Geoff's Exocet build - Basingstoke

[geoff]

Hey Ed, thanks for the responses, my concern would be having tensioned springs and by just removing the centre bolts means they are not tensioned and safer whilst they sit in the garage for months?

So decision made, going to leave the springs compressed, make for a smoother lift of the body and I have spring compressor tools to deal with them later if necessary, but likely to replace them anyway....possibly

Spoke to a local powder coater today and he gave a ball park £100 guesstimate to powder coat a subframe and all arms, so that has pretty much made up my mind to abandon the idea of getting a blast cabinet, since that will probably cost more, especially when I realise my compressor may not be man enough for the job.

[geoff]

Some progress yesterday, all front body bolts removed and all but two on the rear. The nuts on the rear subframe were the worst, lots of freedom spray, wire brush, breaker bar, blow torch...the works and the two right at the back decided to start spinning the threaded bar as well. So today I will have cut these two off, then the body should be free.

I cut four 200mm lengths of timber to chock into the suspension and lifted the suspension before wedging them in and now it looks like it has been raised up, my new off road MX-5!

Chain is also now attached and waiting for the engine crane to arrive on Tuesday....now...will I be able to wait until Tues to try and separate it, just thinking about jacking up the body so it is 6 inches or so above the PPF so that I remove the last petrol tank bolt and leave that behind when the body comes off...hmmm...I have wheel cribs that I made last year, I can use those with jack stands to get some real height.

[geoff]

Finally there, everything attaching the body to the PPF are now free, two exhaust rubbers on the rear and the steering column on the front off this morning...no dramas. I was able to lift the body high enough to get access to the final bolt on the petrol tank, probably not worth undoing the other three until this point really, and now the tank rests on the PPF. So now waiting for the engine crane to arrive from the hire shop on Tuesday to lift the body off and directly onto a neighbours trailer who will whiz it down to the scrap yard.

So I guess I now have time to start thinking about what to put up onto Ebay, will spend some time cleaning and taking pictures and see what transpires, there seems to be masses of parts on Ebay that means the chances of getting anything substantial are low, but I will put up everything I can and just wait and see.

[phaeton]

Do you not have 3 mates who can socially distance themselves from you to lift it off?

[geoff]

The hire on the engine crane is only £29, would have cost me more in beers if I got friends to help lift it!

[gm]

good luck for tomorrow - remember to cut both of the vin plates off before you send the shell to scrap

[geoff]

Another successful day, the work put in over the weekend to ensure everything was seperated, and to have the body just resting on the PPF paid off with an extremely smooth lift and seperation!

[geoff]

Spent this morning trying to break down the rear suspension, so that I can get the arms powder coated, but met with lots of resistance. 

Brake callipers and disks came off with no arguments. The callipers are covered in silver paint, all over including the backs of the pads, so that will be pleasant job to clear off.

Shock absorber bottom bolts are spinning on both sides, knuckle top bolts are free, bottom bolts are not, and drive shafts refuse to part company with the hubs.

Shock absorber bottom bolts I will leave until the knuckle is separated, when I can then cut a small window under the control arm to insert a spanner to get on the spinning nuts.

Kuckle bottom bolts will need a fair amount of wire brushing, and possibly sanding, the exposed section in the middle that currently is stopping the bolt from sliding out.

Removing the driveshaft is going to be an issue, thinking of removing a couple of studs and placing a bolt through from the other side with nut on the back to try and pull the hub off the driveshaft, giving it a good hard whack when it is under tension...my next plan will be to use heat, and then i will give in and purchase a 15 ton hydraulic puller......anyone else have any ideas on this?

[geoff]

So I started the challenge this morning on removing the first knuckle....I started by removing the knuckle top mount, and the sway bar, one of the say bar bolts was already mashed, so the 5mm Allen key would hold, thankfully one of them did, so that leaves the plastic bar connected to the lower control arm, I will deal with that when it is off. I then started tapping on the hub to try and free it and then started hammering on the driveshaft and to my surprise it actually moved...I thought it was going to be stuck fast....so I kept hammering and then smiled!

So I then removed the lower control arm from the subframe (it is still connected to the knuckle) one bolt broke straight away, but no drama as just used a drift to knock it though and the other was a breeze.

I now have a knuckle off the frame, with a lower control arm attached and the shock absorber attached. So now I can get it onto the bench and work out how to free the lower shock absorber bolt, it looks like I may be able to get a ring spanner in from underneath but shining a light in there shows the tabs holding a square nut in place (I think) and you can see one of the tabs has been pushed out, so I will explore this further on the bench to see the best way to tackle this.

For the long bolt connecting the lower control arm to the knuckle, I will see if I can clean it up and work out a way of pushing it out....sash clamp possibly???

The end of the drive shaft has mushroomed slightly, I am sure that a burr will fix this, but not sure if I am replacing with a new drive shaft end or not...if I keep it, I will also have to remove the ABS ring, as I am not keeping the ABS.

[geoff]

Spent another hour on it this afternoon, and started on the large lower control arm bolt first. I put the breaker bar on the bolt end and moved it backwards and forwards until it made a cracking sound, then hit the the nut end, with the nut on, and kept repeating this....and it moved, and then it moved some more and then I had to take the nut off because there was no room for it and hammed on the thread end and out it popped. Phew.


Then I moved onto freeing the shock absorber, I could see that with a little bit more room to access I would be able to get a spanner on the square nut, so out came the compressor with a grinding bit and that was all it took. I used a punch to get the tabs, that were supposed to hold the nut, out of the way, a 17mm spanner fits and then it was easy.

So only have to press the bushes out now. What appeared to be a massive issue yesterday, turned out to be all doable and I will take the other side tomorrow morning, pre-warned, and pre-armed this should be much smoother....famous last words....

[geoff]

So started on the nearside rear this morning...the drive shaft was not as tight and everything else was about the same, so a duplicate of yesterdays work and now all done. Next step is to remove the front, but I am on holiday for the next week, a week by the sea...happy days.

[emdubya]

I'm very much enjoying your blow-by-blow account, and I'm sure many others are too. Have you considered compiling each step into a pdf as you go? It would be an invaluable resource and an easy matter to turn that into a book eventually.

Enjoy your break and keep up the good work when you're back.

Em

[geoff]

Thanks Em.....was great to read that on my return.

So back on it this morning, progress will be slowing down now as I have to spend time preparing what is left. I removed the front wheels, callipers, calliper mounts, and disks....I have run out of the break it free oil, so held off tackling the front suspension. So returned to the rear and set about seeing if I could remove bushes with tools that I have, and used a sash clamp, socket, long bolt with nut and washer and boom, four bushes out. I had no way to leverage on both sides of the bush, so had to resort to clamping from the outer side of the other bush. This was successful, but a bit dodgy, no way would I recommend this and will certainly not use this method on the lower control arm with the wider distance, so will give in and order a bush removal kit from amazon, avoiding the really cheap ones!

I then thought I would see how bad they really are by going at one with a wire brush...and an old screwdriver to scrape off the old flaking coating...and not too bad at all, no actual pitting and just surface rust, so will bring the power tools next to see how good I can get them before sending off for powder coating. I know the powder coater will do the prep as well, but there is nothing more satisfying knowing I have done it myself.

[geoff]

In the true spirit of building your own car, I am going to make my own Bush removal/install tool. Using threaded rod, 400mm of exhaust pipe, a large washer about 45-50mm, so will cut a piece of flat steel for this, and some nuts and washers...thats the plan......

[emdubya]

May 15, 2021 8:57:43 GMT geoff said:

I then thought I would see how bad they really are by going at one with a wire brush...and an old screwdriver to scrape off the old flaking coating...


I often wonder how much metal is lost from heavily rusted parts - not that this is likely to be much of an issue with such a light car as the Exocet. Nonetheless, it would be interesting to compare the weight of a cleaned-up rusted part with the weight of the new part. Just a feature of my OCD . . .