One of the crappier jobs on a restoration. I did conduct a bit of a test, comparing kerosene, WD 40 and using heat. From what I could tell, WD 40 worked better than kerosene and heat worked way better than WD 40. A mapp torch worked better than a heat gun too (make sure you know what's on the back side of the panel you're heating up. A little mineral spirits and steel wool should clean up the rest. YMMV.
TR4?
Good eye - 1963 solid axle. Trying to do a budget driver rehab.
Looks like you're well on your way with a pretty good foundation to start with. Down the road you might want to convert to tube shocks in the rear--although they're stiffly sprung, so, not a real concern now. I do know an old trick to "rehab" them was to fill them with straight STP. Killer steering wheel!
Was in the same family for the last 30 years. It's had a few patches and bruises over the years. some good fixes, some not so good. The worst have been pop riveted patches over the sills. New ones are on their way. Floors and trunk look good. Every nut and bolt is putting up a good fight so far.
Are you going to use "english" fastners or go SAE with replacement hardware? My 67 Spitfire drove me nuts trying to find proper nuts and bolts back in '76....and then there was which size wrench would fit....So, if you're staying OE, where are you getting the fastners?
A basic "one-owner" for 30 years. That's impressive, and says a lot about the family.
I'll go SAE on most stuff - I may spring for the moss fender hardware if it's not too big of a hit to the budget (trying to keep it at 1500). Definitely not a concours type of rehab - mainly going for functional and decent looking. I may do a few Kas Kastner mods like camber gain adjustments and add the "octopus" for better oiling.
Very cool project, this. If you farmed everything out to a restoration shop, you could probably spend upwards of $40K, so it's neat to see how far you can go on a much, much smaller budget. I bet yours'll drive just as good as the 'big dollar' restored car.
Also, didn't realise they had front disks. Was that standard?
I will be at that stage sometime soon with the fiat. I heard Dry ice works well too
I feel your pain. That was the worst part of restoring my TR6. I tried kerosene and WD40 as well, but settled on a propane torch and scraper in a well ventilated area. When a bit of that melted goo lands on exposed flesh, it hurts like hell. For the sheets stuck on the interior surfaces, cold and some gentle hammering/scraping works pretty well.
Luke wrote: Also, didn't realise they had front disks. Was that standard?
Triumph started using front disk brakes standard on TR3s around 1957.
mad_machine wrote: I will be at that stage sometime soon with the fiat. I heard Dry ice works well too
Dry ice works very well. You still need to hammer and scrape, but there is no issues with outgassing - other than the CO2. However, you need to let the dry ice rest on the area to work on. This is easy on a chassis rotisserie - few people have one of those.
dry ice works best on a horizontal surface---I typically do a little cold and a little heat and then a little solvent action at the end.
ok.. now that we know how to remove it..
what do we recommend to replace it with? My problem is living along the atlantic ocean. Everything eventually rots here due to the salt air.. any body recommend an undercoating that is not the cheapo crap in a spray can?
Epoxy primer and two-part bedliner
It gets epoxy primer - no heavy undercoating - the bag of crud weighed in at 56 lbs. If I were spending more and thinking street, I might go with something like lizard skin or the bedliner route.
It is not in the nature of undercoating to be removed. It is simpler to get an uncoated car from a part of the country that thinks undercoat is the fine hair on a dog or cat.
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