Showing posts with label body. Show all posts
Showing posts with label body. Show all posts

Tuesday, 1 January 2008

Bodywork home repairs

BEFORE you do anything go to the following web forum and classroom at:
http://www.autobodystore.com/

Ask about "moving metal" and show them a picture of your problem area. These guys know their stuff and many are ol'schoolers that pratice the "art" of bodywork. They would be the experts I'd ask first. I was turned on to these guys by Christopher Markley of www.motorapido.net, who worked on my wife's 1967 Vespa SS180.

On the Bajaj Yahoo Group today, Mark emailed and said his scoot was dented by a hit-&-run and he wanted suggestions for repairs. His cowl was damaged.
This dent is somewhat creased and that is not a good sign for an ameteur home repair. The more it is creased the harder it will be to repair without needing to repaint.
On the flip side if he can manage to bump the dent back out he may get away without re-painting the cowl, because the paint is in decent shape currently.
For smaller dents without creases I recommend either buying or building your own Ding King from "As Seen on TV". If you visit your local Harbor Freight Tools, Home Depot, and Dollar Tree (for mini hot glue gun and glue) I am sure you could easily make your own dent remover that is even more versatile than the Ding King.
In the photo you can see it's an easy 3-step process using a Ding King.

For this dent this approach would be my first line of defense. ALWAYS use the way of least resistance and work your way up. Hammers are almost always a BAD idea.

With a friend applying hand-pressure to the back of the dent and you working your Ding King try to pull out the dent while your friend pushes you guys may get it to pop back out and look somewhat decent (not perfect). You never know. Research heating and cooling the metal too for expansion and shrinkage. You can heat it with a Harbor Freight Tool's heat gun (cost about $10 on sale) -- just check on how it will affect the paint first. This is a much better approach than a dent puller, which requires you to drill a hole into the metal and then pull it out.

Your next line of defense is hammer & dolly (costs $16 on sale at Harbor Freight Tools).

Friday, 6 July 2007

What's wrong with this SS180 body?

Fellow VSC restorer, Mark, wrote me with a question -- is his SS 180 body correct and original?

---- Here's what he said ----

Jeremy,

Take a look at these 2 pictures of the back of my SS.

Notice one side (right engine) has a small lip on the frame around the wheel arch and the left side (spare tire) doesn't it has a rounded more flat edge.
Does/did yours look like that?

Don't worry if you cant remember, Im going to ask around some other places, want to make sure this is standard and not a sign of two scoots being welded together.

Mark.
I have a lip on my Lammy for the cowl to hang from, but this lip is lower and I remember having a lip like this on the SS and looking at my photos of the finished painted body on this blog I don't see lip on the batt side at all, but do on the engine side and it does curve all the way down like Mark's does.

My guess is the left side of Mark's bike was knocked somehow and the lip should arch over the wheel as the right side did and that YES this lip is correct and if he is getting the bike painted he should have the body shop repair this lip.

Please don't just lurk, if you have a response or know where to go to get the answer let me know POST A COMMENT by clicking on it.