Floorpan not so good

My respiratory system showed no unusual effects after Wednesday's session. Today was all about finishing; removing the last of the goo and paint and the usual wash and metal prep cycle, maybe even a coat of POR-15 paint.



I tried using a scrub pad in combination with acetone, without much success. What did work well was to spread a "clean" rag flat, soak it with acetone, wait a minute then move it around just a bit, working the wet down into the goo. That plus some scraping on the thick spots and slowly it came off.

When the goo was gone I used a flap disk in the 4" grinder to remove most of the paint and some light corrosion. To finish off the last bits I switched to a wire brush in a die grinder.



I was working on a rough spot with the die grinder when the brush broke through a spot, and underneath was all rust. The only way to be sure it gets taken care of is to remove the repair panel floor pan. Good news, if it can be called that, is that it is pop riveted in. I can't wait to see what's lurking underneath.

I did finish with a POR-15 clean and prep, if only to prevent any more damage.

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Ripping out old carpet

 

I will not be surprised if my asthma acts up tonight, or if my allergies go haywire. I pulled out a bunch of old carpet from the passenger's side of the E9 today. Filthy, rotten carpet. The bottom layer actually looked original, which would make it 38 years old. Dust. Mildew. Candy wrappers from my kids when they were in elementary school, which was, say, fifteen years ago.

It was not my plan to remove the carpet. I started out to work in the engine compartment, where I need to weld in a patch along the gutter by the rear RH corner. To do that I needed to check what was behind the panel. That was behind the glove box, so that had to come out. Except the glove box hinge was blocked by a pile of old carpet.

I had no idea the carpet had been glued to the floorboard. The mystery glue looks like creosote; hard, tacky, sticks to skin and hard to wash off. Softened by naphtha, better removed with acetone and a wire brush. The brush breaks off tiny balls which dry and can be vacuumed. I must have wasted an hour removing this stuff and the job is still unfinished. It has to come off for the POR-15 to stick.


The floor pan and part of the firewall have been replaced using galvanized steel, which appears to be in good shape. The edges were smoothed with some kind of filler, which has dried and shrunken considerably. That has to be re-done. Even the new floor has a few small rust holes, so it will get a layer of fiberglass as part of the POR-15 process.


I did remove the glove box. The inboard support still had the original pin and snap ring, but the outboard support was a bolt and nut. Only two lag bolts attached the hinge even though there are holes for three. Had to disconnect the light wires.

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RH nose, air dam, almost ready

My goal for the day was to duplicate on the right side what I had done on the left, namely bring the repairs to a close and put down a coat of real paint to block moisture as I continue working elsewhere. This does not mean the area is finished and ready for paint. More like ready to start wet sanding as prep for paint.

Well, I didn't get that far. There are some tricky spots remaining. Most notably a deep groove along the joint between the panel beneath the grill opening and the air dam, caused by a fiberglass patch. In the close-up pic it is below the black fiberglass patch in the center of the pic. I got as far as being ready to apply filler but was out of time. Hopefully I'll do that during the week.

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LH door off, LH nose painted

Had a good day today. The kind of day where everything just works. Finished everything I planned to do with time to spare, so I had a relaxed lunch with my wife.

I bounced back and forth between painting the nose ... what I wanted to do last week ... and removing the LH door.



I used a #6 metric hex wrench on that special hinge bolt, and to get better grip I cleaned off the paint with a small, pointy wire brush in a die grinder. Came out easy.

On the RH side the door window motor ground wire on the inboard end was attached to the frame with a screw. On the LH side things were different. The original ground wire was extended with a sliced in section, then went to a multi-terminal ground point which was not connected to anything. Odd.



Wiped down the nose with acetone, applied two coates of acid etch primer, them two coats of white finish paint. This area is not finished, I just want to keep moisture out.

Next week I need to get the RH nose to the same level of completeness and disassemble the LH door.

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Door Skins, day 1

I never got around to writing last week's blog. On Saturday night we attended the 50th anniversary concert of the Hawaii Gagaku Ensemble, and Sunday was taken up by a long bike ride. It's been busy.




Last week was unusual in that the shop was full to overflowing. My E9 was overshadowed by a row of trucks.





Smoothed out the Epoxy Filler applied to the RH corner last time.





Underside of LH grill opening after grinding down the excess POR-15 from the fiberglass patch. To be filled in with TECHNIFILL.





This is to remind me to work on the RH side.






RH corner after shooting with POR-15 Etching Primer.






The bump in the middle of the curved is a weld seam from when the car was made, or old repairs. Cannot get that any lower.






Last thing done was to apply TECHNIFILL on the underside of the LH grill opening.


It's been a couple weeks now since I started looking for door skins. So far the most promising source has been Classic Heros, an English shop specializing in BMWs. Hey, they use an E9 on their web site, so they must be okay. I got a nice reply from Barney Halse saying they probably have them in stock, but he was out of town on vacation. I worry that the shipping will exceed the purchase price.








Now the the nose is just about done I decided it was time to make a big step forward, so today I focused on getting ready to fix the doors. Step 1, remove the inner panel on the RH door. Remove the latch handle, then the arm rest. The book described clips around the edge, but mine had screws. Typical old BMW shop manual.








Found the connector for the window motor in a recess behind the kick panel. Also found a lot of light surface rust, which I will need to treat. The two hot wires were easy, just a couple of push-on terminals connected to a large plastic block. The ground wire was another story. First, it was loose. The connector is a ring terminal attached to the frame with a screw. The screw has not been tightened, possibly because it is next to inaccessible, but it is now rusted solidly in place. I ended up cutting the wire ... I would never put it where it was. This might explain why I had a ground problem with the door windows.






I lost a lot of time fiddling with that ground wire, but I was determined to get the door off. I call it "visual progress." I ran into a stone wall when I discovered the FWD upper hinge bolt does not have a standard hex head. It looks like a Torx head, but my Torx tool did not fit tight enough to turn it. That was my day.