Off goes the rest of the body

Since we have a perfect engine, our main objective now is to strip down the rest of the body and refurbish and repair the chassis and sand-blast and zinc it so that it'll last atleast my life time anyway!

Well the diesel tank may look nice and square there, but when we took it out, which didnt take much effort, there was a massive dent on the bottom side of it.I ve been told that were just going to weld some flat bar to the dent, and pull it out, doesn't sound too complicated does it?Its funny that when we emptied the tank there was over €70 worth of diesel in it!!

Apart from that, the chassis is actually in great nick! The front half is near enough to perfect because of all the diesel that used to fall on it, and the back half is pretty much the same. The only pace that needs some attention is the rear crossmember (the back of the chassis). I think were just going to fabricate a new one, and fill in any weak spots, sand blast the whole chassis, and then paint it with zinc.

Although this may sound perfect, its still not as good as the whole chassis being galvanised,so, in theory, our chassis could still rot from the inside out, so what were going to do is, were going to screw in two holes through the back bucket and into the chassis, and were going to have two screw caps to close them and seal them. What were going to do with these is, every so often we'll pour in old engine oil into them which will keep the inside of the chassis in perfect nick. Every time I change the oil, ill pour the old oil in, that should keep everything under control!

Theres the whole exhaust system,which Im going to replace. My plan is, to buy a mild steel exhaust system for my series 3 and galvanise it, which will save me the hassle of ever having to replace the bugger again!

Heres all the bits and pieces I took off the rear bucket before we took it off the chassis!

and of course, Id just like to point out that there are some luxuries in life, you cant do without, like this good ol burner! In the freezing cold mornings, this has kept us going!!!