R4 restoration made in France

[Snoopy1974]

1987 R4 GTL restoration made in France

Hi, my name is Alexandre, I'm 35 years old, live in France, and I drive R4 for 15 years. Actually I have a 1987 GTL Clan model, but it's in very poor condition (about 240000 km !) so I decided to restore it few months ago.
I love the Renault 4 and I love the english language, so I'm going to tell you here the story of my R4 restoration. Just on detail please don't pay attention to my faults...
First of all, here is my car, from far we can beleive it is not very bad:


But if you look under the chassis :shock: :shock:






It has all the traditionnal problems known about R4. The body too has many "little" problems... For example, look at this beautiful repair of the rear left wing !




Actually I wonder if I'm going to repair all the problems of the chassis or trying to find another one in better condition...

 

[maurice mathews]

restoration

Hi Alexandre.like you I love my 4l,Best of luck with your restoration,

 

[Bluebell]

Hi Alexandre,
Whereabouts in France are you?

 

[Snoopy1974]

I live in the north-east from France, a rural region where we still can see Renault 4 on the road, and in the cars scrap yards

 

[Snoopy1974]

Finally considering I don't want to spend too much time on my car, I decided to change my chassis, I will repair the genuine chassis later, for another project... I'm lucky because few months ago I found a chassis in very good condition for only 300 €, it inclued motor, gearbox, and the nice GTL wheels fitted only in 1986 and 1987. With my friend Sylvain and his big Mercedes D we fetched the chassis at the beginning of september:

It's in very good condition, I looked at it in details and I didn't see any problem, all the critcic points of the Renault 4 are ok: floors, fixation of the rear suspension... The only "problem" ? It is entirely covered with dry ground !






The next stage in my restoration: dismantle all the châssis to protect it against rust, treat the hollow bodies and paint it. Sorry for the mistakes, I hope you'll understand me

 

[jjad]

Looks good! Thanks for the picture. Keep posting to keep us up to date

 

[Snoopy1974]

:smile: good evening to all,
I started to dismantle the new chassis at the beginning of september, I removed the soundproofing material glued to the floors (wich keep the water and make the floor rusting, I won't put them again when I will reassemble the chassis), the front floor seemed to be in good condition at first sight:

But after scratching in every corners I saw several little rust holes :eek:



The rear floor was in good condition too but it had very little rust hole too :shock:


The front and rear bumpers was really too damaged, they will directly go to the garbage:


At this moment I was a little disappointed, I beleived the chassis would be perfect and just needed a new paint. I understood I will have to use welding equipment to repair it correctly...

 

[Snoopy1974]

I dismantled the exhaust system, I thought it was ok but after checking it, only then front bent tube will be reused.


I took pictures of the brake-distributor (not sure of this word, sorry...) to be sure to able to reassemble it correctly. I also took many notes to be sure not to forget anything when I will reassemble the differents parts:




At this point all the rear parts were removed, I decided not to remove the rear suspension because I don't know if I would be able to reassemble the torsion bars and to adjust them. On the other hand the rear brakes were be dismantled of course, even I took a very long time to take off the bearings (finally with hammer and chisel):




All the metalic or plastic staples were carefuly removed, they will be washed before reassembly:


The front suspension was removed, for the same reasons eposed above I also decided to leave the torsion bars and the low arms on the châssis:


The only parts removed were the motor and gearbox, now the chassis is naked and ready to be repaired before painting:

 

[John Doe]

From my point of view you are restoring a good chassis Don't mind me, I have two R4 that will be in need of restoration

 

[Snoopy1974]

From my point of view you are restoring a good chassis Don't mind me, I have two R4 that will be in need of restoration

This châssis comes from the south of France (Alpes Maritimes) and I think it has never known snow, rain... or anything else wich could affect it.

Good luck for your future restorations

 

[Steve Hennessey]

I've got one of those as well

 

[Snoopy1974]

Waouhh, beautiful

Mine was not as nice as that, the following of the story in few days...

 

[Snoopy1974]

At the first time I decided what to do with the rust holes, I carefuly sanded around them to see exactly the problem. Some of the holes would be filled in with welding, but the other would need patches




Before welding anything, I sanded the chassis, I put it upside down and started underneath, the pictures below show the chassis before sanding:


During the sanding I discovered a bad surprise:


To make the patches I cut them into a piece of cardboard before cutting them into a 1 mm steel sheet. After many hours of sanding, the chassis is ready to be repaired:






The places the floor is less damaged (the metal is dig, I'm sure it's due to the dampness hold in the soundproofing material) will be repaired with mig welding:

 

[Snoopy1974]

Good evening all,
at the midle of september I decided to remove the polyurethane moss in the "longeron" (sorry I don't remember the english word), to do that, I used a screwdriver to destroy it before blowing it.




Few days later a friend of mine came to me to weld the patches and repair different place of the chassis. When finished I sanded the top of the chassis before the first coat of rustproofing.






The welding around the patches has been scraped with an angle grinder but to have a nice finishing touch I will use filler after rustproofing:


Here are the products and the tools I'm going to use to protect my chassis, maybe they are not sold in UK but in France they have very good reputation. The treatment will consist of one coat of "Rustol CIP", one coat of PPG primer, and two coats of urethane painting. Before the painting, I will apply stoneship primer on the underneath of the floor. The "Rustol Owatrol" will be sprayed on the inside of all the critic areas of the chassis.




News of my chassis in few days...

 

[malcolm]

Looking forward to more photos. The ones you have posted are a bit small and I can't always see what you are talking about. It is possible to load photos on to the forum. See http://www.renault4.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=2531

You are doing well. I't should be an excellent car when it is finished.

 

[Snoopy1974]

I do understand, thanks Malcolm

Picture of my 2 Renault 4: the grey one which is going to be restored, the blue one, bought 2 months ago (77000 km, comes from south of France, many bumps on the body but chassis absolutly NEW, the price ? 500 Euros )

And last but not least... the "white panther" of my friend Rodolphe, 150 km/h, see that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdtnOlEYRqs

My next project after restoration of my GTL, to build about the same one

 

[Snoopy1974]

Hi all, here is the following of my restoration. I decided to start by the underneath of the chassis, after hiding all the nuts and bolts, dusting the surface, I spray a first coat of Rustol CIP:


Then I returned the chassis and finished the first coat.




I choose to let the genuine stoneship primer at this place of the front of the floor, it was in very good condition without rust attack, and I didn't think it was useful to remove it before apply a new one:

The Rustol CIP is a very good product but you have to wait for a very long time to be sure it's dry, so after one week I decided to treat the inside of the chassis with another Rustol product: Rustol Owatrol. Every place has been treated with it, even the rear arms (which are in steel metal known to be more fragile than the other type). On the third picture you can see the Rustol Owatrol passing through the two parts of the chassis, I am absolutly sure that all the little places will be protected:



:smile: Another week to wait for the drying, after it, I will apply sealing on the chassis before primer PPG...

 

[DavidN]

Nice work!

But you should definitely wear a mask working with paint!

I wish i was that far...

Greetings,

David

 

[Snoopy1974]

I agree with you David, I had the nostrils glued with orange Rustol during 3 days, wonderful

Just a little break in the story of my chassis, today I bought material to resolve one of the biggest problem of our lovelies R4 : rust. I don't want to see my wings rusting again in few years even I did all that I could to protect them. This is the reason why I decided that my R4 restored will have its 4 wings and the 2 "doublures avant" (sorry, what is the english word please ?) built in fiberglass.
Firstly, I gave to my coachbuilder two second-hand front wings which have been prepared. I'm going to build moulds around them, then I'll make my front wings in fiberglass :smile:

 

[Snoopy1974]

Hello,
After waiting for 2 weeks to be sure the first coat was dry, I put a sealant at every corner of the chassis:

This type of job is not very pleasant because every time I do that, I use my fingers to apply the sealant and it's very, very, very dirty...

Compare to the first coat of Rustol, I decided to put tarpaulin on the garage floor to prevent dirty marks due to the paint frog:

Here are the PPG products I used for the last primary coat before black paint:

Few moments later the chassis was painted, nice isn't it ?

At the same time the wishbones have also been painted, I didn't change the bushes because the chassis has only 51000 km:

As I said above, I decided to use filler to finish the surfaces where patches have been welded. Not difficult and after that the finishing touch is perfect:



Ready for paint now