First job was to fit and bolt up the steel plates that I prepared and painted yesterday. I realise I forgot to put in the wood screws on the outer one, so that’s a little job for tomorrow morning.
I spent the rest of today freeing up the brass hinges on the boot doors, as I need and I want to trial fit them to check everything is in the right place before I finally fix the repair section for the boot door frame. I also spent some time considering how best to rehang the boot doors. They were just screwed to the timber frame with wood screws which turned to oxide probably a good few years ago. So I have decide to drill through the original fixing holes and mount steel plates with captive nuts inside the doors and inside the frame. To that end I ordered the required fasteners at the end of the day.
I have also just realised I passed my driving test 45 years ago today.
Work continued today on the two corner uprights at the RH side of the boot door opening. I used a coach bolt right through the perimeter rail in order to fasten the bottom of the outer pillar to the rail.
Next I made up some steel plates to reinforce the join in the outer pillar, three in all, one above the curved corner rail, one below it and one longer one for the inner face of the pillar. I drilled the pillar for the 1/4″ bolts then drilled the plates to match. I also drilled both the two outer plates for a wood screw to add an additional fixing to the pillar as they are not continuous like the inner one.
Final job of the day was to paint both with a coat of blue hammerite smooth enamel. As the plates were made from Zintec, I felt it was not worth the trouble of etch priming them especially as they are well protected in their positions.
Most of the morning was spent make minor adjustments to the corner upright pillar to ensure a good fit. Due to a materials shortage I had to add a small piece at the rear to support the inner lining of the boot space. This was screwed and glued and left to set until the end of the day when I was able to sand it to shape to match the inner pillar, just to the left, that the boot door is mounted on.
The base of the inner pillar, where it meets the boot perimeter rail was very rotten and this had extended into the perimeter rail for about an inch. I was able to remove most of this and make an infill piece to support the new inner pillar.
After lunch I modified the aluminium template for the outer pillar so that it could be used to manufacture the inner pillar. The inner pillar is quite a lot thinner in cross section than the outer but is reinforced by blocks that fit between the inner and outer pillars. Once this was made I was able to cut the new pillar for the boot door opening.
Last thing in the day I was able to screw and glue the corner pillar to the existing section but it has yet to be fixed at the base to the perimeter rail. As yet I am undecided on how to do this. I am leaning towards coach-bolting through the perimeter rail as this pillar proved additional support for the boot door pillar.
Outer corner pillar fixed at the top but not yet at the bottom,
Restoration diary of a 70-year old AEC single-deck bus and the trials, tribulations and adventures of our 1966 Bristol bus.
