After almost 3 years, 23 "store bought" parts welded, glued (the 2 fender beads) and bolted (the passenger side front fender) to the car, innumerable patches welded on, several months of panel fitting, filling, sanding, and dust, I'm declaring the exterior body work phase of this project complete!

What that means is that all the panels are on the car, they've been made straight, with metal work and filler, and the car is ready for primer.

This past weekend I finished up the front valence, a skim coat on portions of the driver sill and lower dogleg, and some light filler on the rear valence around the tail pipe exit.

All this work was with 80 grit. Sanding was done with a 17" Dura Block, and a 21" long ASF flexible sanding block. The latter is excellent - it has 3 steel rods that you can insert or remove to adjust the flexibility, and it was perfect for sanding the front valence, with either 1 or 0 rods in it. With all 3 rods it worked well on the sill/dogleg area.

To review, I'm following "Mike the Bodyman's" prescription for body work:

- Obviously, get the panels lined up as good as humanly possible, and do your hammer/dolly work to minimize filler.

- For anything more than a skim coat, use Duraglass. It's reinforced with fiberglass strands, waterproof, and very strong - it won't crack, and sticks to 80 grit scratched metal like crazy. Sanding it definitely builds muscle. "We" (okay, Mike) used it, for instance, to extend the sides of the hood at the front, to get consistent gaps it's entire length. A lot of it went into reshaping my new, BMH fender, which had very poor shapes in the area of the upper door gap and the lower bonnet-gap area.

- Duraglass is prone to air bubbles/pinholes, as it's thick stuff. You'll also tend to want to shape it with 36 grit, since it's tough stuff, so you'll almost always want to skim coat it with Rage Extreme. This is really nice filler, very smooth, sands easy. You can almost use it like a thick primer - give it some 80 grit scratches to stick to, clean off the substrate, and you can really feather it smoothly into the surrounding surface.

- Use multiple layers of masking tape to protect the adjoining panel edges. Use a 4-5 ft semi rigid alumnimum bar as a smoothness guage. It can follow the large radii inherent in B body panels, and show you where you aren't flat.

Glad to be past this stage, one step closer to getting past the dusty parts of the job. A shop coated in dust is not a pleasant place to be.

Next steps:
- Get the panels off the car.
- Put 3 coats of primer on all the exterior surfaces. I'm using PPG K36 high-build urethane primer.
- Get the drivetrain out of the car.
- Flip the tub on it's side, and finish the underbody repairs. These include both battery bins, 2 tunnel patches, one heelboard, the top battery shelf panel, and both floor panels.
- Strip the existing undercoat off the car.
- Seal the bottom surfaces. K36 can be mixed as a sealer.
- Seam seal the bottom.
- Paint the bottom, single stage.
- Undercoat the rails, tunnel, floors, with Hippo liner tinted Flame Red.
- Flip the car rightside up.
- Prep the bay (got at least one rust hole to fix), seal the bay, interior, and boot.
- Seam seal those areas.
- Paint those areas with the single stage Flame Red.
- Block sand my primed exterior.
- Base coat the exterior panels Flame Red.
- Clear coat the exterior.
- Reassemble.

So - there's still quite a bit of work to do!

Per the previous post, I took advantage of the availability of an experienced body man to both speed up my progress, as well as to immeasurably improve the quality of the finished product. Mike was able to assess what I’d done to date, point out areas that could be improved, as well as get the majority of panels lined up, flat, straight, and ready for priming.

However, he couldn’t finish the job, since he needed to get back to California and his family. I had mixed emotions on that, but in any event I was way ahead of where I would have otherwise been, and the concept of this project was never to have someone do the whole thing for me, anyway.

So I just had to pick up where he left off. I was able to watch Mike a lot while he worked the car, so I had a pretty good idea of both what needed to be done and how to do it.

In particular, I had told Mike that the outer rocker panels were a low priority. I’d seen worse, and anyway, most casual observers don’t get a good look at them anyway, since they’re so low on a low car, and tucked in. You really need to be back from them to see them.

However, I’m not a casual observer, and after seeing how good Mike got all the other panel fits, it seemed a shame to have such poor fits with the rockers. So I’d do them myself.

The problem was that the panels around the rockers were “higher” than the rockers. This was probably built in to the replacement rocker that I used. Possibly if I had caught it before welding it in I could have shimmed it out at the top flange. But who knows, that might have caused other problems. In any event, to fix the problem the outer rocker surface would have to be built up.

Duraglass is the tool to use for this. It’s a polyester filler reinforced with fiberglass strands. It’s much tougher and stronger than normal polyester filler. It’s also thicker, and a bit harder to work with because of that. The thickness causes it to tend to hold air, resulting in more pinholes on the surface. But a small price to pay for the extra strength, which is important when you have thicker fills. Just skim it over with a good quality surfacing filler (e.g., Rage Extreme) and you’ve got the best of both worlds.

BTW – a trick Mike showed me was to mix in an ounce or two of liquid polyester resin into the Duraglass before adding hardener. This thins it out, making it easier to work with and less likely to trap air. It also slows down the cure a bit.

So the approach was:

1. Rough up/strip the paint/primer off of the rocker with 80 grit on a DA.

2. Mask the edges of the surrounding panels with 2-3 layers of tape

3. Clean off the surface, and spread Duraglass into it, at least as thick as the tape on the surrounding panels

4. After it goes off, work it back down with 36 grit on a body file, until you start to get close to the masking tape level

5. Finish it off with 80 grit, first with the body file, the by hand until you’re cutting into the bottom layer of tape (remove each layer as you cut through it).

6. Use long blocks, small blocks, the edge of spreaders, whatever, as sanding blocks as you shape the filler into the right shape of the outer rocker. Pay particular attention to the “tucks” where the rocker goes under the front and rear fenders, and the fit along the door.

7. Once you like the Duraglass surface, remask, mix up a fill of Rage Extreme, and repeat the process, focusing the fill on the low portions of the Duraglass surface.

8. Once the Rage Extreme surface is good, sand in the radii at the edges of the panel.

That’s pretty much all there is to it. The sanding motion, especially with the long boards and body files, is across the car in an “X” motion (i.e., not straight forward and back, but somewhat up/down while going back and forth, as if you were writing a big “X” in the side of the panel. That helps you get the curvature you need.

Beware of using the 36 grit too long, it cuts fast and it’s merciless, it’ll cut the surrounding panels just as quickly as it cuts the Duraglass.

If you’re a really good body man, you can get this job done with one fill of Duraglass and one of Rage. I am not a really good body man, so it took me two fills of each. Like almost every other job in restoring this car, I don’t do it as quickly as a pro, but I can come close to a pro’s quality if I take my time.

In any event, I like the result I got, the “After” is dramatically better than the “Before” - now the rocker is tied into the surrounding panels, almost like they were all cut out of a single block, which in a way they were.

So all the new exterior panels are on the car - both sills, both doors, hood, deck lid, new right fender, right side dogleg, left front fender lower panel, left rear fender lower patch.

Now it's time to tie all the panels together, flatten the panels and get them straight, and get ready to prime.

I met Mike when he was doing the body work and painting on Bill's MG. Mike is an experienced body man, over 30 years of working on custom cars, collector cars, manufacturer prototypes, etc.. He knows what he's doing. He's also looking for work in Tulsa, not impressed with the rates the body shops are paying people, and picking up custom jobs while he's looking. And his rates are reasonable.

So I faced a decision. Do the body work myself, learning as I go, do the best I can and live with it. Or, pay a craftsman a reasonable amount of money to make the car perfect. Quickly.

I chose the latter. So while I do my day job, Mike is working on my car in my garage. At the end of the day I get caught up, then into the evening take on jobs to help him keep going - fitting the hood, welding up seams, etc..

The goal is to get the car ready to prime, then turn it back over to me to finish. So far, so good.

Both doors were rusted out, and I covered reskinning them in previous entries.

I don't know whether the root cause was the door skins, or my door skinning ability, or the original car, but the door gaps, while good around most of the door, open up too much at the top rear, above the trim strip/feature line. Where the gap around the rest of the door was nominally 1/8", here it was closer to .2". It seemed very noticeable to me.

A separate entry could/will cover fitting the door, and at this point I feel pretty experience in that, so I'm confident that this area can't be fixed by adjusting anything - more metal has to be added.

So the plan is to take an 1/8" steel rod, procured at the local Loew's/Home Depot, and weld it on to the edge of the door, then grind it back as necessary to give me that nominal l/8" gap.

Once I got that done, I still wasn't happy with the area right at the feature line, and a bit below it. So I just "migged" little weld spots onto the back edge of the door skin in those areas.

Then I decided to do the same at the feature line on the b-pillar, where it had rounded off a little over the years. Same drill - weld a little, then grind it down to roughly the shape you want.

I used compressed air in between the welds to cool the metal and make sure that I didn't heat up the panels so much to warp them. Went slow, and stayed cool.

I used a straight-edge to make sure the weld area wasn't highter than the rest of the panel.

The final result looks much better than the original. The gap is much more consistent. A little metal filler will take care of the pits/uneven surface where the weld meets the panel.

No entries since June. What's up with that, if anyone cares? Well, ever try to work in an unairconditioned garage in Tulsa, OK, in July or August. Believe me, you won't do it unless you really have to, or are getting paid plenty.

But it's back below 90, more or less, so back to work I go.

My MGB buddy, Bill S., came over to check on my progress (bringing his new-to-him '73 with him, which he figuratively stole from someone who redid all the mechanicals and interior - nice ride, Bill!) which wasn't much.

But I showed him my fender beads, which had been eaten away by rust in spots. They looked bad. My original plan was to fill them with an all-metal filler, then shape them back into the original shape. I gave that a try, but didn't like the results - just too fine a feature to try to reproduce in filler, or well beyond my skills, or both.

Showing my crappy beads to Bill was just what I needed to commit to replacing both of them.

So I did a little research. The beads are available from Moss, and there's a procedure for replacing them.

Lindsay Porter describes one approach in "The Car Bodywork Repair Manual", which is basically to grind the existing bead off, cut the top off a replacement bead, and solder it in place.

There were also a couple of approaches written up in the MGBE forums, that were basically updated versions of Porter's approach, using epoxy/panel adhesive instead of solder, with or without including a portion of vertical leg of the T in the repair.

To review, the fender bead is a T-shaped strip of metal, the vertical 'body' of which is sandwiched between the outer fender and the cockpit/boot surround stamping. The three pieces are spot-welded together, reportedly. I have no idea how the factory got a spot-welding tool in there, which is why nobody tries a total replacement.

Anyway, after doing my homework I went to work:

1) Grind off the old bead. A grinding wheel in an angle grinder handles this easily. Focus on the middle of the top of the 'T', and the arms will basically fall off as you grind down.

2) That leaves the vertical 'body' of the T, sandwiched between the body panels. I used a cut-off wheel in the angle grinder to grind out a portioin of that vertical piece, about 1/4" or so of it. You've got to be careful to not go too deep, messing up the spot-welds holding the panels together, nor get too wide and cut the panels instead of the 'T' body. Go slow, stay centered, and it's very doable.

3) Take the replacement bead, and again using the cutoff wheel, slice off the T body so that it's no longer than the depth of the groove you've just created - about 1/4" or so. Leaving some of the body gives the T some stiffness, without it, it will tend to want to roll up. It also gives you more glueing surface.

4) Lots of test fits to make sure you've got a good fit. I tried some pre-bends in the bead, carefully, so that it followed the top contour and didn't need a lot of force to keep it in place. That simplifies the clamping process while you wait for the adhesive to cure. Make sure you keep the bead protected while you're working it, it tends to want to rust pretty fast if not. If you're working in a hot Tulsa garage, and sweating on it, it rusts REALLY fast. I used Picklex 20 to protect the bead.

5) I had some holes in my 'slot' where the corrossion that messed up the original bead had eaten either the floor or the sides out of the 'slot' where the replacement bead would be glued in. This slot needs to hold the adhesive in place, so I rebuilt the corroded-out sections with JB Weld - the 'stick' kind where you cut off a piece, knead it to combine the epoxy and hardener, and then shape it in the 5 minute work time that you have. There was just enough access through the side panel, and I used a 2" section of spare bead to give me something to work the JB Weld around. It wasn't perfect, but it worked.

6) I used 3M Automix, 8115 adhesive to glue the bead in the groove. It's a two-part epoxy, and uses a special calking gun that sells for aroung $90, and mixing tips for application. It comes in 200 ml 'siamesed' calking tubes. This is very good stuff - I tested it on a small piece of sheet metal, and after a few hours it was on there for good. I suppose any good epoxy would work, this isn't the toughest application in the world, it's non-structural and all that. But Bill (see above) had a couple of tubes and a gun to loan me, so it was very convenient.

7) Set up the gun/tube/tip. The only trick is to run a bit of adhesive out before you put the tip on, just to be sure that you don't have a void in either of the two parts, so they mix correctly in the tip. Put the tip on, and go to work. You've got to go slow, because the tip is just about exactly the width of the groove you're trying to fill. And fill it, you ideally want a little bit of squeeze out, to ensure that the arms of the 'T' are glued to the top of the fender, minimizing the risk of moisture getting under them and rotting them out again. I filled the groove so that it was even or slightly over-full, and ran a knife blade down the groove (again, slowly) to ensure that I didn't have any air trapped under the adhesive.

8) You've got lots of work time with this adhesive, so no need to rush. Fit your prepped bead into the groove, and start to clean it up. I used paper towels and lacquer thinner from a spray bottle. Don't wait forever to clean up the squeeze out, after a few hours you'll likely have to sand it off.

9) I used qt cans of paint, a BFH, some gallon gans of thinner, etc., to hold the bead down while it cured. After I bit I also used duct tape at the ends where I couldn't balance any of the weights.

10) Done. I feel good about my new beads. I think they're important to the look of the car, and the new beads are 100% better than my old, 'filled' beads. Progress, I love it.

Addendum: About a week after finishing this job I was browsing in my local autobody/paint store and ran across a family of body panel adhesives from Evercoat - info available at: http://www.mgexperience.net/phorum/read.php?1,1549760 . They are two-part epoxy based adhesives, like 3M Automix or Fuzor, that are packaged in a standard calk tube that fits in a standard calking tube gun. They use the same kind of mixing applicator tip that Automix uses. Very clever packaging, and something to try if you don't have an Automix or Fuzor gun available to you and don't want to spring for a $60 to $90 gun that you may only use once.

The boot floor was just laying in position for the last few months as I worked on the DS sill and the DS rear quarter patch. With that done, I used the pressure blaster that a friend loaned me to clean up some of the remaining paint from the trunk that the stripper and heat couldn't get off, and got ready to weld the floor in.

I drilled 1/4" holes around the floor flange, about every 1 1/2 inches or so - there were 20-22 holes in the side flanges, about the same in the fore/aft flanges. 2 holes in each of the muffler hanging flanges, and 3 holes in each of the axle strap hanger flanges.

Once the holes were drilled (and thank goodness once again for the Drill Doctor, sharp drills are handy) I removed the primer from the floor around the welds with a 50 grit Roloc on a mini angle grinder. One more test fit, and I marked the position of each weld, removed the panel again and prepped the 'receiving' side of the welds with the Roloc/grinder.

'Clamping' strategy varied with the position of the welds. For the sides, I simply pressed the flange into the side members with a hammer handle with my left hand/chest, and welded with the gun in my right hand. It was actually kind of handy to rest the nozzle on the hammer handle at times. For the hanger flanges, I tightened the pieces together with a sheet metal screw through the middle hole, drilling a hole in the flange to fit. On the front surfaces, there was naturally a tight fit once the hanger flanges were welded, but I pushed down with the hammer handle just to make sure. At the rear, I used long throated vice grip clamps - I don't know how else I could have done it, and the clamps were relativelyl cheap at HF, coming in a set of 3 of various throat depths. The muffler hanger flanges required the deep throat clamps as well.

Once the welds were in, I made several rounds with the griding wheel on the angle grinder, and the flap wheel (love the DeWalt flap wheel) on another grinder.

With just a tad bit of filler/sealer, I think it'll be a good looking, sturdy new boot to hang the fuel tank off of. One less thing...