2nd August - The old chassis is no more!

The plan today was for both Minivin and myself to head up to Swindon for the Sodbury Sortout ....which we then found out had been cancelled! :( So my planned order of paint will have to go by phone it seems.

Anyway to make use of the spare time and as the weather was unusually clear and warm it seemed daft not to crack on with the task in hand. So with the old rolling chassis sitting in the drive the remaining bits were removed, axles cut out (most of the bolts were rusted solid in the spring bushes) and the whole chassis cut up ready for the scrap man.

So from this...........



A 109 chassis can be reduced to this in 3 hours with the help of a 9" grinder and 5x 2mm cutting disks....



What was interesting (from an anoraky persepective at least)was the internal condition of the chassis rails. The rails on the front half of the chassis were in surprisingly good condition for a ~45 year old vehicle. The original dip paint finish had started to peel and there was only slight surface corrosion at the base of the rail. But the rear half of the chassis was completely different. Serious spalling had occurred and you could easily see that the original material was now around 0.5mm thick - and had then been plated over where it had holed. It appears that this 109 had been used to maybe launch boats in a salty environment in the past? It had belonged to a Co. working on canal boats for many years but they had been working in fresh water...or maybe not?

At the end of the day the minimum it would have required was a rear half chassis and a repair to the drivers side front dumb iron assembly. As the former is no longer available a full chassis is the only option....bank manager withstanding!

STOP PRESS!!!! -- A 'team' of trusty fellows have been press-ganged into being over my place at 1900 tomorrow to shift the new chassis.