Devon Eurovette (Bluebell)rolling resto

[beetlebobby]

Ok its bloody cold out there,,,so while the rear hatch is waiting to have a bit of flatting and paint ive dragged out the nearside front door and started to have a look at the damage,,,,it dont look good!!!! from the pics you can see theres a fair amount of work to do i have ordered the door skin as totally naffed and also the only repair panel you can get from vw heritage for the underside of the door which will be a good start with me hopefully able to make up the other panels to weld in heres a few pics of the rot and also under the bit i cut out yes more rot!!!! going to be fun this one,,,,

[Zebedee]

That looks a little crispy.
I managed to pick up a cheap replacement for mine but it still needed a fair bit of work doing to it. Are you going to completely reskin it?

[beetlebobby]

Yes zeb door skin already arrived and bottom repair patch.so ive cut out the rot and made up a few repair panels myself which took an age to do,,,ive now got to the stage where ive tacked a few panels together to see fit before i weld up for good,,, the bottom curved piece i cut in slots to make it more manageable around the corner it also goes up a slight incline,,,i could weld it as one bit again but i thought id leave it as its going to have a seal tucked into it and so wont be seen,,,(especially when ive got it stuck down with a bit of tiger seal).ive still got to cut out the heavy duty piece of steel and replace that before i attempt to remove door skin which i noticed has two tec screws holding it two said piece of steel,, lol bodge or what,,,
so jobs for this week hopefully to finish off cut n shutting and start stripping out door furniture.

[Zebedee]

Coming together like a metal jigsaw.

Mine looked like this under the step end of the bottom of the door.

[beetlebobby]

Hi all managed to strip the rest of the furniture off the door then drilled out the spot welds holding the bottom half on,cut slightly below required amount for the repair panel to gain access to inside for a big clean up and paint the internals but looking at the window surround ive spotted the rust forcing the welded lip apart in places so im going to drill out all the spot welds and gain access to the nasty rust as i think if i just cleaned up in that area it would come through pretty quick,,, at least if i split it and treat best as possible it might stand a better chance.so as it stands im in the middle of cleaning off dirt,rust ,glue and probaly all the paint at some point,,,,i did do a quick trial fit of the new panel and its a good fit,,,,also painted a bit of red oxide on the repair panel for the bottom of door and had to cut n shut a small piece that had rusted through (needs welding)
must order some tiger seal before the door skin is fitted as its bonded to the spars running down the door,,,
plus another spot weld drill bit 6mm this time as 8mm a bit too big
Next job keep plodding on,,,,,

[beetlebobby]

few more pics

[beetlebobby]

Still waiting for my 6mm spot weld bit to come so in the mean time ive done a few more bits on the door basically cleaning bits up and de rusting,,,removed the spar from the old door panel which was welded up the top and just bonded with a sealer to keep it in place,,,scraped off most and white spirit brushed on and left for a bit seemed to remove the rest,,,then de-rusted best as possible and given a coat of red oxide,,, door also wire wheeled and cleaned up ready for a coat of something or other,,
i also took the quarter-light apart not too bad a job although there is a fare amount of rust at the bottom half which will need addressing and all the seals will require renewing(not cheap this lark eh?),,,

[beetlebobby]

few more

[beetlebobby]

Hi all been waiting for the 6mm spot weld drill bits to arrive before i tackle the top part of the door which i have now done today, still took a bit of chiselling but eventually separated the two parts,,,and as you can see there is rust all around the frame outer edge so this will require a good clean up and for now ive covered it in bilt hammer rust eating stuff and wait for the morning and have a look,,,,
In the mean time ive invested on one of those cheap Chinese diesel heaters which came yesterday so ive cleared a space in the corner of the workshop to accommodate it and the spare car battery to run the thing which im going to replace with a 12v 20amp power supply when it arrives,,,it cost just over £100 off amazon and took 2 weeks to arrive not bad really all the way from china,,,,so got a gallon of diesel and stuck some in primed the pump and hey presto heat pumping out like these no tomorrow,,,,sweeeeet.did have to drill a hole in garage wall so exhaust doesn't gas me inside but apart from that the install is very easy,,,
right hopefully do a bit more de rusting tomorrow and maybe get the red oxide out again,,, how we roll eh!!!!

[beetlebobby]

Hi all well the last few days ive managed to get out in the garage and do a few bits,,,mainly derusting things by various methods wire brushing,,detox gel,,rustins stuff(pretty good)turns it grey,, even electrolysis also does a good job,,,i was going to epoxy paint the panels but wasnt sure if you could cover existing patches of rust that remained and its bloody cold so out come the red oxide again,,,probably going to over coat it with rustoleum in the new year,,
In the pics you will see the quarter light strut after electro cleaning as you see it was very rusty to of eaten right through but came out a treat after its bubbing bath,,,,
hopefully start welding it back together in the new year,, then the fun starts,,filling, sanding, filling, sanding you get the gist,,,
Happy Chrismas everyone,,,,