Managed a couple of hours slowly removing the offside rear bulkhead.  It has been slow progress due to the number of patch repairs in the past and I wanted to retain some reference points for aligning the replacement panels.

Good job I’ve a tiled floor in the garage – it will feature in a lot of photos for the time being.

The plan is to make a replacement rear outer bulkhead. I have a replacement inner panel and a new spring hanger box section plus floor pan.  Lots more cutting away and rest removal before I even get close to fitting in a new panel.

Work has been slow on stripping the Midget as I’ve been doing other task to create some space in the workshop.  Today I’ve finally stripped the last of the easily removable stuff from the chassis and there are just a few clips and bits left in place – plus the window glass and mechanisms.

The body is in a bad way and there is plenty of evidence of a bodged refurb that I suspect was done about 10 years ago.  Plenty of hard filler in the floor pan to cover the holes and lots of underbody seal to hide the bodge.

I’ve been buying new panels ( sills, floor pans and cross members ) but more are required. Just glad there is no race against time to get this done.

Here is a selection of photos of the situation as it stands.

I’ve been slowly stripping the Midget over the last week and I’m now starting to see the scale of the task ahead. It’s is rather fortunate that I do like welding but the problem I can see is what to weld the new panels to.  The A and B posts are in a bad way where they meet the sills. The floor isn’t joined to the sills and there are substantial holes under the pedals. The rear spring hangers on the bulkhead have been repaired badly in the past so they need replacing, and so the list goes on.

Anyway,  a few pictures of the state so far.

Today (13th March 2011) I took delivery of my latest project but quite why I chose this car is unsure. I was at Race retro the other week and tried out a race Midget for size and was surprised that I fitted fine. One week later and I’m on ebay and bidding on a 1970 car that was “for spares or restoration”.  Worryingly this car was on the road in the summer of 2009 but there are holes in the floor, sills, A posts, B posts, wheel arches – and that is before I strip anything off it.  Over the next few days I’ll be organising the shed so that there is space to work on the Midget before I get cracking on it and get to see what is salvageable.

One good thing I’ve already noticed is that there is more headroom in the Midge than the TVR S3. Legroom isn’t quite as good but with some GRP seats that issue can be resolved.  Here’s a shot of the interior – and this is the best part of the car!

First job is to sort out the paper work and get the V5C and V890 to DVLA.  Time for a stiff drink now.