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TR3 rear lower closing panel.


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P1090695tr3.thumb.JPG.7c6c9c9b6d6947745cd6b620b4381cc7.JPGFA_KA29ATR2.png.29824952565143fe87727a93beb41e22.pngI have started the restoration of my TR3 by removing the rear apron and lower inner panel. I bought a new/old stock stanpart apron from a member who had had it for years and a repro lower closing panel from a UK supplier. The repro panel does not fit but what confuses me when comparing a repro from a uk supplier and a photo of one from Bastuck, is that they are different in that the tabs that fold over for welding to the sides and boot floor face different ways.  I attach photos, which is correct.

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Hi, I'm working on the same area on my car at the moment and just had a look underneath and i can say 100% that it is the bottom one of your pictures with the flange ends going the opposite way to the main flange. just posted pictures the other day of the rear end work, luckily the car i am working on was from a dry salt free part of the USA so it's almost as good as the day it came out of the factory

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Mine is x USA but it has been in the UK since the 1990s.  Attached are photos of the Apron before and after removal. Once removed it was clear the lower inner panel had been repaired several times. The stiffeners on either side are also rotten as is the o/s quarter panel. Luckily its all coming apart easily. Welding it back together may be a different story. Another surprise is the amount of filler the complete car appears to be coated with it, inside and out.

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Edited by Phil Read
missed part of the text.
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just taken a quick break from working upside down on the rear quarter real time, i am amazed at how badly the car was spot welded at the factory, most seem to just pop off, this is useful though as it saves mangling it to get it apart, looking at your car i don't know which would be the worst to work on badly rusted or solid but dented, at least on yours you can just cut a whole piece off and replace it though getting the parts to match will take some of effort plus the price just looking at a rear panel on ebay made my eyes water, i popped a pic or two below of the area i am on now, i do have more pic's on my camera for a few more before and after photos.

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just add a few more, had to peel back the quarter closing panel to work the shape back into the end of the rear panel as you can see no problem with rust on my car just badly dented maybe it broke loose in the container in transit as all panels are dented in some way or another.

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My TR3A was in a similar state with the addition of a bit of corrosion. I put it down to American parking techniques. I ended up completely dismantling the rear end, replacing the end side filler panels and making a new rear closing panel. 

Rgds Ian

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have just removed the rear body to chassis mounting bolts on my 3A so that I can lift the body slightly to fit the inner lower inner panel. Between the body an chassis was a triangular rubber pad. I checked the parts book to order new ones but find that the parts book lists an alluminium "c" pad. Is this pad a fixed thickness and do you use only one?

 

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Phil

I had the same issue a couple of years back with UK supplied rear closing panels for my TR2 all having their edges folded in the wrong direction. 

If you complain you usually get told nobody has ever complained about them before..

Kind regards

Ade

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I am trying to line up all the panels on the rear before parching and tack welding. Unfortunately every thing only fits where it touches. One query I have is do the tubes on the lower part of the rear apron go through the holes in the lower closing panel or just but up to it?

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Just now, AJ2014 said:

Phil

I had the same issue a couple of years back with UK supplied rear closing panels for my TR2 all having their edges folded in the wrong direction. 

If you complain you usually get told nobody has ever complained about them before..

Kind regards

Ade

I sent it back and got a refund. My panel from Bastuck arrived yesterday, a bit dearer but 200% better quality.

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23 minutes ago, Phil Read said:

I am trying to line up all the panels on the rear before parching and tack welding. Unfortunately every thing only fits where it touches. One query I have is do the tubes on the lower part of the rear apron go through the holes in the lower closing panel or just but up to it?

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just had a look at mine, the tubes just poke through the hole 2 to 3 mm and then they have a weld all around the tube, looking at your picture it looks like you have yours just about right, you just need a bit of weld to finish off, by the way quite a few of the closing panels on my car do not match very well with quite large gaps, some worker at the factory even used the spot welder on them even though the panels did not pinch together leaving them un-welded and open to the weather, a very strange quality of workmanship.

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Thanks for that. Mine looks as though it has been repaired several times, there is a lot of dried red mastik in the gaps. I know it had alot of work done back in the early 90s when it was reimported. When I have all the panels somehwere near I will tack weld so I can remove the clamps and see if the wings fit before final welding.

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update on progress and a few pic's if interested, just had a bit of time this weekend to make a repair piece to the rear quarter and make those fiddly trap nuts as well, i did try to save the old flange but it was too bashed up to repair nicely and then it warped when i tried to weld the holes in the edge, there seemed to be a bit of brazing as well and the MIG just hates welding on brazing, on the rear panel the metal on the edge was very thin where it mates up to the wing i assume this is due to the pressing of the rear panel thinning the metal in the pressing prosses, this may account for the corrosion in this area with many cars,  anyway it is now tacked in place and will be finished off tomorrow.

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That is a very smart repair. You must be doing this sort of work for a living and not just Saturday afternoon. I am very impressed with the curved repair panel with captive nuts. 

Send more pictures when you have time.

Thanks Richard & B

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Thanks, it's just a weekend hobby, i did apply to Colchester collage many many years ago when they first introduced bodywork as a course but it was so over subscribed i didn't get in, though they did say apply the next year, i never did so just picked it up with trial and error, i cheated and made a steel sandwich to bend the flanges of the repair piece so i can always make another if needs be and will use again as i need to repair the rear wing edge as well.

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Hi, Thanks, not had much time this weekend to work on this area, i have made a replacement piece for the rear wing edge as that too was a bit mangled, like cheftush in his u-tube posts i also had a badly fitting wing that did not match the profile of the rear panel so cutting and replacing was possibly the better option rather than endlessly beating at the thin wing skin , at times things do go from bad to worse with too much stretching of the steel, the pictures show i have just tacked the repairs so far but i did get a bit of welding done, quite a slow job as i like to quench after each tack to stop warping, also rather than angle grinding welds i prefer to hand file welds again not to put too much heat into the steel. anyway here are some pic's and i will post some of the finished work soon.

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Pictures are great, when linked to a question you find you get lots of great advice. I need to fit a quarterpanel and do quite a bit of patching on the o/s particularly around the lower inner quarter panel, before offereing the o/s wing up.

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It looks like I need a new rear panel.... £800 approx!! I think mine is beyond saving. I've ordered a new boot floor and have already got new stiffener panels and triangular panels and closing panel. . Is there an order in which to proceed? It would make my life easier if I could just hack everything out of the way, but I'm scared to be so impetuous. 

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a bit hard to know how to proceed without a look at the car, it does depend how much you need to do on how bad it is, it would be good to post a picture or two to know how bad it is, can you do that, if the car is very bad then sometimes it is best to dismantle completely and start again and this can sometimes be easier than cutting out and repairing a large quantity of the car, looking at the tr2/3 they look quite easy to do that to and they have quite low accuracy tolerances judging by my one and that is a post TS60000 and those are supposed to be better made and more accurate than the early cars, some of the panels do not match from one side to another, i have restored a frogeye that was so badly rusted that in the end i just had to cut it in half and rebuild the two halves then weld them back onto a new floor pan and sills, it can be done with a bit of time, also taking measurements of other cars can often lead to despair as they do differ.

Edited by R.M.
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