolland]

Weather moved around - didn't rain all day as predicted - so, I was able to get started on fitting and welding in the first repair section of the inner rocker

Cut out back to solid metal on th car- made Initial cut of filler piece

Test fit. The drop in sill to rocker lip is perplexing - I don't see a stagger like this at the front of the driver's side

after some back & forth - I left a section of the floor lip that coincides with the area I had to remove

mostly welded - rain is coming back so I primed it all with weld-thru zinc primer. Lip alignment seems OK now. Just a slight step at the front

Just tacked on the underside where the floor pan had to be welded

The remaining rearward inner section should be possible with just plain "L" or possibly a dogleg section

I bent a range of options on my friends metal brake. Lower piece will be the rear rocker section

repair section I have that was cut from a parts car only goes as far as the pillar

The rear section is a little hairy towards the jack point & behind were the  tie-in to wheel arch happens. Once all this is addressed, the rocker skin can go back.

Acid soaking a spare set of 280Z front control arms to remove excess rust. I need to modify these to fit the Apex Engineered front subframe. Didn't want to cut up the originals which are far too nice a condition to modify

TUS-11a UJoints finally came - hopefully tomorrow I'll have time to install one.

 

 

 

[HusseinHolland]

My Mum has been feeling poorly the past couple days, so this morning I gave her a COVID test & it was positive. two of my sisters had visited several days ago, and one of them had tested positive for COVID. I took her to a Doc-in-a-box to get further evaluation  - they confirmed she has COVID & given her overall health, quarantine & rest is about all there is to say about it. Thankfully I didn't get it this time around. Got her home, and then my Volvo C30 wouldn't start 😞 . I couldn't leave it, as it was blocking her driveway. I thought perhaps it was the clutch position switch, as there was 0 action when turning the key to start. I bypassed the pedal switch (PITA), no change. Got the Mrs. to operate the key while I tried an alternate length of battery cable, and then I tested the wiring by hooking up a spare starter motor from an older T5. That engaged & cranked, so my starter is dead. I pout that starter in just so I could get the car home. Bosch reman is on order. Glad it happened after the morning errands & not while I was transporting my mum in the heat.

VO 31268035

 

Edited July 15 by HusseinHolland

[Patcon]

Sorry about your mum. Hopefully she comes through it ok.

[HusseinHolland]

Got the Z front control arms cleaned up pretty nicely. Next I have to figure out what about them needs modifying to fit the Apex-Engineered front subframe. They had no clear directions on that

Edited July 15 by HusseinHolland

[EuroDat]

Do you have the Apex-Engineered front subframe or have I missed it? With the subframe you could reverse engineer it to work out what you need.

[HusseinHolland]

6 hours ago, EuroDat said:

Do you have the Apex-Engineered front subframe or have I missed it? With the subframe you could reverse engineer it to work out what you need.

I have their subframe designed to accept the VQ35DE motor - it's not installed in the car. That will be a couple years out, I need to do the LS conversion in my Volvo pickup truck first.

They couldn't tell me what would need modifying - I set one in the subframe today, and basically it the inside radii that needs trimming to allow for adjustment in the subframe. There are 4 'keyed' slots - 2nd from the top is the only one that has no interference. I don't know which of the 4 equates to stock offset for the control arm. I'll have to ask them. Hopefully that they have an answer for.

[HusseinHolland]

Back on the Volvo rust repair . Tomorrow I need to make the B pillar tie plates that rotted out, then I can do the rocker skin

Cut out the rot on the rear half

cut matching section to fit. Lower lip will be trimmed later

stripped & applied weld-thru primer to butt join area

added dogleg at left end to make up layers at wheel arch lip

Started tacking the rear section in - I first added a bridging lip between this & the repair section from Friday (under clamp)

rear section overlaps mid section, as with original construction

Made the small end cap for the wheel arch base that the rocker skin ties to

Not going to grind down the MIG welds - I'll just apply seam sealer to that

spot welded the lower step to the floor and center crossmember  junction

and forward repair section to floor lip 

Still have to finish the mig welds where the floor joins the vertical repair to the right of spot welded section

 

[HusseinHolland]

Got the underside seam welded, that was a bitch - working on my back. Welding spatter gets all over. Primed & initial seam sealer 

Got the B pillar base welded in - 1st part

Side impact post & rear end of B pillar base

The areas I've marked on the sill seam have to be modified for drainage

Stepped the forward edge of this rocker section to fit inside the rocker, adjusted the fit to the B pillar anchors

After I did the seam sealer here, I put some paint on the inner sill, since it's open anyway

 

Edited July 17 by HusseinHolland

[HusseinHolland]

Moving along, although the day was cut a little short by a storm coming in

Started by making the rear cap for the rocker

A little forming work to get the fold & profile right

tested the seam sealer compatibility with the spot welder - looks good, so I used it on all the spot weld seams

seam welded the upper junction with the MIG after this 

To deal with the drainage channels, I just drilled holes in the sill and tapped the edges with a ballpein hammer to contour them slightly concave

proceeded with fabricating the rear half of the outer rocker skin

step in forward edge to tuck under forward rocker repair panel

cut the square holes needed to retain the sill covers - those are from later 960 series, which is what the forward rocker repair piece was cut from. That way, I had guide holes to follow in terms of spacing, offset & specific dimension

Prepped the outer sill lip & the backside of the sill so I can spot weld thru. Had to add another clamp - this one clamp wasn't providing sufficient conductivity for the spot welder to operate

Only got as far as spot welding the sill lip, and the rearward overlap -by then the storm was moving in pretty quick, so I packed up for the day. Should be able to finish the outer skin work tomorrow.

Lightening was coming through that darker cloud bank - I had about 5mins to pack up before the downpour

 

 

[Namerow]

That same storm dropped over 4" of rain in Toronto.

[HusseinHolland]

20 minutes ago, Namerow said:

That same storm dropped over 4" of rain in Toronto.

Presumably you got it first? It wasn't as bad as they were predicting in my area, although rain & lightening  did continue sporadically throughout the night. Drying up now, so I can get back to welding 🙂

[HusseinHolland]

Got the rest of the rocker welded, and sealed the various seams, then drilled the 7 8mm holes in sill lip for the rocker panel cover. Primed & painted those. 

Top edge of rear half

forward section done. No process pics, it was all the same steps as the rear half. seam sealer on the sill lip, spot weld that, then MIG weld the vertical junctions, and then the top seam. I made more work for myself there, as I didn't leave a slight flat lip below the ridge line, which meant I was welding at the ridge line & had to make sure that stayed defined.

7 of these

Panel retainer clips in place. rocker cover clips to those, then the plastic rivets go in along the sill. Forgot to take a pic of that

Edited July 19 by HusseinHolland