|
Two weeks have passed since buying the van and sadly spare time has been very precious. A good Saturday however meant that I was able to get out bright and early and do some more work.
Since I’ve had the van the backdoor has been jammed solid, as it also has no handle this didn’t help. Rescue however came in the form of my dining room door handle which fitted a treat. Using lots of elbow grease and a squirt of WD40, the door soon opened. It must have leaked at some time as all round the edge it was stuffed with bits of plastic and rubber. With the back door open I was able to have a good look in the back and sort through all the extras in there, throwing away bits of rubbish. There was also a lot of carpet to, most of it well worn and of no use but finding an almost new piece of carpet that was shaped to go around the engine bay was a great find.
As the windows do not work I removed the inner door skins. This revealed a rotten door skin that will need replacing and a rotten regulator. The actual regulator works and can probably be cleaned up but I'm not sure how I will attach it back to the window. In addition the quarter-light windows are totally rusted up. Again WD40 released them and got them working again but some how (??) they will need replacing.
Another spot where there seems to be a lot of rust damage is just under the heater unit under the bonnet. For some bizarre reason Reliant built a car completely out of fibreglass and then mounted the heater onto a metal hood. A small drain hole it the bonnet recess means that over 24 years water has dripped in and rotted the heater away. My suspicions were confirmed when I took it out and a pile of rotting metal greeted me. Luckily the hood is a basic shape and so I’m sure I can fabricate a new one with a sheet of aluminium or something.
The wind out side was starting to really bite and so working inside the car made sense. As my brother and I plan to remove the body to treat the chassis and running gear I started to remove the interior. First the seats came out. After a spray with WD40 the four bolts nearest the door on either side came out with ease. (I don’t work for WD40 and they do not have any association with this web site but every rusted bolt I work on gets sprayed first of all and it works wonders.) The two bolts on the inside however were a nightmare. Trying to have one arm in the car clutching a 7/16 socket whilst under the car holding a 7/16 spanner was quite a task. After a banged head and two grazed knuckles though the bolts finally gave in and reluctantly unwound themselves. The seat belts then came out closely followed by the rear seat and the metal seat runners on the floor. Once these were gone, the carpet then pulled out easily and was folded away into a plastic bin liner so that I can use it later on as a template.
A quick break for a cup of tea and several tuna sandwiches later I jacked up the car and studied where the bolts were that held the body on. I used the jack from my Rover and as that’s angled and shaped for the Rover the Reliant wasn’t happy on it at all. I therefore decided to leave that until I can get hold of a better jack or indeed some axle stands. Under the car everything is coated in a layer of rust but it seems very superficial. The chassis appears to be in great shape and 80% of it still looks to be covered in its original paint.
The next step is to remove the body but I shall need help for this and so need to e-mail my brother nicely and see when he can next come over to give me a hand.
Elvis Payne February 2004.
Go to Part 3 - March
|
