1970 DORMOBILE - COMPLETE RESTO - IT PASSED :)

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pinheaduk

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Oct 9, 2007
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Location
Paignton, Devon
OK here is my new ride after selling my split i bought a early bay taxed and motd, a 1970 Dormobile. Was bought as a project with work needed in usual areas, roof needed new glass etc etc.

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IM just glad it was cheap

When i got it back home after a nice drive back in it i decided to do some repairs to the outriggers and discovered some nasties

There was more filler in the chassis than the body and they gave me recepits from the place that did the work, cannot believe they passed it off as a decent job and gave it an MOT

After a lot of scraping and using a paint stripper i got most of the filler off and wallah.

There was newspaper in the chassis with dates before and after the MOT

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and this was a new one, another gloryfying repair by the supposed garage

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lovely area to fit your rear hatch rubber :)
 
ok started to hack away at the front chassis area, i knew this was gonna be bad but WOW

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both sides, both arms rotten and ill keep saying it, this had just pass an MOT hehe

But thats why we love veedubs the work involved to them back to glory
 
ok bitch and winging over, the body aint much better but hey ho, it has a full dormobile interior

so i started on the chassis to day, decided to do the area around the cargo floor first get all chassis rebuilt, outriggers, sills etc

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nearside area was pretty bad so cut outrigger off and cut rotten area or chassis out and made some templates for the replacement steel

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tacked in place

then ground back lovely jubbly

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OK now the other side, same thing gone in the same area

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the bottom are was a bit rusty but not as bad but thought best to replace

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tacked in place to see the fit, had to move it around a bit to get it to line up with rest of chassis

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seam welded it in place once it i was happy

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then sealed and painted LOVELY STUFF

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OMG :shock: That`s a sham to say the least!!! I`m glad someone is saving it from the "cowboys" though :lol:

Well done bud good luck with it all, i`ll be keeping any eye on your progress 8)

Dormy`s are the way forward :lol:
 
i was happy with the front part or the cargo area chassis looked like it hasnt been touched which is always a bonus so i moved onto rear area, was only gone on the offside rear but was a little tricky as it was knackered around the rear torsion housing..

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so started by taking rear cargo floor area out as it was shot to shit and the crossmembers and the floor supports had seem better days

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i cut a hole for the handbrake cable to fit through but will mess with the hole when i refit the cable to make sure its a good fit

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Im happy with the finish

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Have to agree with Kempy name and shame....its one thing buying a bus from joe public with his DIY welding but a suppossed pro.... :x

Nice work there though....looks like its gonna be a good un once youve put it right.. :D
 
Once i was happy with the rear chassis area i started to put back on the outriggers, jacking points, and the floor supports and i also put the inner sills on....

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placed the inner sill on to see how the line up was before i welded everything in place

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tidy the welds up then primer to protect

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it was the first bay i have worked on where the sliding door track was absoloutely gone, and this was a nightmare to try and line up and fit, took a lot of test and fit using sliding door

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fettle fettle fettle :)
 
Nice work there chap! shame there are gits about that just filler everything :cry:
 
yeah i agree, my first bay was solid underneath and the body was wrecked but this took the biscuit, i mean some of the other restos on here are just as bad chassis wise and you wonder why we all bother hehe

and i agree dormobiles are the way forward, always had tintops and thought why not, alwasy loved the roof style and this one will be slammed and fast with a bit of luck and lots of money :)

but i keep saying to myself , why did i sell my splitty for this hehe
 
Cos early bays are better than those small splitties! :wink:
 
You're a fast worker :)

Over what period did you do the work shown as looks really good.
 
all the work shown took 4 days and the other pictures im about to post took 2-3 long days though, hardly eat just drink lots hehe
 
then decided to try and finish cargo area as well as start on rear of the bus and cover whatever came up when discovered, and columbus thought he had problems,

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http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e152/pinheaduk/107.jpg[/IMG

both rear wheel arches where repair, ground back and sealed

[img]http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e152/pinheaduk/108.jpg

started to put the cargo floor back in, where possible i saved the good areas which i cut out so there were a doddle to put back, but the replacement floor is crap as the pattern doesnt match so did the best to match it match

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same with the front saved the best bits

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thats tidy for the amount of work gone into matching the floor up it looks like the rest will be great.
 
once happy with that i moved to the rear corners and wheel arches, i knew these were bad and got the proof when i cut them out and found the original panels underneath with no spot welds just pot rivets holding outer panels on and the battery trays were the same, not welded in just held in with sealant --- whoooopeeeeeee

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rebuilt this area before putting battery trays in

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i also bought the rear corner ends from just kampers for £5 each which is a bit pricey but because i was replacing the rear wheel arches i couldnt save the seam and they were better than i thought when it came to putting rear corners on

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just placed this one on to see how high or low to go, as i would weld this to corner replacement panel before putting on van and it worked a treat

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the above picture show the small end piece which i welded to panel before welding to van, you can just see the spot welds going down the panel

another inside view

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other side

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