Progress pics: my Anglia

[Jonny69]

I'll title this one in the words of Crocodile Dundee when some rough looking guy pulled out a piece of rusty metal on him... "Call that rust? THIS is rust..."

Anyway enough of this idle chitchat, I've got it masked up at the moment so I can spray the roof. I rubbed it down a few weeks back but got busy workwise so it sat for a few weeks. Managed to lay down some primer over the last few days and it went better than expected. The only place I buggered it up was hung over and unfed this morning along the rain gutters where I've got some runs. It's exceptionally difficult to get the paint to go in there!

The idea behind doing the roof before the rest of the car is I can do all my fillering and sanding with the doors on and the dust won't end up in the car. While I'm doing that I can get it MOT'd and be driving it and just pop the doors off when it's ready to paint when the weather is good.

I also started looking at the damage round the back and SURPRISE!!! the rot had really set in. Looks like the car had been rear ended at some point in the past and rather than repair the metal the back of the car has been sculpted from a solid chunk of filler. I gashed out this chunk which is about 3/4" thick:

I scored a couple of rear panels off eBay. I think I paid a bit over the odds for them but I really needed the things as you'll see in a bit. I was offered some rear 1/4 panels cut off a car but I wanted something virginal and unfettered so these were ideal. This was the horror show hiding underneath:

And a bit closer on the really crusty bit...

 

[Jonny69]

So you can see there wasn't much of the old panel left:

I'm now the proud owner of a really big pile of filler dust.

Basically what I've had to do at the back here is use the new panel as a guide to build up what was supposed to be behind it, chopped out all the old grot and started again with fresh metal:

Et voila!

Soon she'll have an ass just as Henry intended it to be, not how some bodger body repair place thought thought they could get away with.

Anyway it's a bit more of a setback, but nothing I can't handle (manly roar) and nothing I've learned not to expect. It's so close to being a driver IT HURTS!!!

 

[Jonny69]

Looking good... Think you'll be on the road way before me.. I must stop taking panels off, I keep finding more and more rust to deal with....

Hahahah, I know all about that story! These are the last two panels that can come off except the roof

 

[Jonny69]

Yeah, Escort RS2000 struts with adjustable spring platforms up front and I got some new leaves made up for the back with 7 leaves instead of 5. Got Leda to uprate the lever-arm shocks to match. No point going the whole hog with turrets or coilovers at the back when it's a road car primarily

 

[Jonny69]

whats the insurance like then? Standard engine?

Hell no! It's a 1660cc crossflow bottom end (Mk 2 Escort) mated to a full race Cortina GT head, twin Webers etc:

I was going to be running a monster 1825cc precrossflow, but it's a bit of a mis-match of parts and it didn't run properly so I went for the smaller bore and crazy rev-happy route instead. Such is life. Insurance was about £150 TPFT last time.

When welding those panels on try not to get them to hot and warp the quarters.

I know, tell me about it. I've not welded any bodywork on view before and I'm ****ing myself about it. I guess on the bright side if it goes wobbly I'll just use more filler... I'll be going real slow on them. I thought maybe I might weld them on the inside since there's access as it might involve less grinding afterwards.