Last bit of metal to go in on the windscreen/dash area. Thank god.
You're upside down, on a cold metal sloping surface with welding sparks falling down on you. Also makes the top of the welds look shit as gravity pulls the weld pool downwards. Still got to grind it down too which is even more unpleasant as you have red hot iron filings being flung out at you. You try to be on the bottom side of the grinder as less sparks but they're still falling downwards thanks to gravity.
What you see above is two hours of work...
Make a template out of card/thick paper
Cut template to shape
Transfer to metal
Cut metal with cutting disc
Shape metal with flap disc
Clean up metal
Offer up metal to body
Reshape metal to fit some more because you cut out on the wrong side of the line
Repeat the last two a couple of times
Attempt to align the metal in place while fixing into place with magnets
Swear when the magnets and the carefully aligned metal falls onto your face when you let go
Put magnets back on but with a wedge to try stopping them falling off again
Tack into place while using a screwdriver/hammer to keep pressure on area lined up
Weld between tacks
Use air to put out the nearby underseal that's now on fire
Move out of the area because the underseal fumes are wrank and can't be good for your health
Put respirator on
Weld some more
Use air line to try removing condensation from inside your helmet thanks to the respirator
Start welding again but through fog
Swear and do a dance because a hot molten ball of weld has just gone through your Sketchers/inappropriate footwear
Do the above for an hour
Finally sigh at the awful looking welds in the knowledge they'll look respectable once you've run the flap disc over them and also appreciate you don't do this for a day job
1974 Dolomite Sprint
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint
Yeah, but that's two hours of all the above undoing 40 years of decay. Now pay yourself what that level of work would have cost you to have done elsewhere. Pour into glass. Enjoy.....
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint
What is the hourly rate of a decent restoration place nowadays? £25 p/h? £50 p/h? £100 p/h? I literally have no idea!
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint
My mate has a body shop in the North East. He's done me a favour quite a few times now. I normally send him pictures on messenger and he quotes me on that. He mainly does insurance work but if you can wait he'll hop on it when he's quiet.
If you could get it up here I doubt you'll get it done cheaper anywhere else.
He replaced the rear arches and resprayed my mx-5 for £800. He did have it for nearly a month though.
If you could get it up here I doubt you'll get it done cheaper anywhere else.
He replaced the rear arches and resprayed my mx-5 for £800. He did have it for nearly a month though.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint
£60 ph was my last big body repair a couple of years back.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint
Didn't TripleRich say about £60-70 ph on that Granada thread ages ago?
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint
My local MOT garage charges what amounts to be 50 quid an hour with the VAT added on so you could easily see 70 quid an hour I should think.
When welding upside down is there a setting on your MIG for manual? Turning the wire feed down a bit wouldn't hurt to stop it raining molten balls of snot on you and get the welds a bit more flush. I know these new machines are good but I bet they have their limitations.
Not the best of photos but that was on the underside of one of the ZX's I did.
When welding upside down is there a setting on your MIG for manual? Turning the wire feed down a bit wouldn't hurt to stop it raining molten balls of snot on you and get the welds a bit more flush. I know these new machines are good but I bet they have their limitations.
Not the best of photos but that was on the underside of one of the ZX's I did.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint
You can switch to manual mode and it'll set the start settings to be whatever the parameters were last given in auto mode. The auto mode has a upside down mode but only for fillet welds.Scruffy Bodger wrote: When welding upside down is there a setting on your MIG for manual? Turning the wire feed down a bit wouldn't hurt to stop it raining molten balls of snot on you and get the welds a bit more flush. I know these new machines are good but I bet they have their limitations.
I did actually weld that in manual mode and I've been using it a lot more in it. Was tempted to stick it back into auto and turn the trim up to put more heat in plus maybe turn down the metal thickness too.
I'll probably end up grinding down what's there and running another bead over the top to be sure.
Most of the above was tack welds next to each other, rather than running short beads. Problem was that I kept welding on top of the nearby tack once they all got closer together. Quite hard when you're almost an arm's length at times.
Last edited by SiC on Tue Dec 22, 2020 6:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint
That's really useful to know. Maybe later next year when I finally (or if ever) get the thing back on the road...paulplom wrote:My mate has a body shop in the North East. He's done me a favour quite a few times now. I normally send him pictures on messenger and he quotes me on that. He mainly does insurance work but if you can wait he'll hop on it when he's quiet.
If you could get it up here I doubt you'll get it done cheaper anywhere else.
He replaced the rear arches and resprayed my mx-5 for £800. He did have it for nearly a month though.