Bus is back on its side ready for chassis rail rust repair
Both areas will be repaired before the centre section goes in
The right door upper hinge pin was fused and the hinge cracked when attempting removal. So a hinge from a donor door had to be drilled out and installed.
Door screws were used with nuts on the inside then the screws were ground flush with the hinge face.
Wow, I don't think I've seen a bus resto like this in Oz yet with this amount of tricky rust repair. Good to see its all being done right and thorough.
Depending on the state of your roof, looks like you might be better off getting some new Autocraft roof sections like the ones in this pic, to fix that gutter rot.
Rather than repairing properly, at some time in the past someone plated over a rusty inner sill with new metal and seam welded it to the floor - looks okay until you cut it off.
The middle outrigger on right side was removed along with a heap of other rusty metal
Here you can see the remnants of the previous inner sill cover up, along with the original rusty inner sill
Due to multiple repairs required on the floor, it was decided to cut out the entire length on the right side of the cargo floor
Front outrigger also had to come out for replacement
More plating over rust in the front wheel arches will come out as well
The outer sill support pieces (lower) will be replaced as well
The left sill under the cargo doors is much the same as the right - rusty!
Once the previous "repair" was undone the true extent of the problems were evident
The left side of the floor will need to be replaced as well due to multiple rust holes and pits.
A section of the front top hat had to be replaced as well as the rear inner arch
Steve spent quite a bit of time repairing the chassis rail bottom section and inside, with only the outer section to go
We had a Gerson and Schofield outer sill and strengthener in the shop for comparison....will decide which goes in tomorrow (so far the Gerson has the edge)
All three outriggers on this side will need to be replaced along with the jacking point....all should be in today
Another day and more progress has happened!
Al will be taking a well earned little break from today till next Monday.
Anyway here are some pics of what has happened today.
Finally got some primer on today - first prepped the single pack etch applied by the blaster...
....then applied a 2K etch/primer surfacer, then after suitable flash time the 2K high build primer was applied.
Steve has become very familiar with the bottom of the bus. The left side inner sill went into today along with a couple of the outriggers after further chassis rail repairs.
