Due to many customer cars that showed up over the last few weeks at the bodyshop – progress on Mildred slowed down a little bit. This week work on the right side of the car started. The inner front wing had a lot of holes. After removing the bad metal a custom panel was made and seam welded. The old top flange incl. The nuts to bolt on the front wings was salvaged. Like on the left side the reinforcement piece has a hole at the bottom.
After a discussion with Malcolm Gammon in the UK, who gave me many valuable recommendations, I know know that I bought the wrong repair panels. The ones I have are for rubber bumper cars. We will close the gap – but we have not decided how. Option A is to just cut and weld in a little edge. Option B is to form the inner wing a bit different. The additional space in this areas is for the dual line brake servo that rubber bumper cars had.
Removing the floor and outer sill was easy. The right inner sill has a bit of surface rust but is in a usable condition. While a professional welder is working on Mildred – I am working/helping on others projects. A classic Mini that was fixed up and painted needs finishing touches. And amongst those – the rear screen and the windscreen needed to be reinstalled.
The younger generation thinks that like on modern cars the seal is first offered to the screen and then put onto the car. This is NOT the way I install the glass on a Mini or MGB GT. One those you first fit the rubber seal to the car. When doing this you need to make sure that the roof liner is tugged under the seal. With a lot of soupy water the screen is them slid into the lower part or the seam – followed by the upper corners. While doing this you gently press the screen towards the passenger compartment. Once the entire lip of the covers the glass (make sure to only use plastic prying tools) – the fillet strip is added. This will push the rubber outward and secure the screen.
The rear screen was something I did last Saturday. It just took me a bit more than one-and-a-half hour – a record time for me. The new seals from Minispare fit perfectly. Backed by this success I thought I was hoping to get the windscreen in quickly as well. And I had a great start. After 25 minutes the screen was in the rubber seal. Fitting the chrome fillet strip turned out to be much more difficult.
There is a special tool to pry in the strip. You need to make sure that you keep the tip of the tool inside the rubber. With a wiggling motion you then press in the fillet. This was really hard work on the front screen. Almost three hours later – with cramps in my hands – I finally finished the job. At least a good practice for my own Mini as well as fitting them to my MGs
Fixing C6622 
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