Lancia Beta Spyder (77 or 78)

[hongkongphooey]

Well as requested,here's my build thread copy/paste from Retro Rides so excuse me if some of it doesn't make sense.

Let me introduce you to my new project....a '77 Beta Spyder in Rover nightfire red  :-/. It was originally a 1600,but somewhere in it's life it has been fitted with a 2 litre. I've no idea how it drives as the gearbox is fubared,but it did come with a good gearbox. It's been off the road since 2006 (presumably when the gearbox gave up) and it pretty tatty aound the edges.
I went to see it 135 miles away in Southport last weekend,thought 'what the hell',handed over the cash and arranged to have it delivered the following monday,for the sum of £160.

And here she is....She isn't really that low at the back,the boot was full of spares



Twin 40 dcnfs too  8-)




Looking a little lost in little Japan




So today I kicked the Celica out of the garage into the cold and started stripping it down to see if the rumours of terrible rust on 70's Lancias is true...

Fire it all out now,think about where to put it later!!




See,totally untrue,no rust in sight!!



Erm well,perhaps a bit 




Disease ridden soggy sound deadening..



It's had a mega amount of patching done on it already too....the rear turrets especially.

One good thing,it looks like it has uprated springs and dampers on it as well as braided brake lines...Why does any car need this much suspension travel the wrong way though??!!



Tomorrow,i break out the grinder and knotted wheel!

[hongkongphooey]

You know when you start a project and you have all good intentions of making a really professional job of it,doing everything perfectly,but when you get down to it,you realise your skill/patience/resolve/tools and equipment says otherwise? Well I had that moment today!!

After seeing the amount of patches already slapped over the rot rather than cutting the rot out i've realised that i'm never going to make it perfect with my skills and budget,so i'm going to get it solid rather than pretty and roll.

Anyway,after a couple of hours with the knot wheel,i was left with a headache,tingly fingers,a very dusty garage and this







Some holes,dodgy seat and seatbelt mounts  and pinholes everywhere
So off came the knot and on went the cutting disc......Ooops.



This is about the point when I start thinking....How the hell am I going to fix this!!

Unlike some great threads on here,there probably won't be many detailed pics of the repairs and I tend to get carried away with working and forget the camera....I just hope I can find some good metal to weld to!

Why do we do this again?

[hongkongphooey]

That's a patch and a half!



Some more patches...if you like that kind of thing




It's never as hard as you think it's going to be once you start putting metal back in.

Some more general pictures of cutting out rust and welding in patches!

The front seat mount was well gone and the floor under it






The rear mount was gone too....Also for some reason,the last person to repair it didn't use the original seatbelt mount,but welded a nut to the sill covering and used that instead! God knows why,as the original mount was solid as a rock and is welded to the actual inner sill structure.



Patched. I'll put the seat mounts back in when I decide what seats i'm using as the originals are a bit torn and tatty.



A couple of small holes on the bulkhead



Patched



Next up on this side is a couple of repairs to the top of the sill covering and then most of the offside rear floor needs replacing as there are loads of pin hole in it.

[hongkongphooey]

Some more chopping,some more grinding and yep you've guessed it...some more patches.

The last major patch on the drivers side



On to the passenger side.....it's already had more patches than me old Nan's quilt!

Chop chop....i can see the floor again



First patch in



Building it back bit by bit



And that's the passenger front done.....not as neat as the drivers side,but hey,it was never going to win any awards anyway!



On to the nearside rear tomorrow if I don't get hoodwinked into any criggy duties

[hongkongphooey]

And today's efforts...More of the same unfortunately.

The rear of the front seat mount and the floor underneath it needed replacing



Chop chop....patch ready for welding in



And in...bit more to do with this yet though.



While I was down the back end I found a previous halfarsed repair where the rear suspension bolts to the floor....i hope someone didn't pay for this repair! I had to chop out a section of the cross member to get to it,,,,,the cross member needed some repair to the lower part of it anyway.

I haven't cut that hole out....that's what was above the suspension mount 



Chop it out...i did it in two sections



Weld a bit in....chop out the other side



Weld in the other side



And cross member welded back in.....i've skipped a few stages here because a) it gets a bit boring to look at and b) I never think to stop and take pics!





It's a good job I enjoy this!

[hongkongphooey]

Managed to get out for a bit this morning before family duties took over.....

Finished patching the rear cross-member and the sill covering and cut out the nastiness on the rear floor



I guess this'll be it till after criggy.....i'm sad,i'd rather be welding than getting intoxicated!!

Well,i was going to try to take off as little as possible underseal on this car,as last time on the celica,i ended up walking little bits of it in all over the house and getting into some serious trouble!! Unfortunately,it's hiding all sorts of rubbish,so it needs doing 

I found some more rust on the floor from the underneath that needs doing...These are taken from under the car




This is underneath the centre cross member which now needs removing so I can cut the rot out....spot weld drill ordered. You can see the patched up hole in the nearside rear foot well too



While i'm waiting for the spot weld drill,i thought i'd rip the rest of the headlining out and see whats what. Plenty of surface rust,but nothing too serious.
The captive nuts for the roof clips need attention..



As does the tops of the screen frame on both sides



I also took the wings off to see what's underneath and was pleased to find someone had got there before me and done all the hard work! 

[hongkongphooey]

A little bit more done whilst waiting for my spot weld drill 

I took the windscreen out and did a little work on the frame as well as the door posts.







And then my drill showed up....Yay!

So on to work with the cross member.




Cut out and welded up.





I've put the cross member back in,but not finished it yet because I still need to chop it about for new seat mountings.

On to the sills,and it was a bit of a mess behind the back of the nearside sill.It doesn't look so bad because I started chopping out before I took the pics





I'll start building it back up tomorrow.....it's fairly complex for me so i'm looking forward to the challenge. Pretty it won't be,solid it will!

[hongkongphooey]

Anyway,on to todays progress,which was a bit frustrating as I didn't seem to be able to lay down a good weld all day! I cleaned the steel as best as possible,cleaned the earth clamp,changed the tip,messed with the settings....i hope the welder isn't packing up!

Pics.....Bottom couple of bits in,with a load of waxoil as the next piece starts to box things in



Central piece in....covered this in weld through primer. Maybe this isn't helping the welding??



From the back



Sill piece back on....looks a real mess in the pic,but it's not ground down properly,and a trim piece goes over this,so a skim of gobbo and all will be well!



with a small repair to the back lower section




And the back end boxed in and an extra patch



On to the back of the chassis rail to repair this...



Usual thing....chop out,weld in.

[hongkongphooey]

No weldy weldy tonight,just choppy choppy.....On the front half of the sill.



Chopped out and cleaned



Top left of the cut.....so that's where all the last bloke's welding wire got to!!



Finish cleaning and start welding tomorrow. Gonna have to make a new sill piece though as the piece I chopped out is a bit crappy. I'm going to try and utilise a pair of sills I have for a Toyota Corona,unfortunately not the model Corona I own though!

[hongkongphooey]

First two pieces in



Followed by a load of waxoyl,then the central support pieces



followed by a load more waxoyl,ready for the outer covering

[HFStuart]

It's great to see but I can't believe how fast you're progressing with this. TBH it irritates the hell out of me as my garage it too small to work on the car so I had to spend all of Christmass with the inlaws....

I think you might be best to weld a rib or two to that large floor panel  - it's bound to resonate at some speed and it'll save you pulling out the interior again when it does !

[hongkongphooey]

I really enjoy it Stuart (when it's going well) so i just crack on with it. I reckon that panel won't be that bad with some dynamat on it.....it's 1.6mm so quite thick.

Anyway....more progress. Little bit warmer out there too

Got the Corona sill on the other day...it's not been cleaned up yet,but no doubt it'll need some filler.



On to the other side.The sill wan't too bad,but i decided to just take it off going on what state the passenger side was in. Seems i was right.





A nice little pile of rust cleaned out from the chassis rail!



Start chopping back to good metal bit by bit






Then start added back in bit my bit







More tomorrow...

[hongkongphooey]

I spent my time filling in the holes today.



Another angle



This piece was left long for a reason.....to be revealed later



And the rear chassis section boxed in



And the centre sill support section in the middle of being welding in



Some good progress me thinks.

[HFStuart]

Indeed - once it's done what will you do to paint it ?

Susnshine today at last today ! So I was able to start striping my scrapper to give me enough space to work on the other one.

New storage shelves assembled, exhaust off, tank out, interior stripped. Which in istelf is not too bad between wife and daughter duties.

Taking up the underfelt confirmed it's the right thing to do - what a mess it makes yours look rock solid !


Stuart

[hongkongphooey]

I'll spray it in my garage....i'm not one for spending 2k on a paint job!

The underfelt is disgusting stuff isn't it.....just soaks up water and holds it like a sponge.

Did you have any trouble taking your tank out?

[HFStuart]

Yep  - it was specially designed by Lancia to rot out the floorpans.

Thankfully the tank is fabricated allumium one that's only been in for a couple of years so removing it wasn't a problem. When I took the original off I was very careful but I still sheared one of the studs. Ideally I'd have used heat to loosen them but I was a bit timid doing that with the tank so close.

Stuart

[hongkongphooey]

I'll have to find the studs under 6" of underseal first!

[hongkongphooey]

I've done a few bits more....plenty of grinding and a few little patches,not worth any pics though,but the main thing was getting the Corona sill panel on and the rear section completed.

Pics...

It's going to need some filler,but then so is the rest of the car 



And the reason I left that piece sticking out earlier on





Should be just about right for a side exit exhaust.....i've always wanted one

[lanciamad]

Ahh so that's what you were upto , guess your be fitting a custom system then Would have been easy to fit a side exit exhuast on the other side using the original system but bet it would be loud.

[rossocorsa]

is a side exit exhaust road legal? or more to the point are you sure you will not gas yourself especially with the hood down and pedal to the metal? lancia dedras have a habit of nearly gassing the occupants and they have a tin roof and a conventional exhaust so a beta spider with a side exhaust and no catalytic converter......