Lancashire GTL

[barnfind]

I haven't posted on here for many a year and alas for the last few years I haven't had a 4 to post about. A few of you may remember that I restored (with some help) a TL some time ago, which needed more than just a chassis overhaul, more like a complete rebuild with quite a few areas returned to iron oxide and even more turned into fresh air! Nevertheless I persevered and eventually ended up with a nice cream car (below) with a good seventies brown interior and relatively few miles on the clock.

Alas other commitments meant that I was persuaded at some point by a local dealer to sell this and the car was eventually bought by a gentleman who I believe took it back to the land of its fathers. This act I have often regretted, but with a couple of other classics, (below)

a stiff workload and a few family matters, I put aside any ideas of another heavy restoration and hung up my mig welder for the time being.
However, I have recently retired, and now have the time for another project. My wife suggested a 2CV, and it was a logical progression from this to another R4.
So I've done it, I have bought a late red GTL, which appears to be in decent condition, and intend to do a full body off job on it. I have no doubt that some rust will be revealed by the stripdown, but hey, it can't be any worse than the TL (can it?)
On the body front the car has little visible rust, but a battered rear nearside wing , so if anyone has a decent one of these that they fancy parting with, then do get in touch.

I don't actually get the car for a couple of weeks as yet, so there will be nothing to report for the moment, but I will be revisiting the R4 Garage Website to try and recall all of the dormant knowledge that I accumulated when doing my original car.

 

[Cornish4]

Great to hear that you are back in the R4 scene, you know it makes sense. Looking forward to following your restoration barnfind.

Regards Brian.

 

[jjad]

Good decision! Looking forward to seeing photos.

 

[barnfind]

Good to find you all still here. Car arrives next week, so watch this space.

 

[barnfind]

Well the car arrived the other day under a blazing sun and now sits in my garage awaiting attention.


There is always that moment of uncertainty if you buy a car largely on the basis of a series of photographs (although I have previously been lucky when doing this), when the car eventually arrives. However first impressions are very good. The car appears quite straight and tidy and carries its years well. The paint is fairly faded and has a sort of eggshell finish rather than a shine, but that doesn't worry me since it implies a degree of honesty in its condition. The inside isn't too bad, the door cards are okay, although some of the fastenings will need a review. Front seats are worn, if anyone has a decent pair of front seats in the GTL fabric, then please get in touch, otherwise they will be re-covered. Dash trim is grubby but will clean up. The moon roof leaks slightly and will be reconsidered. Ideally I would like to fit a Webasto type roof at some point when funds permit, but in the meantime, I will overhaul the existing installation. The car also has a towbar which will be useful for a small trailer and as a mounting point for a cycle carrier.

The car wings appear fairly rust free, but the rear wings have both had multiple dents knocked out of their rear corners and are a bit wavy. They could probably be improved, but for the amount of effort needed it will be more straightforward to replace them. The fronts appear okay and I will probably try and retain them, since I have had problems in my previous restoration with the fit of aftermarket items. Oddly, the nearside rear wing appears to have had its fastenings removed at some point down both vertical flanges, although it remains firmly stuck with sealant. The other side has rivets in place of self tappers down the vertical flanges.

Doors appear okay, with a couple of dents in one of the rears. Bonnet has a couple of shallow dents but they will smooth out. Under the bonnet, the bulkhead and inner wings appear in decent order with no visible rust.

Rust: Well there is some. The bottoms of the C posts have some corrosion, so I am prepared for some rust in the top of the underlying chassis when I pop the body off. There is also some crustiness in the mounting flanges for the rear wing, mainly internal. There is a plate in the floor pan, a couple around the rear seat belt mounting and another on one of the rear chassis members, albeit neatly done. I will report on the remainder of the chassis and floor pan when it is exposed, but I am hopeful that it is generally in much better condition than my previous TL.

The rear tailgate has a diagonal crease in it, but the car comes with a complete and almost perfect replacement which will be substituted.

What next?

Well a stripdown, culminating in the removal of the body from the chassis. Dealing with any rust in the chassis and then painting/treating it in order to make it as future proof as possible. A makeover of the body with new rear wings, local welding and new paint. Interior, a good scrub with either new front seats, or covers, some improvements to door cards, probably some sound insulation and new front mats. I won't be aiming for a concours job, just a nice tidy example that I can drive around without fear of it getting dirty, or rusting away prematurely.

Anyway, first job was to construct a wooden cradle on heavy duty castors that I can sit the body tub on and move it around without needing the help of three strong men!
View attachment 18996
Target date for completion is Spring/ early Summer 2018.

 

[mojobaby]

Look forward to following your progress, she's the same colour as mine. Good luck

 

[Suffolk789]

I miss Renault IVth ... but she's definitely gone to the right person. I bought the tailgate in Holland from Ruud Wind in January this year (as penance for dinging it). He has since retired but sold his stock of spares to www.kihon.nl. The first generation Renault Twingo sunroof fits the Renault 4. That might involve a holiday to France to find one. I never got around to swapping the passenger seat with the driver seat. This could be a good short term fix while saving / searching for a new interior.... Looking forward to more updates : )

 

[Suffolk789]

Bryan - you should buy this ... now: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Renault-T...375547?hash=item41bda1db7b:g:nKgAAOSwo3pWeHcw

 

[barnfind]

H Theo - good spot. I have bought it!
Bryan

 

[Suffolk789]

Good man !! They are getting rare. There's a post about it here (and I think someone else has posted a project about Twingo roofs in R4s) - http://www.renault4.co.uk/forum/threads/twingo-sunroof.6144/ ... give Renault Reborn a call about helping with the Chassis when you are ready. Simon gets booked up so you might want to plan now...

 

[JdeW]

The other oldtimers are real gems but nothing beats a R4 the red GTL is looking good. Can't want to see the progress. Good Luck!! Greets Joop

 

[barnfind]

Well we now have the body off the floor pan and the true state of everything is revealed. It is actually quite good as R4's go. The actual removal was quite straightforwards, using and engine crane to get the body up into the air and then supporting it so that the chassis can just be wheeled out. Even the notorious long bolt under the back seat came undone without a fight.

The chassis, nearside rear suspension mounts are a little suspect. The outer one has a hole in the top and the foam filler is very visible. I will need to find a way of getting that out when I get the mig out, so that some future rustproofing can be put into place. The actual sides of the mount actually appear solid, however. The inner mount also needs some further investigation. Offside mounts look okay, the inner has had a repair in the past, quite neatly done.
Front corners look okay, one has a small fairly neat plate in the triangular panel at the end of the toe board. The other side is okay.
Floors, rear floor is good, front floor has two large patches. They appear solid, but are oversized, and the rotten area below has been properly cut out. I am just wondering now whether to leave them, or chop them out and put in a proper repair panel.
Body tub has some older neat repairs around the seat belt mounts, and will need attention at the base of the C posts.

Next job is to take out the fuel tank and then drop the rear suspension to get a better look at and do any repairs.

Photos to follow.

 

[barnfind]

Here are a series of photos as promised.


This is a the bare chassis, prior to dropping fuel tank and rear suspension.



Offside mount looks reasonable. Oddly enough this was caked with thick dry mud and I had expected the worst.



Nearside is intact but has a hole on top (under the C post). The inner mount is dubious as well. I have now dropped the suspension and this area will also require some work. Nearside inner is however, okay, having been neatly plated previously.
Out today to buy some decent steel sheet and weld through primer.
Fire up the Mig!!!

 

[Suffolk789]

Amazing !! I hope my claims about the chassis were correct. My 2CV mechanic in ipswich* replaced some of the rear pipes. His methods were quite rudimentary. Are you planning to redo the pipes while the chassis is off ? *did I send you his service history ? PS ... might be worth replacing shocks and rubber mounts while chassis off ? - they are relatively inexpensive... oil ones are fine.

 

[barnfind]

Yes given that the body hadn't been off, then your claims were generally reasonable and if untouched, the car would probably have survived another MOT on the basis of what the tester could see. The rot on the rear chassis was not really visible until the suspension was dropped, which is quite commonplace, as indeed was the true extent of the corrosion in the nearside outer. The outer still feels solid albeit it looks quite tatty. Although it looks as if some waxoil has been sprayed into the open ends of the rear chassis, it had not penetrated down to the cross member and the suspension mounting area was bone dry as are the insides of the outer box sections. I think that's a warning to anyone thinking of cavity wax injection, there are a lot of baffles, etc. in this part of the car structure and there is no guarantee that something sprayed only in one location is going to have thoroughly coated all of the insides.
This car is far better than the TL was, both in floorpan and body tub terms, and if you hunt down my previous thread on this on the forum, then you will see that all four corners of the main TL chassis had completely disintegrated, as had the inner rear mountings. There were several layers of patches in some areas on the TL, all of which came off with only minimal persuasion. Really it was a chassis replacement job, but we persevered (not sure that they were available at the time anyway). It was fine when repaired and saddens me more than ever that I didn't keep it.

I didn't get any service history with the car, so anything that you have would be appreciated. I will clean everything up prior to refitting the tub and replace anything that looks dodgy in terms of brake pipes, shock absorbers, rubber bushes, etc.

The repair area has now been anointed with Vactan to kill off any rust that I haven't been able to remove by other methods and will have cavity wax pumped in locally to hopefully slow down any future deterioration. The sections around the mounting bolts on the outside face were all intact, and the internal stiffeners were all okay, so alignment should not be a problem and I have been able to use the mounting bolts to clamp the plate into position, with loads of weld through primer to reduce the likelihood of any rust forming on the inside face of the repair plate. The reverse face against the fuel tank is fine on both rear members.
The outer mounts have Renault foam in them. On the nearside I have managed to rout it all out and I am just now contemplating the best way to repair the mount, as opposed to just chopping it off and starting again. I haven't attempted anything on the offside outer as yet, and am hoping that only minimal work will be needed.

 

[Suffolk789]

I'm so happy Renault IVth is getting a rebuild. Will dig out history. Kent Bergsma evangelises about Miracle Paint here:

 

[barnfind]

Welding is well advanced now, the nearside suspension mounts are both repaired and I am now tidying up the rest of the floor pan to receive paint. Offside looks okay albeit some surface rust, but it has been soaked in Vactan and will ultimately get a coat of satin black Rustoleum, which is also rust resistant, and a good soaking eventually in Waxoil or similar. I have also had to do a small patch in the rear floor. All the repairs have been treated with weld thru primer, and the reverse surfaces of all the repair patches also. I have used a brush on seam sealer, although the resultant finish is a bit rough. Seem to remember that I had similar problems with this stuff before. However, it won't be visible, so I am not unduly worried.
Picture shows the repaired outer and inner suspension mounts, albeit the inner has not yet been primed.

 

[barnfind]

I have now painted the floor pan and the box members with Rustoleum, after passivating any surface rust. It is in gloss and looks a little odd (couldn't get any matt locally) but since most of it will be invisible once the body and floor coverings are back in place, I am not unduly worried. Spent yesterday afternoon refitting the suspension. My gas filled shocks were not supplied compressed, so I spent quite a while fathoming how to compress them and then wire them up so that they could be fitted. Eventually did it by jamming them under the workbench vertically and compressing with a trolley jack. The front ones were relatively straightforwards, however.

 

[barnfind]

I have repaired the frilly edge to the offside inner wing, using scratch built repairs rather than the rather expensive repair panel. It looks okay and fortunately most of the repair is hidden once the wing is fitted, so not too much post welding fettling is required.

One thing that I learned with the last Renault was to make sure that you colour code your brake lines prior to dismantling. When I came to refit everything, it took almost as long to fathom last time as it did to strip the car down and take the body off. This time I have managed the situation better with judicious application of coloured paint to each connection rather than just relying on photographs. Of course the entire brake system in the TL was toast, so there was very little to retain as points of reference.
The C post bottoms were fairly rusted, as the picture shows, after some attention from the flap wheel. I have repaired them with new metal. Copying the curved section on the nearside was a potential problem, until I realised that rolling some steel around the handle of my trolley jack gave exactly the right radius. As far as I can see, the last piece of welding is the missing section of the offside rear wing mounting flange.

We are now almost ready to put the body back on the chassis. The reason for doing this now this is twofold. I could leave it separate and paint it etc., but I think that the risk of damaging it whilst refitting makes this risky. The second potential issue is that prior to painting, I want to cut the roof and fit the sun top. I am not sure how this will affect tub rigidity prior to fitting the stiffening frame and so I have decided that it would be better to do it once the tub is bolted down again and aligned by the floor pan. Finally, although it is manoeuvrable on its trolley, it is now in the way a lot of the time!

 

[barnfind]

........Kent Bergsma evangelises about Miracle Paint here:

I have had a couple of old Mercs and used Ken Bergsma's website for inspiration a couple of times. He does love this paint, but it doesn't seem to be available in the UK. I suspect its like POR15.