Red Rallye resto

[Ben_w]

Right, quite why I didn't buy a rollover jig in the first place (other than being a tight fit!) I don't know. Hindsight being the thing it is, I could have saved a lot of time, energy, discomfort and physio bill if I'd bought one of these first.....

It rained until about lunchtime and I didn't think I was going to get anything done. However, the rain stopped, so I started.

Brew in hand, I wandered out side. Manouevered the jig into position a little, rolled her on her side, marvelled at what a tool I'd been trying to do this without a jig and got cracking.

Most of the underside was fine. A few spots showing a little surcae rust which I attacked with the grinder, thinking is was perhaps poor prep first time round. In a couple of places, it may have been but lack of room and light to see what's what won't have helped much but in all honesty, I think it's probably the zinc in the Electrox doing its sacrifical thing. Either way, when I took back the coatings, in most places it was good, clean bare metal underneath. This really is testament to the quality of BH Electrox and Epoxy Mastic. It's been sat outside for over two years with no cover, no nothing. Other than a few cobwebs and dust and dirt, it's as clean as the day I did it.

Anyhow, down to the business of grinding (as I once said to the wife with a cheeky wink as she sighed and rolled her eyes....)

The only bit of the car I never got any protection on was perhaps the first 6-9" inches front the bulkhead back. I just left it bare. Some surface rust, but again, nothing serious. The only real issue I have here is that these sections, as on so many GTi6 & Rallyes, have been mistakenly used as points to jack the car up. You can see the indentations. I've two options. Either drill all the spot welds, remove, straighten and spot weld back on or try a technique to pull body panels out where a series of hooks are spot welded along the panel and a rod passed through which is then used to pull the panel out. I doubt very much I'll find new sections, I'll ask my parts guys but not hopeful.

Anyways, Imgbb is good but a pain to try and organise pictures so I'll just post the lot. I had to nip out mid afternoon as clearly my wire brush was done! I also decided to split the three sections that made up the section of sill that was properly squished and attacked them with a wire brush on a drill before going at them with the Hydrate 80.

The only other bit that was a real issue was that odd closed box section that forms the rear suspension bump stop. I got in there with another wire brush bit on a drill as much as I could but access is still awful, even with the car on its side. I then applied as much Hydrate 80 as I could. Did the underside of the chassis legs too then gave everything id done a good coat of Hydrate 80