Giving the Jimny a birthday

Nice work MikeG, interesting to watch it all start to come together. Did similar myself to my old Land Rover many years ago and it's still going strong, so well worth the effort if it's a keeper.
Get some wax over and inside everything, it's good for those hard to paint or missed bits. 
Carry on posting, watching with interest.
Mike

Thanks Mike,

I've got some waxoyl for the internals of the chassis, will probably do the underneath of the body with it after it's had a coat of paint too.  All these are on the to-do list.  Next few days will consist of getting the axles and suspension sorted.  I'll keep you all posted with a few pics along the way.  I'm away to start my day at the shed now.

Nice work!

Cracking progress there in a short time, Keep it up and it'll be done in time for the end of lockdown

Thanks Soeley, Riccy,

I've held off doing it for so long, I'm just in the frame of mind in getting stuck into it.  I'm also renting the shed I'm working in, so I have a deadline looming to spur me on. I'm in there from 0930 till 1900 each day, which seems like a long time, but as you well know, there are always problems. The gearbox you sent up is still on my motor Riccy, still going strong.

Well, today 4th March.  I decided to take out the kingpins so I could extract the halfshafts from the front axle and clean up the cups on the end of the axle.  The bolts for the kingpins and the ball joint scraper seal had seen better days and have practically returned to nature.  I will have to make up some correctly sized bolts as I don't have any that length, only longer ones, shouldn't take too much time on assembly, I'll probably be running back and forth to the fastner shop when it comes time to put it all together anyway.  The same kingpin bearings are going back in for now as I don't have spares at hand, plus they are good enough to pass an MOT.  I don't need a shed to do that job.

Next up was to remove the anti-rolll bar, 3 bolts came straight out with no issues, the last one decided to shear, so it was out with the propane, oxygen and a litte bit of water to thermal shock it off.  I'll be touching up the paint with the batch I make up for the axles and suspension components.

I then thought it would be a good idea to remove the rear axle. The brake line to the rear was in good shape, so I was going to leave it, however the jimny decided for me that it wanted that line to be replaced as the brake pipe had stuck to the threaded brake fitting and turned the pipe into a double helix shape, so it was off with the brake line altogether, nevermind tho, I've still got some spare.

On the rear axle, I decided to keep the bolts (well most of them) as they were quite new.  However, the last bolt to come off the top of one of the shock absorbers (the ones under a cover) decided that it was not going to come out, regardless of how much it turned.  After a bit of messing around and head scratching, I figured out that the reason the bolt would not come out was due to the fact the bolt body had fused itself to the inner metal bushing of the shock absorber which stopped any longitudinal movement of the bolt.  No matter how hard I hit it with a hammer, no amount of vibration would shift this bond.  In the end, I had to cut the bolt head off, bend the cover back so that I could prise the top of the shock out wiith a crowbar. What a palaver.   In the pictures, theres a close up of the bushing with part of the bolt still stuck inside it.   I tried drifiting the remaining bolt out, no luck, then I tried pushing it out with a bearing press, no luck with 300kgs of force, I just bent the bolt I was using to press it out.  I then tried drilling it out on a pillar drill, still no luck. I'd had my fill of fastners for the day and it was 1900, so I decided to call it quits and start fresh with it tomorrow.  I still need to recover that bushing as I'm not sure I'll find a bit of pipe like that, unless my old shocks have similar sized bushings.  So it will be out with the gas and oxygen yet again tomorrow.  If that doesn't get it out, I'll just have to bite the bullet and find some pipe.

I had the same issue with the top shock bolts. I managed to drill, in situ, a 2mm hole through each shock eye, the rubber and its steel inner into the bolt,,,,just ! A daily spray of Plus Gas for a week was next. Careful heating of the threaded mount at the rear was next with a good spray of Plus gas. Then,, a rink spanner on the bolt to really tension it with the rubber in the bush then a good whack with a hammer created a sort of impact drive effect which very slowly made it give way and come out. I was fitting new shocks so wasn't worried about damage to the top eye.

Glad you had some luck with it. I didn't have enough patience with it as I wanted them out same day. Time is money when you're renting a shed and your jimny is in pieces. Luckily I'm fortunate enough to have oxygen and acetylene or propane on hand for bolt issues. Saves so much heartache when you come across stuck or snapped fasteners. I'd be lost without it at the moment.

Well today 5th March, I started out by heating the removed shock absorber bush and getting the remains of the bolt out.  The metal bushing was then reinserted back into the rubber bushing on the shock where it belongs, great.

The next job was to get the axles hung for the prep work. But first the radius arms had to be removed.   My optimism about keeping some of the bolts for the rear suspension soon left when I had to get the angle grinder out again to zip them off. With that and the ABS sensors removed (after much messing around) I had a look round the yard and found an engine hoist frame.  I also borrowed a scissor lift trolley, chucked the front axle on it and proceeded to raise the axle to the desired height and hang it up with cargo straps and a couple of small shackles.  I did the same with the rear axle, but instead of the engine frame, I chucked a few planks of wood up on the rafters to spread the weight and hung it up in the same fashion, cargo straps and shackles. 

But before I started grinding away at the axles, I decided to make a start on all the small things that will also need a coat of paint.  Might as well do everything with the same batch of epoxy paint and use it up. I managed to finish the panhard rods, steering and tracking rod, rear brake drums, CB antenna mounting bracket, rear shock absorbers and both prop shafts.  All in all, quite a successful day after yesterdays fastener fiasco.  To be honest with you, the rear shocks will probably need to be replaced soon, but I'm not swapping them out until they fail an MOT.  The orange boots for the shocks were taken home with me and given a bath in the sink with some washing up powder and they came up quite nice.

Tomorrow, I still have a few things to grind and then I'll get stuck into the axles.  Cant wait to get the paint on everything so it has plenty of time to dry and I'm not left with easily scuffed components when it comes to fitting it all back together.

Saturday 6th March,

Another grueller in the shed.  Managed to take out the M6 bolts and the M8? bolts (can't remember what they were now) from the rear radius arms that had snapped off at some point, so have reclaimed some areas to fit p-clips and neatly route my handbrake and ABS sensor wires correctly again.  Much nicer than the tie-wrap solution that had to be done. Yet again, heat wins the battle against stubborn fasteners.  All radius arms are now buffed down and just about ready to receive a coat of paint.

Made a start on grinding the front axle, mostly ground down now, apart from the awkward places, so I will need to get some burr bits for the dremel, otherwise I'll never be happy with the nooks and crannies still full of rust.  The swivel joints look quite pitted, which is to be expected considering the state they were in, so I had a look back on the forum and decided to go for a POR15 solution.  Might as well do the job properly (and hopefully only once).

Tomorrow will be more of the same, grinding and perhaps a break now and again to have a look at how I'm going to fit the new front slam panel to the body. I need to decide how much of the front needs cut out for rust ingress.  No idea what I'm doing and not sure if I should make up a template/jig against the original panel so that I can align the new one with ease.  Does the front need to be braced to prevent it folding in when the panel comes out, as I don't think there's anything else holding the wings apart at the correct distance?

Hi MikeG, 
I did the POR15 swivel refurbishment and they are still perfect, so it does work. Yours will take quite a few (thin) coats to make them smooth again, it's a paint, sand, paint, sand etc until the paint fills in all the holes. To this end I remember POR suggest silver has more filling properties than black, so may be worth checking. Keep the stuff in the fridge and decant a very small amount onto a small jar for use, a little goes a long way. Drys with humidity, so takes about 5 hrs irrespective of temperature.
Keep up the good work.
 

Hi Scimike,

Thanks for the pointers. I've went ahead and ordered some POR15 high build primer, which can be sanded. Hopefully that will level out holes and reduce the amount of time I need to get it coated.  I've also went with silver finish for the factory fresh look so that the condition of them is easier to see.

Hopefully this paint will give a nice smooth finish for the dust cover to slip over. 

I'm thinking about replacing the kingpin bearings now, so I'm not sure whether I should take out the old bearing jackets before painting and run grease round the mating faces or just leave them in and pop them out whent the paint is hard.  Not sure if I'll risk cracking the paint finish that way....