Uwbuurman: 1978 323i polaris: almost done

[uwbuurman]

To get a good image of the part I needed I took this photograph. The rest of that beautiful new outer wheelhous is useless, apart from a little piece on the other end. But he, I can never duplicate this piece from a singel piece of sheet metal, so I’m happy with this sollution!



Old piece and donor.



Clearly this has been tempered with before…..



Dry fitting.



And welded in!

[uwbuurman]

At the rear side, I welded the outer sill to it.



Then I prepped the inner wheelhouse to go back in. Drilled the welding holes, sanded it and primered it.



A litter of vice pliers



Grinded down welds and a welded wheelhouse.





Some more hooks and ends to weld and the rear axle mount is ready to go in again!

[uwbuurman]

Friday, August 23th 2013.

I had a productive day. Before I welded in the new wheelhouse, but th inside still needed to bewelded also, in the spot where all the rust was. In this pic it’s welded already, using the welding scheme from BMW (like all my welds)



After that it was grinding time, so I can get a move on with the sill.



I had to make a new donorpiece, using a pile of rust as the mould. But I think I’ve done alright, its a straight fit!



And in the anti corrosion primer.



Welded shut.

[uwbuurman]

Sanded down and nice and red. If you look closely you’ll see the hole for the rear axle pin. This is one piece with the 2mm thick plate that you see in the rearseat. Since there is a lot of tension in that piece, I’m dry fitting. Look close and you’ll see two pop-rivets.



Inside



Then I uses some bolts to get the plate in position. The plate and mount has tob e in the exact right spot, because the rearaxle is mounted to it. So I bolted it down, since I can’t get vice pliers around it to clamp it down.

[uwbuurman]

Attached! So now I can fit the piece of floor again. It has a resonable fit, so thats great.



But before it goes in, we need to derust the other side.



Sandblasted it.



And partionally welded and clamped down. Then I ran out of welding wire, so until I bought me n new 5kg spool with copper plated wire, nothing will happen.



So I got on with the inside



Sanded down all welds on the wheelhouse



And in the Zincspray for protection. On the pic its not dry yet, but what a nice look it has to it, beeing in one colour. Can’t wait to get the car sandblasted and sprayed in epoxyprimer!

[uwbuurman]

September 12th, 2013.

Ran out of welding wire, but I found a sollution fort hat. I bought a new 5 kg spool, 0,8 mm, copperplated.



Finiched the axle mount and floor.



This is ho wit looks from the rearside. This is molten metal, welded on the other side. So the welds are goed, because there is a meltbath. So it attached good!



Besided that, I repaired some spotwelds in the side panel. Some burned thu the panel, and weren’t very nice, because of that. Grind them down and it’s all nice again.



Finished and in the zincspray. I’m very pleased that this f*cking job is done. Needed to sorted, but it was a hell of a job.




The inside of the wheelhouse looks like this. The black dots are spots where some extra spotwelds will be.

[uwbuurman]

Having this job done, I want to work from the rear to the front, finishing all the details. Finish all the ugly welds. I started with a job I postponed a few times. The edge of the boot, the rear panel. You can’t work with a lot of big powertools in these little corners, so it’s gonna be a painstakingly slow proces.

Startsituation:





Then comes a lot op grinding, welding, grinding again, closing new holes and sanding. Over and over and over again.

[uwbuurman]

In the meanwhile:



And ready:



And zincsprayed:







Time ran out today, so one of 4 corners will be finished another time.

[MortenM]

Impressive work!
I restored a 2002 in almost the same way a few years ago,and i know what a huge amount of work(and money) it is.
Thank you for saving an E21 from the scrapyard.

[uwbuurman]

Thanks man! Still have the 02? I love your 323i with all that history to go with it!

[MortenM]

No i sold the 02 two years ago. I never finished it,but i did all the rust repair. Restoring an old house and having two small kids was enough for me.
So,hang in there.

[uwbuurman]

Sounds familiar! Will do!

[uwbuurman]

Sunday October 20th 2013.

The rear end of my 323i is nearly done. Son ow its for the details and when those are sorted, I can get started on the floor. I’m looking forward tot hat, but first those damn details….

Right side of the bootfloor is finished.



And I spotted some spots to improve. And so I did.



Rear panel aswell

[uwbuurman]

Some more spotwelds, because I wasn’t satisfied on the way the two wheelhouseparts were joined.



And grinded down



The reinforcementstrut welded.



Rearseat backrest attached again:

[uwbuurman]

And than, when you think you’ra almost ready… I glanced at the exhaust mount. Old work from Brovë, so never to be trusted… This bracket is made out of two brackets, just fiddled together, not even lined out, in height or width. So I took the grinder. Again. Let’s go for pretty.



And there you are. Rotten underneath. A mess.





Rust cutted out.





So i made me a new piece.





Welding, gringding, finishing, this chassisbar is as good as new!



Than the bracket itselve. It needed repairs before I could replace it. First steps: cleaning and add some metal.



Next step: make it to size and shape it.



And tacking it to the car.



And yet another evening has gone by, just doing little chores that won’t help me in the total, but in the end give me a very rustfree car. And the list gets shorter as I go on!