Uneconomical to repair!

Anyone who has ever taken on an old Range Rover Classic or a Discovery will be sure to know all about the tales of woe, and how some folk actually believe black silicone is an effective repair over a welded repair, I think I have born witness to many bodges over the years and never in my life have I encountered so many that involve that most inconspicuous of products that most of us welders use for seam sealing, black silicone.

I will get back to the black silicone in a minute, here is the last plate welded into the back of the drivers side sill.





And here are some pics of the patched up front inner wing on the drivers side.





All done and tidy

The last piece of the puzzle now, oh boy!!!

This is the bit where you will now understand the rant over black silicone :evil:



Yes that was a bit of tin stuck in the hole and no I was not happy to find it!!! Bit of tin pulled out and oh my.....



So time to get busy with the flap wheel and see what becomes of the rest of it, by the way, this is not good from my point of view as this is now far exceeding my time allowance for this project and yes the black silicone has reared it's ugly head again.



Not 100% on how I am going to tackle this bit and need to sort out my game plan and see what is going to be the best, quickest and above all, the safest option to get this repaired.

Thanks for looking in as we draw ever closer to completion.

good on you for reparing the landy

looks fab so far - the finished bits - hope those last bits are do-able

dieseldog69 said:

Not 100% on how I am going to tackle this bit and need to sort out my game plan and see what is going to be the best, quickest and above all, the safest option to get this repaired.

Thanks for looking in as we draw ever closer to completion.

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Those last areas photographed there are probably some of the most awkward bits to fix on a Discovery. When I did mine I did use the wheel arch repair section on one side, the other side had a good arch but the bit your showing there was rotten so I think I cut it all back, then welded in a big plate with a hole in it for draining. The underseal is a pain as it stinks as you grind/weld it.

Wonderful work. Wish you lived near me.

Bringing this up to speed and to a close.

We saw the rot in the wheel arch, and the C pillar, well time to cut it all out and get some new metal welded in there



Chop chop and all that.



Bzzzz, Bzzzz as I weld in a new section of steel to rid the rot.



Looks better but has to be fnished off nicely cue flap disc and P40.



Now time to re-create the post bottom and inner arch.

No pics of how bad it was but think the repair will give an idea!











Don't poke it, it looks solid enough, well, actually this was a previous repair that was nothing more than a patch stuck over the top of the rusted out section of the outer sill, it got worse too!!!

This picture is an important one for me as it shows how bad an idea some folk have about what constitutes acceptable workmanship, I am no expert and can be taught new things daily, but look close at the build up of sand and silt inside the sill, had this been cut open fully and cleaned out and fully repaired properly, waxoyled and treated against further rust then this repair would never have been necessary, anyhoo....



I mentioned it got worse didn't I?





I had to cut a rather large lump right out of the middle of the sill between the B pillar and the body mount, see my bottle jack propping up the door post, well, that is a must have to keep it going back square, the pillar and cut open sill can drop by as much as 5cms!!!





You know how it goes, get busy with the 2mm plate and get building it back up.









Sorry no pics of it seam sealed and painted black but think you can guess wow it looked.

Final part of this helping hand was to source a brand new exhaust for this truck, old one was bodged to get by but it was BAD!!!




This is what it looked like when I had removed it from the car and dragged it out for closer inspection.

Pictures no longer available at this time.

Shocks and surprises over, lets see the new one in place shall we?







So, that concludes this helping hand session, I have put a massive ammount of time and hard work, not to mention a heck of a lot of welding fabrication and skill into making this car awesome again.

Thanks for taking the time to read and please comment, your comments make this all worthwhile.

absolutely fantastic job, I am well impressed

you work clean, and that is nice to see

nrgserv said:

you work clean, and that is nice to see

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+1

Looks like a labour of love, keep up the good work dieseldog. Black silicon and underseal are the work of Satan

Amazing work almost like metal artwork.

Nice work DD, though this is a repost of something you've already posted isn't it? Either that or my déjà vu is really coming on...

Saltlick said:

Nice work DD, though this is a repost of something you've already posted isn't it? Either that or my déjà vu is really coming on...

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Complete LZ thread instead of it being lost as a post in someone else' thread

Ahh good, thought I was going mental again.. :bolt:

Hats of to you, labour of love is what keeps these things from the scrap heap
top job :clap2::clap2:

If we were in the pub now it would be I ####in love you man time

Amazing work, what's the next project going to be?!

I doff my cap to the OP.

Great thread. Thx for sharing. It makes my little patch look quite innocent

Great work. I wish I had a fraction of your skill

@ DieselDog - I salute you.... the work you've done there would be monumental if it were your own vehicle, its even more epic given its a customers vehicle, but given the "customer" isn't paying you for your services - your doing this "pro-bono" - words fail me other than to say you should get a medal for doing that.