Blindrhinos 1970 Red roundie rebuild

[BlindRhino]

So I'll begin this story with a little background...

When I was younger we lived on Hwy 40 (Cumberland hwy US40) across from an Exxon station. Where I first saw an Inka 2002. My dad being a VW bug guy told me that BMW made crap cars and that there was "now way in hell" he'd help me buy it. That was the first moment I knew I had to have one...

Fast forward about 29 years...two boys later and who knows how many cars, I don't want to count any more...I found an Agave 76 for $600 bucks, rusty, no oil in the motor and barely enough water in the radiator to get home...So I bought it, and forgot to tell my wife that I was getting rid of the MG. Well the old 76 was to rusty to save without more metal work than I wanted to do and reconstruct. So I found 2 more '02s and a bunch of parts on craigslist and bought them...this is the saga of the red roundie...

Here is the engine bay...when we got her.

Here is the body...I think we pressure washed twelve pounds of dirt off it.

We (I use the term loosely because my sons help a little and make sure I don't get crushed with my ingenious ways to get the car in the air) decided to strip it down and rebuild it. Why, well we can't hang out at the strip joints and taverns every day and this seemed more sensible and possibly less expensive, but probably not.

So with some prodding, help ,advice from Dave(Chanomix72) and a few others (Patrick@Midnightmotorsports, Bob you know who you are, Bill "down under", and the "Midnight Crew") I decided I can do this with relatively little experience tearing a car down and building it back up.

I will warn you some of the welding you will see is sketchy at best and I am a marginally decent at bodywork. my specialty lies in buying cool tools and having beer in the fridge and a desire to learn how to fix stuff.

Thanks for looking and lets get going...to the projects...

First, redo the speedometer...why not? well I have a bit of ADD and some of my projects might seem a bit out of order to the average person and the person who knows how to do this professionally.

We took it completely apart on the dining room table (I guess your not supposed to do that at our house) We painted the interior trim rings and cleaned everything and removed the temp face plate and replaced it with on we bought from someone on the FAQ. Notice the numbers.

I'll leave tonight with that and cover the things we have already done in the next post.

Thanks,

Russ

[BlindRhino]

So, after a cold ones on the first day I think I have seen the sun in over a week in ever so gray Western WA. Here are a few things we(my son and I) have done.

Read LSD beadblasted, cleaned and painted.

Then some taillight assemblies.

Pressure washing the body

Drop out front end and make temp rollers

Rebuild rear end thanks much to Bill William write up on this. We could not have done it without that.

before pic

After pic

Then it has been stripping paint and just getting ready for body work. We are going to split the body and insert so to speak MK1 flares in it so we can run the et11 13" Intra wheels from 1977

I will do a write up on how to do this. it is actually pretty east if you have marginal skill. We already did one rear and pics to come then the write up.

Part of the paint stripped

Oh and by the way. The goal is to have a fun car. Nothing silly fast, but fun to go for drives and not get made fun of when you show up in an E39(thanks Dave and Patrick, I am still drying the tears) haha.

When $ permits have a 9.5:1 motor, with a Schrick 304, Dual Dellorto 40's, a 5 sp, 3.91 lsd, no back seat(kids add extra weight) a radio to drown out any noise it might make from my assembly of the car and that should cover it. That's it till I get some more pics that are not of the car in ratty shape.

Best,

Russ

[Guest Anonymous]

cough **m20** cough

[potentialm20]

+1 on the M20. If you are ever in Eugene (OR) feel free to stop by and check mine out.

[Koblenz]

Nice build, nice car, nice read!

[BlindRhino]

Alex, You guys in Oregon and your fancy M20's....

I still have to get(translates in to buy) my son Alex his E30. No time or better yet, $ for that M20 right now. He still has college to be paid for.

Hopefully tomorrow and part of the 4th before we blow a few things up...man it is nice living in a town where there are virtually no fireworks laws, other than hey stop lighting dynamite off after midnight...oops(Sorry if my ADHD takes over while typing)...Car, back on track. We should be doing the second rear flare tomorrow. Nothing like loud noise to prepare for the 4th. Pics tomorrow or wednesday of the start of the second flare. I'll do a writeup on the flare process. It is actually easier than I expected. As long as you don't mind grinding all the "overweld" you do when you are an amateur.

[CubbyChowder]

I'm in the process of welding some MK1 flares on my '02 and just curious about your process. Nice project so far!

[potentialm20]

Nothing fancy about mine....

[BlindRhino]

So after a fun filled week on vacation and some work on the car here it is.

I'll also do a write up on how I did my flares for those interested in the process we used to do them.

Wheels are an Intra 13x6 ET11 running a 205/60-13.

Here are the pics of:

1.Cutting the lip

2.trimming a bit more

3.flare trimming, fitting

4. hold in place, cleco pin to body

5. weld in

So that is it in pics. Write up will follow in construction zone for those interested. The rest hopefully I can get done tomorrow. The next step is to tack weld between the cleco pins and then finish all around inside and out. Then fill/weld the holes from both sides.

Grind/sand the edges inside and out and prime. On the inside I will run bedliner.

Best,

Russ

[Chamonix72]

Damn, son! I need to get myself up there and check out the progress. Or to watch you burn down your house. Either way, it's exciting.

I might give ya a holler tomorrow. I need to get my car out for a drive since the sun finally made an appearance.

[BlindRhino]

Thanks Dave, I got a fire extinguisher ready for ya tomorrow. I hope to have the rear end done and be ready to move on to "from the back wheels forward" tomorrow night by sundown.

Mikey(cubbychowder) your flares look great! I think I should ask you for a write up! I will be doing one though soon.

And you guys in Eugene, (Manimal(eugene 02) and PotentialM20) uh huh, yes a big fancy M20 would be cool, but then to finance it I would have to sell my seats among other things sit on milk crates

Koblenz, Thanks!

Best,

Russ

[dondmar]

Looking good Russ!