R4 restoration made in France

[Snoopy1974]

Hello and many thanks David,

The engine was not perfectly horizontaly hanged, so it was a little difficult to put it easily in the chassis:

But after few minutes of maxi stress the engine was finally fitted in the chassis


I decided to fit the water pump, to be sure that it will be water tight I decided to put the Loctite product on each side of the Renault seal, first on the water pump:


Then, on the seal after applying it on the water pump:

I don't have torque spanner, so when I fitted the water pump on the cylinder head I took care not to tighten the bolts too much:

Just a little picture of my rocker levers before fitting the valve cover, the manifold was fitted just after:


The valve cover was fitted with the fuel filter bracket:


It's late and I have to get up at 6, I think it will be VERY difficult The continuing of my story will be written later, good night

 

[DavidN]

A SUPERB job!
I love that thread!

David

 

[Snoopy1974]

I love yours too when you worked on your F6 David

The next part to be fitted on the engine was the fuel pump, with its new bolts, nut, grower spacers, brace and seals, no particular difficulty on this stage:

The alternator with its cromate conversion plated brackets was fitted, it's looks like a new one


At this moment I decided to fit the wheels to have more easiness to move the chassis in my garage or outside when the weather is good (not the case these days ); The steering rack gaiter had cracks and needed to be remplaced, I bought a QH adaptable pair:

The steering rack gaiters had to be cutted at the good diameter, to make good job I used an old bush and a scalpel:

The rubber was fortunatly very flexible, after applying many grease on the rack, they were fitted whithout any problem:


Here are the differents parts of the right front semi axle:

I chose to use grower spacers for the fitting of the front lower ball joint, to reassure the tightness of the nuts:

I expected that the halfshafts would be difficult to fit, and... they were VERY difficult to put at their correct place :eek:


This is the moment I decided to refit the frontwheels, and they took a curious angle, I also can say an awful angle...

 

[Snoopy1974]

Here is this famous front wheel angle just after going down the tackle, the positive camber is absolutly terrifying !

I had to remove one the bolt of the ball joint, this one was too long and touched one of the bolt of the calliper blank, I will have to find another one shorter

After pressing my 59 kg on the front of the chassis the camber angle seemed to become a little better

Even I feared the fitting of the rear wheels bearing, this job was made whithout any difficulty:


And this was the first time my chassis rested on its 4 wheels for many months:

 

[Rutger-peer]

You're doing a great job! I've been following your restoration for quite some time! I'm curious about the body work! And of course, you leave me with lots of information about the restorationprocess, like Malcolm and DavidN!

Good luck!

 

[Snoopy1974]

Thanks you, the body work will be certainly harder than the job on the chassis, every parts usually damaged on the R4 have to be repaired. Even I will never drive my restored car under the rain, or during winter I absolutly want that it never rust again, this is the reason why for many months I work on fiberglass parts: front and rear wings, and front inner wings.
The moulds of the front wings are finished, and actually I work on my old inner wings before make a mould around them:

 

[David M]

http://www.renault4.co.uk/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=3604

On the Renaults that I have, that particular bolt / nut are mounted the other way. The head of the bolt is mounted on the TOP of the wishbone and the locknut on the underside.
This will give you the clearance that you need.

David

 

[DavidN]

David is right!

Both of the bolts have to be mounted the other way round.

Regards,

David.

 

[Snoopy1974]

:smile: Good evening, I think I will mount the bolts of the lower balljoints the way you told me, this is the simplest solution
Return to my job of these last weeks, after the chassis was put again on its 4 wheels I came back to the engine, I bought a new set of plug leads, spark plugs, rotor arm and distribution cap:


Then I fitted the 2 new belts at the front of the engine, and carefully adjusted them:

This was the first time my chassis was outside the garage, lovely day !

The next step was the mounting of the differents parts of the front suspension: Monroe gaz schock absorbers and anti-roll bar:

Like the rear bearings, I beleived that the anti-roll bar would be very hard to reassemble on the chassis, but fortunatly it was very simple and quick to fit it under the chassis

The front suspension was finished, the only thing to do was painting the anti-roll bar, the half shafts and the inner tie rods, even the paint seems to be brown, when it's dry it's absolutly black



Next stage: fitting of the cooling system:

 

[DavidN]

Great work!!!

(I'm still so jealous of all these chromated bolts and pieces. AWESOME !!!)


All the best!

David

 

[Snoopy1974]

Hi everybody, here is the contuning of the restoration of my R4:
I had 3 radiators at home, I chose the best one to fit on my car:

I also decided to fit the beam at this moment, to avoid to dismantle the cooling system later, do not forget that I want to start my engine in few weeks, before putting the body on the chassis


Fitting of the cooling fan with 5mm diameter rivets:


Job finished !

Then I worked on the carburettor, after cleaning it is like a new one:

The fuel hoses were carefully installed with a new fuel filter:

I tried to find the best place to install the lower fuel hose, under the alternator, not to embarass the access to the sparking plugs or others parts:

About all the parts are now on the chassis, during the next weeks, when the eshaust system will be fitted, I will try to start the engine to be sure that all is OK before starting the job on the body (I started it these days )

If you're interested you can find this last picture on wikipedia France, with many other ones, in R4 article which have been written for the most part by myself !
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault_4

 

[John Doe]

Very, very nice Keep up the good work.

 

[Snoopy1974]

Many thanks John I'm gonna try to do such a good job on the body but it won't be easy, there are many, many damaged parts... much more than I expected
Concerning the body... these last 3 days I worked about it: I removed the body from the chassis, the chassis is absolutly awful, I don't regret buying a new one to replace it.
Since several months my poor old R4 waited for somebody take care of it

Maybe have you heard that in France these days there is heatwave with temperatures about 35/40°C during the day ! I thought that... perhaps it will be easier to remove the body, the seal between body and chassis, because of the temperature, would be certainly easier to remove
I prepared the job with hoist and straps:


The straps passed around the roof, through the doors, even the drip moldings will receive a trim cover I prefered protect them as best as possible:

When I hang up the body, that I expected worked exactly the way I wanted Because of the high temperature, the body peeled of from the chassis without any tool !



Me and my brother -brothers of Arnold Schwarzenegger as you can see - pulled the chassis on the floor, at this stage only the fuel tank and the rear suspension had to be removed:

The body is now ready to receive a serious restoration and about time too:

The poor old chassis, next time I will show you pictures of the damaged places... gloups !

 

[Snoopy1974]

Do not be afraid please !
















There are parts on the chassis (the subframe for example) that I beleived they were never be rusted, yet, it's totally wrecked. The only part to be absolutly perfect is the front crossbeam (by the way if somebody here is interested I can send it to him for just the cost of postage.)
I know that everything is possible, but I don't have MIG welder like many people here, I don't have enough time to make such a job, so please tell me that it was the good solution to change the chassis

 

[DavidN]

...so please tell me that it was the good solution to change the chassis

I would put it like that ...

To have a chassis in such a wonderful condition like the one you prepared is a GOOD starting point. To do the body will be peanuts...


Greetings from (only) 37 degrees hot Germany.
(As you can imagine I'm totally buisy these days...)

David

 

[John Doe]

We really have to do something about reproducing a brand new chassis. Sooner or later there will be no more good chassis to use.

 

[Rutger-peer]

Haha, not sure whether I'm gonna win the worst-chassis-contest . But I'll post my pictures this afternoon and we'll see!

 

[Snoopy1974]

We really have to do something about reproducing a brand new chassis. Sooner or later there will be no more good chassis to use.

Eveybody here knows that 2CV chassis is rebuilt by several manufacturers, fortunaltly for the owners, a galvanized version is sold for less than 1000 €, life guaranteed
http://www.mehariclub.com/plateforme-galvanisee-garantie-a-vie--a--10071010.html

I've been told that building a R4 chassis would be very very expensive and not economic profitable, in the sense that the R4 chassis is much more complicated to copy than the 2CV chassis, and would be sold more expensive
Maybe one day... I hope so !

 

[Rutger-peer]

Though I heard rumors that there were new R4-chassis being built in Brazil or the like and another R4-fanatic I know said he could arrange a brand new chassis for me for 1200 €.

So it's kind of a mistery about those new chassis.

 

[Snoopy1974]

Though I heard rumors that there were new R4-chassis being built in Brazil or the like and another R4-fanatic I know said he could arrange a brand new chassis for me for 1200 €.

So it's kind of a mistery about those new chassis.

When I had a VW Beetle during the 90's, there were 2 types of parts: "made in Brazil" and "made in Germany", of course the parts of Germany cost about the double of those made in Brazil. For example one day I bought 4 chrome plated wheels covers "made in Brazil"...
6 months later my 4 wheels covers were totally rusted and good for the garbage

Conclusion ? If one day new chassis for R4 are built in Brazil, I hope the quality will be better than the Beetle parts !...