Triumph Spitfire Body and Engine Removal (Finally!!)

Got a good amount of stuff done last night (Wednesday) after work. Since home is on the way, I stopped and got changed into my greasy clothes, packed some dinner, and headed over to the garage for the evening.

My first order of business was to liberate the motor from the chassis. My garage mate was dropping of the engine hoist when I arrived so I had everything I needed to do the job.

I had previously removed the generator not thinking that the front lifting eye, which is made of the generator upper bracket, would rotate since it would only be secured on one end with the generator removed.

Yeah, that's not going to work.

So, I put the generator back in and pulled the motor. Some agitation was required to get the mounts to release, but that was to be expected.

The powerhouse.

Well there's your problem.

Before I got the motor on the stand I needed to do some disassembly, namely the clutch and flywheel. I was a bit worried that the flywheel bolts would be too tight to remove without just wasting my time spinning the motor with the wrench. However, the torque on the bolts was not that high (about 45 ft-lb according to the workshop manual) so I was able to block the flywheel with a large flat-head screwdriver against my leg and just...pull. No problem.

Flywheel off. The ring gear had some spots that were pretty nasty.

The back of the motor with the back plate still attached. The seven bolts you see hold that on.

After that, I mounted it to the stand. This ended up being trickier than I thought. First, I had to get the correct bolts to account for the length of the attachment arms and to provide enough thread engagement. I ended up using 2 1/2", 5/16-24 bolts and a few flat washers. The stand, as I had suspected, was not really sized for the engine (too big, of course) so mounting it was a chore. I ended up pulling the mounting plate and arms from the stand, bolting them to the motor in the best orientation that I could figure, and then sliding the whole package back into the stand.

Engine mounted to the stand.

I am going to revisit the mounting when I go back this weekend. The motor sits very high in the stand, causing it to be very top heavy and it wants to roll right over. So, I'll sling it back up on the hoist and see if I can figure out a better mounting arrangement. It would really suck if I get over there to find the motor on the ground. Hehe...not funny.

Once that was complete, I shifted over to constructing stands for the body. I used the same basic arrangement as I did for the black car except this time I put the 2x4 with the short end "up" in the sawhorse clamps and only used one sawhorse at each end. This gave me enough contact on the body while allowing me to use those infamous Harbor Freight Furniture Dollies to provide mobility.

I screwed a 12" x 18" slab of plywood on top to provide a base to screw in the legs of the sawhorse.

Final product.

I didn't measure anything very closely since it wasn't very critical, but I used a 36" length for the front and a 48" length for the rear. I made the front horse shorter than the rear to account for the different mounting point heights, but it wasn't perfect.

Once those were done, me and my garage mate lifted the body up onto the sawhorses. I am not a strong man, but that thing was very light and the two of us had no problems getting it situated onto the sawhorses as evenly as we could.

Banished to under the stairs until the proper time.

I didn't do anything to secure the rear sawhorse to the body since the cutout for the transverse spring provides a nice "pocket" for it to fit in to. Since the front mounting point is much smaller of a foot print, I used washers and wood screws to attach the front to the sawhorse just to provide some added security in case the body gets bumped.

I may go back and put another quick support under the center of the sills just in case. While I am essentially replacing the bottom 4" of the car, I'd rather it not flex on me while it's waiting.

So now I can look my next main goal in the face and assess for cleaning and repairs.

Okay, frame, you're up!

As it stands now, I intend to strip the frame completely and pressure-wash/de-grease the hell out of it. After the decades of grease and road grime are removed I'll get a better idea of any rust damage that needs to be repaired. Both front outriggers will be replaced (I have spares but they need prep and some minor repair) and I know the frame has a hole internal to the driver's side front outrigger. I did a very quick look last night and didn't find any other obvious spots, but a good clean up will verify that.

Once repairs are complete, I intend to wire-wheel the whole thing then hit it with POR-15. The option is still out there for blasting the frame and getting it powder coated, but I'm not leaning that way right now as the access to those services are not easy to come by around here (a shame I can't get my work to do it for me...we have all sorts of cool toys).

As a final note, I think last night was the first time that I had actually set reasonable goals for work and also accomplished them. I wanted to get the motor pulled and on the stand and the body off and set aside. Done and done! Hopefully I can keep it up.

Triumph Spitfire Body Removal Preparation #8 / Engine Removal #1

A bit of work today. My morning was spent at Harkness State Park in Waterford, CT attending my second (the 29th) annual British by the Sea car show. Unfortunately, the weather was not as nice as last year and threatened rain all morning. This obviously kept some cars and vendors away, but there were a few die-hards there. My favorite was a very nice 1968 TR 250. I actually talked to the gentleman who owned and restored it (it took him a 20-year process).

Self-explanatory.

He located an original, crated TR-5 motor (that's the one with mechanical fuel injection that was only sold in the UK; the TR-5 in the UK was the TR-250 over here, as best as I can figure) in the UK with a guy who didn't know what he had. He had it tuned and updated and eventually put in this car.

The mechanical part of the M.F.I is just below and behind the distributor. Can barely see it here.

The fuel injector side of the motor.

The TR-5 motor could not pass emissions regulations here in the states so it stayed over on that side of the pond while we got the carbureted version of the motor.

Lots of attention to detail on this one and out of a limited field, my favorite. Like I said, the field was very small due to the weather. I got there early, around 9:30 to try to avoid the rain and by 11:30, I had seen everything at least three times and had my lunch at the wood-fired pizza truck that was there (The Rolling Tomato; outstanding place that we eat out regularly at their brick-and-mortar place).

Perfect British weather!

And, since I couldn't resist stealing from an old Chevrolet Impala add that I remember seeing in an Autoweek magazine as a kid:

"Lord Vader, your car is ready." A step up as this is an Aston Martin, obviously.

After that, I headed over the garage to get some work done. Not much, as I didn't have my tools (I finished up moving later in the day, after I was done with my work). I did some more engine removal preparation like draining the oil...

Sometimes, when the filter won't come out...leverage is your friend.

I pulled the dynamo (generator), fuel pump and distributor as well. Though these are not required to pull the engine, they are going to get removed anyway. I didn't have the right size wrenches to pull the dynamo bracket.

I also broke away the rest of the exhaust/intake manifold bolts and tried to remove the exhaust manifold, but lack of a good cutting wheel prevented me.

Exhaust manifold removed...FMEs installed (foreign material exclusion, as we called them in the Navy).

I also removed the mounting brackets for rest of the exhaust system (I know I'm missing the bracket at the gearbox...probably another one or two along the line as well) and let it rest on the ground awaiting my sawzall to cut through the pipe.

Original? I have no idea...but it will be replaced.

Once I get the manifold separated from the rest of the exhaust pipe, it (the manifold) will come out for eventual refurbishment.

So, not too bad, but not enough. Again, the clock is ticking and I only have 12 months to get this car on the road. That 12 months will entail and engine inspection/rebuild, head rebuild/conversion to unleaded, frame strip/repair/rebuild/refurbishment, suspension rebuild, body repair and putting it all back together. Lots of work...so little time.

Triumph Spitfire Body Removal Preparation #7

Sorry if the title is a bit confusing, but it was the closest I could find to what I was actually doing.

Though I have not moved anywhere near the tools and parts that I need to the new garage yet, tonight was the first night that I got some real work done. I cannot tell you how much different a few feet around the entire car makes. I got a lot of stuff done in the tear-down department in much less time that I'm sure it would have taken me at home.

First, I wanted to get the bonnet off and put to the side. Part of this was in preparation for the body removal and part was to see if it, along with the rest of the body, would fit under the stairs that are in the back of the garage. In short, everything will fit just fine as a picture at the end will show.

Bonnet off. Note the tool box which did double-duty as a coolant collector since I forgot my catch basin.

Once I got the bonnet and the front valance (which seems to be in pretty good shape, though with the dents and dings you may expect after 50 years of life at the bottom of a low ground clearance car) off, I moved on to pulling the radiator. I forgot my oil pan so I used a HF toolbox that I brought with me (holding my temporary tools until I get the big tool box over there) to collect the coolant so that I could pull the radiator off without making a mess.

Bonnet, front valance and front bumper in their new resting place.

After that, I decided to pull the gearbox. I didn't drain it of the oil that I put in it after rebuilding it and I fought with myself if this was a good idea. However, since I don't intend on doing anything to it other than putting it back in when it's time, I figured the oil wouldn't spill during removal and didn't see any harm. Along with the gearbox, I removed the drive shaft...it had to be unbolted anyway.

Drive shaft removed. I supposed I'll refurbish and paint this, too.

Gearbox sitting under the very bottom of the steps. I used the mounting bracket to keep it somewhat level.

That's looks familiar. This time, however, the motor is coming out.

After that, I was pretty much done for the night. I did some cleaning up and re-arranging of things, but nothing significant.

My "corner" gets more populated.

Oh, I did take the door braces off the black car and bring them to see how they aligned. I knew, based on the Mk2 doors having the anti-burst fittings, the braces wouldn't fit, but I wanted to get an idea of what I need to do. The driver's side was pretty close. The passengers side, however, was pretty far off. Of course, the two-plus feet between the door hinge mount and the closure will exaggerate any difference, but this was large compared to the driver's side, which lined up within a half-inch or so. Given that the lower A-post on the passenger's side is essentially not there and there is little to no metal connecting the upper A-post with the sill, I suspect that the front area of the car is the culprit. Future me.

Something is not straight. Either the whole body is bent (bad, but unlikely) or the door hinge is not aligned (or the upper A-post).

After all of that, I wanted to make sure that the tub, once removed from the frame, would fit under the stairs. As I suspected, it will fit just fine; front to back, that is. It will stick out a bit side to side, but that's not a concern.

Perspective a bit off, but the tub will sneak right in under the steps.

I cleaned up and called it a day. Sunday is the British by the Sea Car Show. I went to this show last year, very much enjoyed it and have been looking forward to it for 364 days. Unfortunately, the weather is not looking so hot right with rain in the forecast. I will bring an umbrella, but may cut it short and find myself at the garage for the remainder of the day.

Triumph Spitfire Battery Box Installation #5-2 and Big News!

In keeping with the topic, I did a bit more work on replacing, for the second time, that portion of the top bulkhead that I was continually messing up. My welds weren't great, but they were adequate. I'm still having problems with penetration, so the welds were very proud, as the British say. I can get good consistent spot welds on the bench with practice metal of the same gauge, but not on the car. Maybe the heat dissipation of the welding bench itself it helping me out? Anyway, I did some grinding and got most of the way there.

Weld after some grinding. The upper left corner is where I need to use the Dremel so I don't do collateral damage.

I also used a Dremel grinding wheel along with a 90-degree attachment, to get in some tight spots and that worked pretty well. I can tell that it may not be that cost-effective, however, since the disc looks like it's going to get eaten up pretty quick. But, as long as I save it for those tight spots where it's really needed, I think it will be okay. I'd really wish I had a compressor so that I could use an air-driven die grinder. Of course, based on current developments, I think I'm going to get my wish (yes, that's a tease)!

I also wrapped up the multi-post saga of the Rimmer Bros' sheet metal parts. The sheet metal shipped from the UK, in one big box, on Monday. FedEx attempted to deliver it yesterday (yes, two days) around 10am, but no one was home to sign for it. (Rimmer's had designated it to require an indirect signature). So, I signed the door tag and it was delivered today around 10am. One corner of the box had taken a pretty good shot and was starting to tear open, but the sheet metal inside was just fine. I would have like to have seen a bit more care taken in packaging, like sharp corner protection or just more internal padding, but everything arrived without any damage. All in all, I paid $849.09 for everything and, including shipping, saved just about $400 over buying them domestically.

My concern of import fees never materialized, though I'm not sure if it was because I only ordered sheet metal or if this goes for everything. I've never seen import fees mentioned on my favorite forum when people have talked about ordering from Rimmer Bros, so there's that. I would definitely buy from them again, especially during a sale and also given the fact that it took a few days less to get it from Rimmer Bros then it does from my usual suppliers over here (though you do pay more for shipping as a whole, of course).

I shudder to think how much work I'm looking at in this picture. But isn't it beautiful!

So, now for the big reveal! Many, many posts ago I had mentioned that a guy that I worked with and I were talking about going in together on renting a garage so we could both have more room to work on our respective projects. Well, he called me on Monday and said he had found a place that he thought would work and, to make a long story short, Dorothy now resides in her new home.

Backing up to the new garage. There are offices up top and 20x40 bays on bottom. We have one of the bays.

We would have both rather had some more overhead room as he has a lift that he can get his hands on, but there was nothing available in our price range within a reasonable distance to our homes. So, we took what we could get and now I can weld and grind and sand and make a general mess and a lot of noise without being overly concerned about messing up my own house or upsetting the neighbors! Over the next several days I will slowly move stuff over there and outfit my corner of it the way I want.

Along with his cars (a Mazda RX-7 and two 240Zs (the one you see below and the one that he's restoring), he is bringing a 60-gallon, two-stage air compressor, a drill press, a steel workbench with nice big vice and various tools to the garage so between the two of us, we should be pretty much set with everything we need. He also has a 220-volt welder, but I think my 120-volt will suffice for what I need.

About half-way in, looking back. Dot's on the left and that's a 240Z rolling chassis (his) with my sheet metal on top.

This changes my plan of attack somewhat. I am no longer going to finish up the battery box but instead get started on building a body dolly and proper supports for the door frames. Once those are done and properly put together, the body is coming off and put under the stairs out of the way. I'm then going to strip the frame down, including pulling the engine and gearbox (again), replace both outriggers (I have new-to-me old ones already that also require minor repair) and fix anything else that needs it, get it painted (not sure if I will just do POR-15 or go all the way with a Signal Red powder coat) and then start putting it all back together, renewing rubber and other critical parts as I go (like the brake and fuel lines). I've already purchased a lot of this stuff and now it looks like it will finally be time to put it to use.

I agreed to split the cost of the garage with him for a year and the landlord gave us a month free...just because he likes what we are doing. While that gives me what seems like a lot of time now (end of next July), I'm sure in 6 months I'll wonder where the time went. While the cost was acceptable, it was not cheap and the boss will not be happy to have me come begging for more time (and money). I therefore have some serious motivation. As usual, I'll keep the four of you informed of my progress!

All tucked away in her new home-away-from-home.

And, after exactly (to the day!) 19 months, I can once again walk straight across my garage without walking around Dot.

Triumph Spitfire Battery Box Installation #5-1

You may notice the title is "5-1". This means that I'm still sort of on the #5 post's topic, but didn't quite make enough progress to call it #6. Hence, "5-1".

I really need to slow my a$$ down and practice some more welding or I'm going to run out of car! I understand that butt welding is the hardest weld to do. Add on top of that the fact that I'm welding thin body panels and that makes it even harder. Add on top of that the whopping 1 hour of welding time that I have and...a recipe for disaster.

Blow through as far as the eye can see.

I cut that piece out and tacked in a new piece...again...and stopped. At least I didn't blow through this time.

New piece tacked in. I'm "peace-ing out" at this point, as the kids say these days.

I only got a few hours to work on the car today. I went for a good long run early on and then cooked the boys breakfast. After that, the honey-do list had some yard work to do that involved pulling out two nasty old pine shrub-trees things in front of the house. The things were hideous and have been with us since we bought the house 6 years ago. I cut them down and dug up the stumps. Thankfully, it turned out to not be as bad as I thought it was going to be, but still sucked up a few hours.

Along with putting in new metal (twice), I drilled out the two thousand pop rivets the PO had put in to secure the metal patch in the driver's side foot well and pulled that out. All sorts of stuff going on in there. Metal, fiberglass, bondo (I think) and lots of rust, dirt and grease/grime. Not pretty.

The sheet metal "patch".

After patch removal. There is still some fiberglass and resin in there.

I don't think the fiberglass was allowed to cure when the metal patch was put on since it was almost wet and still smelled like fresh resin. Very surprising to smell that given the fact that I've had the car almost two years and the PO had it probably another three since his grandfather had done any work on it.

I also drilled the spot welds out of the driver's side bonnet locating bracket and pulled that one off. This one was in much worse shape, as I mentioned in a previous post.

Wire brush to locate spot welds. No idea what that green stuff is the PO used.

Bottom view showing the break through of the metal.

Top view...a bit more obvious damage.

Fortunately, I have the two from the black car that are in fine shape (they don't make these anymore). Otherwise that was about it. There is a little league baseball game tomorrow (I got out of today's) that I will attend but I should be able to get some welding practice in after, if not before as well.

Triumph Spitfire Battery Box Installation #5

Yes, #5 and I'm still not done. As a matter of fact, I took a rather big step backwards, but more on that later.

I always give my wife grief when she says "I went to Kohl's today and bought this nice so-and-so. It was on sale for $60 when it's normally $100, so I saved $40!" "No, hon, you didn't save $40, you spent $60," I normally reply. Then I get kicked or punched or something like that.

Last night, though, I took the "spend money, save money" approach and I ordered the sheet metal that I mentioned in my last post from Rimmer Brothers in the UK while their 15%-off all Triumph parts was still going (it ends on the 22nd).

After it was all said and done, I got both floor pans, both floor cross-members, both outer sills (the OEM ones), an inner sill and inner sill strengthener (I already had the passenger's of both), and the passenger's lower A-post for $854, including shipping (~ $135).

To source those parts domestically (everyone runs at about the same prices), it would have cost me $1214 without any shipping charges (though most places give you free shipping for an order of that dollar amount). That's a savings of $360, or 30%.

Some domestic parts houses run regular sales, of course. However, I've been watching prices on this stuff since I bought the car almost two years ago and I've never seen them match the non-sale Rimmer's prices. Rimmer's also had all of this stuff in stock when I ordered, something that can't be said for all of the domestic places.

At the end of the day, was it worth it? For $360 - absolutely. Realize, of course, that I had already made the decision that I was going to buy these parts...it was just a matter of when and from whom. But, I won't give the final thumbs-up until the parts are on my door step and all of the import/custom fees are taken care of (I'm not sure how much these will be, if anything...crossing fingers!).

Getting back to that pesky battery box, I intended to fill some pin holes with the welder to wrap it all up before priming and then welding in the box itself.

Black circles are the areas that need to be filled.

Unfortunately, in my repair I had unknowingly become too aggressive with the flap disc and had thinned out the metal. As a result, when I applied the heat from the MIG welder, it blew right through and I was unable to correct it.

The attempted repair, after grinding.

While I probably could have kept at it and eventually been successful, I'm sure when I went to plug weld the battery box in, I would have blown through again and this time the repair would not have been as easy to attempt. I decided that discretion is the better part of valor and accepted my failure, cut out another section (smaller than the original, so I guess that's progress!) and will try again.

The new cut out to be replaced.

This time, instead of a flap disc, I intend to use a grinding wheel attachment on my Dremel. I couldn't find them locally so I ordered them from Amazon and they should be here on Sunday. I'll give a report when I learn how they turn out but in the meantime I should be able to get the new piece welded in.

That was about it for the battery box. There are baseball games to attend both Saturday and Sunday so my work time will be limited. There is rain in the forecast, however, so maybe one will be rained out and I'll have some time available after all.

I also worked on removing the floor cross-members because I wanted to see if I could save them or not. In short, no, I couldn't. Maybe someone more gifted then I could have, but I decided to include a pair in my Rimmer's order.

Top view of the cross-members. Not too bad.

Bottom view of the cross-members. Not too good!

The swiss cheese of the driver's side floor, after removal of the PO fiberglass patch. Note the pop-riveted sheet metal up front.

Passenger's side floor pan, under cross-member. Yuck.

Given the condition of the floor pans, this also put me over the edge to order new ones of those, too, though I was already pretty sure I needed to anyway.

Having ordered all of the new sheet metal, the amount of stuff to take from the black car has gone down considerably. There are still a few things that I want to get off of it, however. Namely, the upper A-post on the passenger's side since a small portion of Dot's is rusted through.

A picture from before I bought her. And I thought this was the worst spot at the time...silly me!

I also want to get the heel board bracket assemblies. These are pretty stout parts as then serve as the transition piece between the body and the radius arms...essentially a body mounted suspension part. While Dot's appear to be okay, there's some rust converter and obvious rust on them. The black car's look to be in better shape overall. I quick trip out back with the Sawzall will make short work of those items, I'm sure.

Triumph Spitfire Battery Box Installation #4

To start with an aside, I took delivery of a new inner sill and inner sill strengthener for the passenger's side of the car from a guy on my favorite forum (or at least its buy/sell & trade forum). While this is a small portion of what I will need to replace, it's a start. I'm really close to dropping a lot of money at Rimmer Bros. to take advantage of their 15% off sale on ALL Triumph Spitfire parts.

Rimmer Bros is a large parts house in the UK. They have some parts that you can't get over here and their prices are generally cheaper, but the shipping gets you. Take for example the sills (or rockers for us Americans) that are commonly rusted out. To purchase them from state-side parts suppliers costs about $120. This same part (the Steelcraft part distributed by British Motor Heritage) is only ~$105 from Rimmer Bros. If you put the shipping on that, however, it's essentially a wash. But, Rimmer's is now having a 15%-off sale for all Triumph parts. With 15% off, the sill is now ~$90 and, magically, shipping kind of becomes free.

Adding up the worst case of what I will need, I'm looking at ~$710 in new sheet metal (again, this is with the sale). This gets me both floor pans, both cross members, both outer sills, the driver's side inner sill and strengthener and the passenger's lower A-post (Dot's is essentially MIA). To price this out from domestic suppliers, I'm looking at almost double that...~$1300. Very tempting.

Okay, enough of that. I did get some more work on the battery box done today and I also cut apart a bit of the black car to try to salvage some sheet metal. This time, it was the two front mounting brackets that go under the forward, outer edges of the floor pans. They are pretty thick (maybe 10 ga) steel brackets that provide a solid mounting point for the front edges of the tub, through the floor pan, to outriggers on the frame.

A bit fuzzy, but I'm talking about part 3, right above this text.

They weren't pretty, but they are in solid shape. I have to remove the remaining old floor pan and random replacement metal the PO (of the black car) welding in there, but that salvage saved me about $50!

A bit hard to tell everything apart here, but the brackets are the thicker pieces of metal with the bolt hole in them.

The corner, cut out obviously, where the brackets were. That's the high-beam switch in the driver's foot well.

I was also working on removing the passenger's A-post in hopes that I could use that, but it is rusted out in the same spot that Dot's is towards the bottom. So, while the top is in better shape, the bottom is just as bad and I think I'll be better off with new.

After I got that all wrapped up, I moved on to battery box work (finally!). You may remember way back in my first post of this endeavor that I had cut the spot welds, unintentionally, of some of the top bulkhead while removing the old battery box. I had intended to just plug weld it back in but made a new piece (out of the old boot lid) instead since the original had quite large holes in it relative to its width.

Pretty exciting, huh? This was easy to make and I drilled 3/16" holes about a inch apart for the plug welds.

I used the zinc weld-through primer for the underside of the piece and got is set in place.

Piece set in place, ready to plug weld.

The contact points of the clamps that I have are not skinny enough to fit in between the overhang lip of the top bulkhead and the front bulkhead so I had to use magnets to hold it in place and I pressed down on the piece as I tacked it in.

Magnets from below.

Welded in. Ground down about half of it in this picture. You may also notice the tack welds on the other part in the background.

After I got that in and ground down, touching up welds as required, I went back to continuing the tack welds on the rest of the top bulkhead. I got almost all of it done but still need to grind down some welds to make sure I haven't left any holes.

A round of tack welds after they've been ground down. You can see several holes and missed spots.

Another round of tack welds, before any grinding.

If I haven't warned you on the power of the flap disk, let me say it now. Those things will just eat metal up. You have to be very careful of collateral damage while using a flap disk. The disk I was using is 60-grit and I am going to invest in 120-grit to see if they are a bit more gentle. I thinned out some portions a bit too much while trying to grind down the welds. Unfortunately, I don't have a compressor so a nice, small air die grinder is not in my tool box.

I did some additional grinding to get the battery box to sit as flush as I could, including some grinding on the battery box itself (the outside edge needed some trimming). While I doesn't sit flush by any means, it does sit in there. I'll go back with a hammer and dolly and get the opening as flat as I can and then work on the battery box to get that formed to fit. Hopefully, when I'm all done, there will not be any gaps and I'll have a good solid fit to weld.

She fits!

Well, mostly. Need some metal bending here.

And here. The box comes flat so you have to flare the back side of it no matter what.

Once I get the battery box fit snug, I'll drill several holes and get it plug welded in. Then, the supports need to get plug welded in and the task will be done. I did get them cleaned up and ready to go back in today, but didn't take any pictures. I removed those with the spot weld cutting tool, so the holes in those are rather large with a lot of metal to fill during the plug weld. I think some practice is in order.