At 10:50 AM 8/25/99 -0400, Chip Brown wrote:
>...I'm going to remove my crunched left front wing and cracked right front
>wing and strip the paint off of both of these, preparatory to a straightening
>and reinforcing job at Morgan Spares in late-Sept....
>
>Do I have to take off that cowling in front of the radiator and the
>bonnet to pull off the wings, or can I just unbolt those umpty-ump
>fasteners to get the wing off? I tend to take cars completely apart and
>then find there's an easier way, so I thought I'd ask the list.
Chip,
If you are removing both front wings, then yes, you should remove the cowl.
So to pull the front wings:
1. Remove the pan below the grill between the 2 valances,
2. Remove the grill,
3. Remove the 2 screw that hold the front bonnet hinge bracket to the cowl
an carefully slide the hood up and forward to pull the hinge from the
rear bracket. You will need a helper to remove the bonnet.
4. Remove the x screws that hold the cowl to the front wings and lift the
cowl off.
5. From under the fender, disconnect the wires going to the wing lights,
headlights and turn signals. Remove the nut holding the wing light to
the bracket on the front subframe.
6. Remove the y screws along the inside edge of the front fender that hold
it to the valances,
7. Remove the decorative door sill strip. There are 3 Long screws that go
down through the lower door frame and sill plate and hold the fender to
the bottom of the sill plate.
8. There are a couple of other screws under the rear of the fender attaching
it to the sill plate.
9. There are 2 nuts and bolts attaching the rear of front fender running
board to the front of the rear fender that have to be removed.
>What is the best way to strip paint off these surfaces? Can I take the
>wings to my local dip shop and expect anything usable to come back? Do I
>need to etch the metal with one of those preparatory compounds (like I
>used twenty years ago on my PV544) before bringing all to my wing man
>(the aforementioned Larry)? I know these wings are made of pieces of
>metal & I am tempted to strip em with the same stuff I use on old
>furniture, which , after all, is what we're dealing with here. But maybe
>I'm being overly cautious. I am not naive enough not to expect quarts of
>Bondo (TM) slathered all over said wings.
The stripping is up to you. You can have them dipped. I stripped mine
the old fashioned way - elbow grease, paint stripper and sandpaper, and
a good bit of time. Regardless of the method of stripping, be very carefull
to remove ALL the bondo around the headlight buckets, along the area where
the fender rolls from horizontal to the vertical, and about where the A
pillar is. If you don't get all the putty out, it will hold some of the
chemicals used to strip the fender and you will have a rough time keeping
paint on these areas.
To redo both fenders might take about a quart of bondo.
Again, it is up to you, but after I finished stripping down my fenders,
I DID coat them with DuPont's metal conditioner to kill the surface rust
that will develope.
Hope this helps
John
John T. Blair WA4OHZ email: jblair@exis.net
Va. Beach, Va Phone: (757) 495-8229
48 TR1800 65 Morgan 4/4 Series V (B1109)
71 Saab Sonett III (71500840) 75 Bricklin SV1 (0887) 77 Spitfire
Morgan: www.team.net/www/morgan
Bricklin: www.bricklin.org
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