2118 replies to this topic

[wot179]

My suggestion is to zip the UC dash out with a grinder, then carefully and neatly grind off the bit that's left on the windscreen aperture.

Actually grind away the back of the spotwelds and peel the remaining strip off.

You could then fuse the dash in with your TIG, edge to edge.

Plug all the drill holes in the LH dash first and sand it up so it finishes up neat.

Its just a suggestion. Im keen to see how you go about it.

[Heath]

Ahh Craig that is a damn good idea but I had already started drilling the spotwelds along the top of the dash in the car a few weeks ago. Bugger! Can still fuse it, but have a fair bit of plug welding to do too :(

What I did on the car was drill the whole way through with every visible spot weld (as the UC dash was going to scrap) and then run along under the join with sandpaper and a torch to find all of the obscured spot welds, marked them on the top and went through from the top too. After a bit of buggering around and cutting it near the pillars, I got the dash out this arvo. Still not cleaned up at the ends though.


Also cleaned up the ends of the LX dash off the car

[micklx]

Love your work Heath !

[Heath]

Yep cool. Fortunately I have a fair few Torana parts and can mix and match, but I'm sure I will have questions. One of which right now, actually.

I'm not used to UC's... this panel hanging from the plenum is not something I recognise from LH/LX? Am I losing my mind? Or is this a UC-specific thing? What's it for?

Edited by Heath, 13 January 2015 - 09:54 PM.

[Neils LX]

I haven't taken mine out yet. I'll check out my spare body's on weekend if nobody gets back to you.

[hawk]

Bonnet release cable clips onto it

[Heath]

Ah that makes sense. UC has the lever, LX has the direct-pull cable under the dash. Will examine further before deciding what to do.

[Heath]

Really struggling how to get this LX dash into the UC... do you need to bend it a fair bit?

[Heath]

I have not cut mine short, at all. It protrudes into the areas behind the door hinges, and there's no real way of getting it in. Substantially too long.

[Heath]

lol nothing is out of whack (if your firewall was outta shape, it would be fairly clear), it's simply that everyone else seems to have cut the ends of their dash on/left the ends of the UC dash in there. I carefully removed the UC dash 100% (sacrificing it in the process), and kept the LX dash 100% complete (sacrificing everything around it) not realising any of this, and now while the dash is the right size, there's no way of getting it in the hole past the kinks in the pillars and I actually bent it last night trying to get it in. 

 

Ah well. I'll have to be a little more creative.

Edited by Heath, 16 January 2015 - 10:06 AM.

[roxiedog]

Heath, mate that's an awesome neat job your doing there .its motivating me to get stuck into the uc I was gonna use for parts. Can't wait to see the finished project

[Heath]

Thanks Terry.

Feel like I haven't made much progress recently, still got my mind on the car, doing gearbox research and finishing little things that don't show up in photos much.

One of the plans was to lose the handbrake. Welded up the holes so far, but I will also be unpicking the brackets from the underside of the car etc. I want this car to be on a diet even with the heavy driveline and all the shit I'm too stubborn about to do without, so any un-necessary factory bracketry I can get rid of is good haha

Edited by Heath, 21 January 2015 - 08:42 PM.

[Heath]

Got my eye on a gearbox at the moment, but won't say too much until it happens.

To answer Toranamat69's question, I'm planning on keeping the brake lines going down the guards. I'm so used to seeing them that it just feels Torana-ish to have them. But I don't love the holes through the the tubs too much.

[wot179]

Rocol will help keep your rotary burr sharp when you finish tidying that up after you rough it in with a grinder, Heath.

I recommend a 3mm grinding disc (old style cutting disc) to gently knock the welds into shape first, brushing the wheel gently across the weld.

Concentrate on only grinding the weld and NOTHING ELSE

Slowly slowly catchy monkey.





If you put the guard back on, you can use your thumb against the top of it to help gain finer control of the grinder, too.

[Heath]

haha I have not used a 3mm wide cutting disc in a long time - do they even sell them anymore? I've been using one of those 'flexible grinding discs' with decent success, but I'd be lying if I said I'd never slid off the weld and into the sheet metal.

Sounds like good advice, though. The guard does go on for some jobs.

[Heath]

Well my mate came Groges down today to check out my work on the car and we decided that I should take the bay a little further. An hour later we had one side almost ready for welding haha
 


Used a spare bit of one of the donor front cut's inner guards as it already had a similar compound curve:

[UC308Hatch]

Looking good, went a bit further than me!!


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