Mopar Muscle Association UK

Been asked to put up some pics of my 71 340 RT , i brought the car spring 17 from a very nice guy from East Grinstead, who'd owned the old girl for around 15 years, he was genuinely very sad to see it go, having invested a great deal of time and cash into the old girl, at the time i'd just been offered a job at a brand new Restoration outfit based in Manston Kent, i decided to take the job on the bases that the money was better, so i could work less hours, be in the new bespoke workshop, mainly E Types and 120's etc, brand new state of the art paint booth/oven, and was told i could use the facility's to do my own car,
Ok E's can become boring but the Mk2 made a change,
So anyway after a few months of ragging the chally about, i thought summers almost over so ill take the car the work and make a start on tidying the car up as it was pretty scabby!
I'd told Barry (the previous owner) that this was my intention and i'd keep him in the loop as the car progressed!

However the moment i started to mess around with the Chally my boss said to me he'd changed his mind and didn't want yanks or other crap apart from Jaguars on the premises!
Strange given the first two cars i done for him where Lotus Cortinas !
So the chally stalled at the first hurdle!
By spring 18 id had enough and just left, the E Type bull ----- and a lot of the owners just dun my head in!

So i thought il look else where and now look after 50 buses and coaches for a local bus company, the wages is rubbish but as everything is a ten footer there's zero pressure,

But before i took this job i was unemployed for most of the summer of 18 so started the tidy up of the chally at home!
Being used to a big workshop i could not believe how difficult it was to do this sort of work on the driveway and a single garage!
download/file.php?mode=view&id=128233
The car's in colour now so most of this is retrospective!

download/file.php?mode=view&id=128236r download/file.php?mode=view&id=128237

As purchased, the car drove very well, put a smile on my face the minute i turned the motor on!
So i start the lovely job of taking the shell, outside ,inside,and underneath back to bare metal, this is always a scary thing to do, old cars are like old ladies and generally look much better with there cloths on!

What made you decide to bare metal it?

Looks a solid car.

Nothing more boring than the E Type / MGB Owners. Driving gloves, picnic hampers, flat caps and boring stories, dreadful.

Mark B wrote: Tue May 19, 20 9:24 am Looks a solid car.

Nothing more boring than the E Type / MGB Owners. Driving gloves, picnic hampers, flat caps and boring stories, dreadful.

Don't sit on the fence Mark, what do you really think about them?

So pleased to see this car getting the restoration it deserves Pete. That car was always solid underneath, and has a strong running motor.

Barry will be tickled to bits to see it done too.

Looking forward to following the story...

Cheers guys,
Ok reasons for bare metal, as with 90% of old cars thev'e been through the stage of being cheap, and that used to mean the boyooz's got hold of them, ragged them, messed them about, MOT rust repairs was also a big thing and as every one wanted welding done as cheap as possible they suffered rubbish but adequate repairs,
So the only way one knows what ones got is to get it naked!
This can and often is very scary, the paint,gob, undersill is gone, all the corrosion can now been seen , as can dodgy repairs/welding, crash damage etc.
This particular car had all the above but fortunately not to terrible.
Under workshop conditions i would have stripped it to a totally bare shell,and had it fully blasted, but that was completely out the question having to do it at home,
So the next very time consuming job was to Acid remove as much of the light/heavy corrosion from pretty much the whole shell, i used about 15 ltrs
its very expensive in small amounts but not to bad if you buy bigger lots.
Works really well, nasty stuff so one needs to be careful with use.

The other reasons for bare metal is the substrate is a none factor, so when the time comes to refinish the car all the etch,primers and finish coats can be properly matched, sinkage and reactions are virtually eliminated.

My brief was make the car as strong as i could, as rust free as possible, look and run nicely, and not owe me a fortune!

So many people throw tons of cash at these cars in a quest for some kind of perfection, and then end up doing there brains when they come to move the cars on,

https://www.moparukhttps://www.moparuk. ... &id=128240

Great Looks solid

Apologies for the double post ?

acid cleaning the floors.....download/file.php?mode=view&id=128244............

Two very small place that needed removing, both over the top of supports underneath,
i reinforced around the seat belt anchors purely as a precaution .
Rockers on both sides where completely sound on the exterior, and reasonable sound on the inside, ive a bore cam for my rifles so i had a look inside!
Things were looking good,

ihttps://www.moparuk.com/forums/download/file.ph ... id=128246n

Acid burn.....
You can just see the rust pitting , underneath the floors came up really very good, the part no are still visable!

Good job wire brushes are cheap! the Acid just eats them

I bet that was a very "Therapeutic" job

I have spent 3 days cleaning a Tunnel Ram and that was enough for me!!!

Nice work, metal looks very solid

Wow, super clean

Small amount of pitting ahttps://www.moparuk.com/forums/download/file.ph ... id=128261t the front, but acceptable , so moved to the other side!