Fixing the body

Air filter and radiator frame

Before the body was bolted up, the air filter and radiator frame had to be secured in place. Getting the bits in place was a challenge. Ideally you should do this whilst you have help. I didn't!

The body needed lifting up a bit at the front to create some space. Blocks of wood, some cloth to pad it out and a trolley jack came in handy. Once I had lifted the body about a couple of inches, the radiator frame was fed in through the radiator opening and secured in place with the four bolts.

I fed the filter in through the radiator aperture, then attached the stainless steel tube from the engine compartment. To get the filter fitted I slid the large hoses back onto the stainless steel tube, then moved them forward onto the filter and throttle. This allowed the tube to be connected between the filter and the throttle easily.

Air filter tube attached to throttle and filter

The air filter is simply held in place with the silicone tubes, clips and the body!

Fixing the body

Starting with the fixings nearest to the engine and front bulkhead, the body was jiggled to pull them together so that there was no gap between the bulkhead and the mounting. Initially this was a 5+ mm gap.

Gap between mounting and bulkhead

To achieve this a sturdy piece of wood was used as a lever between the rear wheel arch (inside) and the tyre. I had Matthew at the front to pull the shell forward at the same time. The body shell was jacked up to help align the holes.

Gap between mounting and bulkhead closed

Whilst keeping pressure on the wooden lever, the greased bolt, spring and penny washer was inserted into the hole and tightened. Not a one person job and a lot easier to write about than do! This was repeated at the other side.

Body bolted to chassis at bulkhead

The bolts must not go through the mount to touch the chassis, otherwise you may get squeaking when it is driven. Not something a GD should do! Here I shortened the bolts by a millimeter or two. An alternative is to add another washer.

Other holes required a little easing/elongating with the Dremel to allow the bolts to fit easily. I had to stand in the body to seat the shell on the mountings in some cases. In others, I had to jack up the body a little.

Two bolts shown in place

Six bolts were fixed through the body holes into the mountings on the chassis around the transmission tunnel (one turned the insert on the mounting). A further four secured the inner wings to the chassis (one I couldn't get to bite at all). Care was taken not to get any debris into the threaded part of the mounting where these had to be enlarged. Here a vacuum cleaner was used at the same time to clear any debris. If any GRP dust had been allowed to get in the threads, then the bolt may have seized and caused the centre insert to turn in the mounting (off side transmission tunnel bolt?) and would have stopped the bolt being tightened.

The last two bolts were in the boot and fitted into the mountings on the rear of the chassis. Here holes were not pre-drilled, so had to be located and then drilled. This is where the measurements marked in the boot, prior to lifting on the body, came into their own. The mounting holes were located by drilling small pilot holes 25 mm up from the boot floor on the pre-marked lines. Once I knew that  these were at the correct location, they were opened out to 8 mm and penny washers added to pack out the small gap (1 on the offside and 2 on the nearside).

The two mounting bolts in the boot

When all the remaining bolts were inserted and fitted freely, then they were tightened up.

I now have 10 out of the 12 bolts in place, however I need to sort out the other two. Hopefully it is not a body off job to sort out!