Matt’s Minor refresh is very nearly complete…
There’s little to report on the Land Rover this month as it’s been away, on loan to Safety Devices who are planning to manufacture snorkels for cars, like mine, fitted with a left-hand wing air intake. So our car has been borrowed for 3D scanning, then use as a test bed for the prototype snorkels that will soon be available through Britpart – quite the legacy for the Land Rover aftermarket parts world! While it’s been away, I’ve been concentrating my efforts on completing works on my Morris Minor Traveller, ahead of a planned family holiday to the south of France – on the Morris Minor Owners’ Club’s annual ‘Minors On Tour’ adventure.
The Traveller had been my ‘at home’ project for a couple of months, but with it up and running once more, I took a spin down to the PC workshop to spend the day with Clive Jefferson and hit the slightly crusty nearside floor edge panels in a single day… well that was the plan.
Up on the ramp, I stripped the front suspension and removed the torsion bar before we lowered the car onto a set of tall axle stands and pulled away the ramp arms to gain access to the rot. Thirteen hours later, we left the workshop having chopped out the crossmember end, floor edge panels and a reasonable number of smaller crusty areas which were better accessed with the former panels removed; and repaired and replaced the panels in question so the car could be raised clear of the axle stands. We were both exhausted and the car wasn’t finished… but a couple more hours the following day saw the job done, closing panels made, all repair sections seam and plug welded and the whole underside and all cavities coated and filled with a selection of Corolan waxes from Rustbuster.
With the welding complete, I could refit the carpet, but the original ‘horsehair’ type underlay that came out was damp, worn and generally ruined after just eight years on the road. And there’s no doubt in my mind that the soggy underlay had contributed to the corrosion I’d just repaired – and would have caused further destru
