Red Rallye resto

[Ben_w]

Did a bit more to the Rallye today. Since finding what i found previously, its becoming more obvious the dash needs to come out. But for now, it was about removing the passenger seat and carpets.

First job was to get it off the jig again as i need to be in and out of the car frequently. Not doing that with it on the jig so for now, its back on axle stands again and with it back in terra firma, out came the seat and i got busy on removing the carpet. Centre console comes out first and the first thing i find is a broken mount.





Not the end of the world but maybe something else to replace. With that out, i undid the dash mounts at the base of each A pillar and removed door seals. Little surface rust underneath but nothing to worry about.





Then removed the front carpet. First thing i noticed is that its been cut in half and it's in two pieces rather than one. Not a huge issue as you cant tell once everything is in and it's perhaps easier to remove. The foam backing to the front carpet sections was very wet though, so they are in the back garden drying out. Interesting there is a polystyrene section under the drivers side carpet which goes under the footrest to the left of the clutch pedal.



Then the lump in the floor from being jacked in the wrong place..



The bigger surprise was the passenger side floor. The sound deadening was already cracked and lifted but taking out the body plug, which had been sealed in, revealed it hadn't sealed very well at all…..



The bigger surprise was yet to come…..i pulled up the bottom of the bulkhead sound deadening to find…….



A 13mm ring spanner thats clearly been there for some time! And then, on removing the rear carpet….



A T10 torx bit! I know this car has been apart before but leaving tools in it? Well, ill take them.

So, with all the carpets removed, there was plenty of mess to clean up.





I took the opportunity to have a look at the seat pretensioner wiring for the driver's seat. This is the one i had to cut off from the seat and, i suspect, the cause of the airbag light on the dash. Interestingly, the drivers side wiring has an odd date code, 18/10/1999, which leads me to think this has already been replaced once as its different to the date on the other side, and, manufactured after the car was built.




Still, it will be replaced again and see where we go. Theres also plenry of evidence of it being poorly put back together at some point. Hacked fittings, and thats assuming they actually bother to do the nuts/bolts/screws up etc...



There isn't a huge amount else i can do right now until i find this other stiffener panel, which still hasn't appeared anywhere. I may well investigate and see if this panel is common across the 306 range (im hoping so and cant see why not?) and may try and find a shell with one still intact. No point having any of the welding work done until i know what's happening with that.