Author Topic: Aurora Rebuild (Read 2296 times)

dwethera · « **on:** April 28, 2019, 10:25:50 PM »

Hi Guys,
I joined the forum last year when I bought my moke:

I have not tinkered with cars for many years so my skills and knowledge are a bit shaky. I had a very experienced mechanic look at the car to give guidance on where start to get this car road worthy. Front and rear suspension were stuffed, Gear selector mounts were missing, Gear selector was worn, Steering rack worn, Indicator assembly not working.... I could keep going. i have managed to source most of the bits I need to get all these things functional.

I dropped out the engine and front sub frame. That revealed a panel welded on the driver side toe board. It was welded on three sides notably with the top edge un-sealed. That did not seem like a smart thing to do so I cut it off to reveal the predictable rust hole.

(Sorry about the orientation of the photo.)

I then proceeded to strip the car down to the bare chassis. There is rust in the rear hull bracket points:

Comments on how to approach the repair of these issues would be appreciated. I have bought a couple of hull brackets but I am not sure how to fix them back into the hull. Should I repair the hole in the panel and then weld the bracket to the repair or cut a bigger section around the rust hole so that I can weld the hull bracket to the patch panel and then weld the whole assembly to the hull?

As for the Toe Board, I am not at all sure which way to go with that. The passenger side is in excellent condition BTW.

Terry · « **Reply #1 on:** May 01, 2019, 08:35:57 PM »

Hi,

it is a shame to see say a nice looking Moke on the outside and such a contrast with the inside. Did you know the inside was not to the same standard at the outside when you bought it?

Besides the hole under your feet, the important bit in that area is the mount for the subframe, what is left of that?

For the rear repairs I would say weld a patch over the holes you have there and fix the new mounts to the original metal that is still there. The problem of the rust is caused by the very small holes, read gaps, at the bottom of the mounts not being big enough to let the dirt and dust out and once it gets wet it goes to mud and starts the rust process. A lot of Mokes have the same problem, they just don't know it yet.

Terry

dwethera · « **Reply #2 on:** May 02, 2019, 11:41:06 AM »

Thank you for getting back to me.

The photo shows the car with a number plate but it was a long way off being road worthy. There were carpets throughout the inside and I was very dubious as to what they were covering up. I knew this was a project car when I bough it but but not quite to the extent it has turned out to be! Hmmm seem to have read that somewhere recently!

After scraping off contact adhesive and bog the following was found:

Thank you for the tip about the sub frame mount. You were right it too needs some work:

I have someone taking a look at all of this tomorrow and will get an idea of the approach to take. Patch up vs complete panel replacement.

On other things, I have stripped the front sub frame and treated it with Xtrol Rust Conqueror. The guy who sold me the Xtrol recommended the companion product Impact Black to over coat it. I have seen references to Xtrol in the forum but none on Impact Black. Have you had any experience/comments with this product?

David

M.Aziz · « **Reply #3 on:** May 02, 2019, 06:41:20 PM »

Hey David,

All i can say is wow.
What type of person would go to such lengths to make a car look pristine on the outside when its so clearly unsound.
The paint job may look nice but who knows whats hiding underneath.
I wouldnt feel comfortable driving that car with just patch panels to be honest.
Have you considered taking it back to bare metal and redoing the paint along with the panels?
The best thing about your moke is its complete so its literally a strip down, blast, repair, paint and reassemble, most people had lots of items missing some of which are NLA which made it much harder.
Its not my call but you should consider stripping and redoing it if you plan on driving it with your loved ones in the car, if your giving it to someone you dont like then just put the carpet back in

Cheers,
Mus

Terry · « **Reply #4 on:** May 02, 2019, 07:21:11 PM »

Hi,

If the top coat in green is as good as it looks in the photos I would be reluctant to spend time and money removing it just because of the issue inside under the carpets.

From what I can see in the pictures I would just stick to cleaning it up as best you can, removing the rust, and liberally drowning what is left in the Xtrol product, particularly the bare metal areas you create and places where the Xtrol can seep in and prevent further rusting like the seams and some hard to get places. You could clean up the inside with some paint stripper on the old yellow paint or get a mobile soda blaster to visit and tape up the green and let them clean up the insides.

I would suggest just making up strips of flat or folded metal for patching over the areas you have pictured rather than trying to replace whole panels, I don't think your Moke is that far gone by a long way to need new panels. But whoever you have coming to visit may have different ideas. There is a post froma few years ago now that shows the type patches you can make up, but basically it is 1.2mm steel in strips that is folded at about 60 degrees to match the floor to the sidewalls with a bit of overlap so you are welding on to solid metal.

I had reason to have a repair checked by a Vicorads Engineer/Inspector a few years ago and he said a patch on top and bottom was a okay way to do the repairs along the floor.

The Xtrol can interfere with welding it might need to be cleaned off where the welding needs to be done when the time comes. Xtrol also can react with strong solvent paints, even when it dry, so test a small area first when painting over it.

I have used the Impact Black product and it is essentially black enamel paint mixed with Xtroll, I am sure the supplier will say it is more but you can use Xtrol as a thinner in normal black paint so I suspect that is all it is. However it will take a few days, even a week, to dry hard so plan ahead and don't be in a rush. I used it on subframes and running gear.

Terry

dwethera · « **Reply #5 on:** May 23, 2019, 10:03:29 PM »

I have to rebuild the Bermuda triangle on the driver's side. It is only the bottom of the inner side panel and the folded seam on the bottom of that panel that is gone. I have removed the spot welds and lifted off the seam that joins to the floor panel. The floor panel looks to be quite solid so I do not have to repair that. I was considering cutting the inside panel back to the upper join of the triangle and then making a "L" piece to butt weld to the cut at the top and plug weld to the floor.

Is this how this job is usually tackled? Does the seat support need to come out as well? It looks like it will be a whole lot easier if the seat support is out but looks like a pain to remove and replace. Thoughts? I have some line drawings done by someone on the forum and I will try to edit onto that what I am trying to do.

David

Terry · « **Reply #6 on:** May 23, 2019, 10:49:28 PM »

Hi,

Some pictures might help, but removing the seat support/cross member isn't something that happens very often so I would avoid that if you could.

If I understand your description correctly I would just cut out the rust and weld a flat piece across the hole from the bottom of the Moke and then maybe a couple of supports to connect the patch back to the inside panel to provide some support for weight in the side box. Welding inside the side box can be very difficult to get a good weld so if you are just removing good metal to get up near the join I wouldn't bother, join it lower down.

All this depends on your skills and welding torch as to just how easy it will be to weld in the side box.

Terry

dwethera · « **Reply #7 on:** June 17, 2019, 09:10:13 PM »

Legend tells us that strange things happen inside the Bermuda triangle. I found a 300mm length of the following inside the drivers side triangle. It is as hard as concrete and had to be smashed out with a chisel and hammer. I believe it is rust impregnated sand. When it is smashed apart with a hammer it breaks up into particles the size of coarse sand. It is a pain to remove because it is kind of ceramic and abrasive tools won't touch it. Breaking it up is the only way to get it out.

You can even see the shape of the lower part of the triangle.

Back to work now for me.

Halfpint · « **Reply #8 on:** June 17, 2019, 10:15:44 PM »

Hi,
Does look weird, I wonder if someone has tried to fill it in with something?
Definately best to remove it all before patching it back up.

HP

dwethera · « **Reply #9 on:** July 24, 2019, 08:23:35 PM »

Mystery substance has been identified as being sand blast grit. Someone previously sandblasted near a rust hole but never bothered to flush it out prior to sealing it up. It explains the regular grain size of the stuff when smashed up with a hammer. It is a complete pain to get out and will only cause me a lot of gref down the track if left in there.

dwethera · « **Reply #10 on:** October 29, 2019, 06:36:27 PM »

Progress is being made with rust removal.

I have been removing paint/rust back to bare metal so that I can weld. Once I have finished working in that area I then apply Rust Conqueror (RC) to the bare metal because I don't know when I will get back to painting it. I have noticed that the RC has to be removed when welding as it affects the adhesion. That does not bother me overly because I have found anything but bright clean metal affects the MIG weld process.

Today I had some spray etch primer and I sprayed some on the RC that was about a week old. It fried up!! Will I have to remove the RC from all the places I put it? Is there a spray/rattle can that is compatible with RC. I have read that the manufacturer of RC has their own primer. Is that the only product that can be used?

I have been using the RC companion product Impact Black on all the running gear and sub frames and it seems to be an excellent product.

Panic! I have spent many many hours scraping and wire wheeling this back to to good condition I really don't want to scrape this stuff off again so I can put a couple of coats of acrylic over it.

Terry · « **Reply #11 on:** October 29, 2019, 10:09:40 PM »

Hi,

I use a single pack primer, not an etch primer, as they are more aggressive for biting into things like galvanising or bare metal so if you have RC on it, it is no longer bare metal. The information that used to come with the RC product had a few do's and don'ts for what to use, particularly anything with isocyanide(two pack hardener) should not be be sprayed directly on to the RC.

Spray cans tend to have a lot of solvent in them and that can be working against you.

Terry

moemoke · « **Reply #12 on:** October 29, 2019, 10:56:10 PM »

The etch primer I have used in the past only requires a very thin coat, more like just a mist coat, I'm not
sure if applying it to thick causes the frying up.

Newie · « **Reply #13 on:** October 30, 2019, 08:04:50 AM »

As the name suggests, etch primer's purpose is to etch the surface - of bare metal. Use it on anything else at your own risk as it is not really designed to stick to coated surfaces.

As Terry suggests, you're better off with a general purpose primer. Probably better still in your case would be a primer filler which can be sprayed on thick, then sanded back and sprayed on again thinner to give you a final prepared surface. Depends how much effort you want to go to

dwethera · « **Reply #14 on:** October 30, 2019, 09:50:29 AM »

Thanks for the advice. I will try some GP primer and see how it goes. I really like the RC. When you put it on the seams it just gets sucked in where it is needed.