This is the Ute we bought from hothx( her pic shown here) - but it wasn't this complete when we got it. Some parts had already been sold off. But we are not complaining!

This ute is not in bad shape - butthere are a few rust issues hoiding under that gold paint. These will be dealt with as we uncover them.

The car had been in a minor accident when it was sold to a few different people. By sheer coinincidence one of my mates (Wayne) had sold it to the people I had bought it from. The chassis rail on the drivers side has a slight bend in it - so we will straighten this and check the chassis alignment with a tremil rod measuring device. Here I have already remove dthe 186 and four speed - These will be sold off to help finance the project.

The first items to go were the tie down bars and tool box-It wasnt very well made or installed so it was not a hard decision to turf it.

The original floors are very solid - not much more than surface rust. This is a good sign that the cowl area wont be too rusty either. Th e four speed shifter hole will be filled and the car converted to auto

No real signs of rust here- just some surface rust once again in a few places under the screen.

The rear screen however was a little sad on the left side - so this is where the rust repairs start

looking from underneath you can see how bad it really is. Not a real drama though some one had riveted a plate here so it was easy to expose. The white paint must have been a vain attept at slowing the rust down -it didnt really work...

The inside was tackled first - this was rather simple - after removing the offending rust inside and out the inside lip was fabricated and oxy welded in place.

Then the out side lip was fabricatd and oxy welded in place. Having acess via the rust hole from underneath made this easier to control distortion for a perfect repair. Not much filler will go in here!

The two lips are plug welded with the mig to simulate the original spot welds. If you look closely you will see the area now cut out underneath ready to be filled with new steel.

After tackling the back window rust I moved onto some other minor rust in the cowl area. This is the drivers side front rust already cut and ready for removal.

Some key hole surgery required on the passenger side. This rust was in the plenum chamber near the cowl drain. So both inner and out will be replaced. The first step was to cut away the rust and clean the area up ready for making cardboard templates.