The Triumph Dolomite Club - Discussion Forum

Sure a lot of you have been here before, MOT time and you spot a crusty bit that needs a little attention, a small patch plate would cover that easily so I'll do it Sunday and book Mr Finnegan for the MOT in the morning, genius.



You get out the angle grinder but as you put the disc to metal, well what was metal, a hole appears, you put the angle grinder down and start pulling with your fingers, then a lot of hole starts to appear, and it's now raining rust


Holy crap, that was my sill 5 minutes ago


And you keep going, and more and more of it comes away in your hands


Okay so this isn't funny anymore


Oh my, that's quite a hole there, and the bottom half of the rear wing is now flapping about in the breeze


Then you find out that the manufacturer pulled out of Europe years ago, there are no pattern manufacturers of the rear sill and arch, and you have a ruddy great hole. I suppose this means only one thing.... Fabrication! Well, I've got a CSE in woodwork I suppose that'll do, how hard can it possibly be?

Is there supposed to be a moral to this tale? Dunno really, think I'm just over sharing my day, maybe beware of what lurks beneath?!

This happened to me a few weeks ago, with a late MkII Shogun (98) belonging to a customer.
A quick prod and what started as a 2" square plate turned into 3/4 of a sill and half a wheel arch.
I didn't prod the other side which looked the same!

Not even pattern sills available despite the immense popularity of the model in this country (or at least, this county)

He traded it in the next week - for another Shogun/Pajero!

You have my sympathy!

Steve

In Holland that would not be a sill because a sill is under a door so this would be defined as an end piece. As it is a seperate chassis vehicle this would be fine for the Dutch MOT.

Jeroen

Oh come on, there's about 60mm under the door, okay, so I guess that it's not strictly speaking a sill. It's not going to be a failure because it's structural, but it's near a seat belt anchor point, and anyway, after my efforts they would fail it on sharp edges now!

Not sure that I could get rid of it Steve, it's the total opposite of the Sprint and yet seems to have it's own charm. Shame with it's legendary bullet proof mechanicals that they didn't give it a bit more rust treatment, but then I suppose they don't have too much bother with rust in Japan. There's a specialist place that ripped me off for a clutch that slips as much as the old one does and stalled me on a warranty claim that I loath to go back to, but I see they do a front sill section that might be persuaded to fit if I can swallow my pride.

When we lived in Devon our house was near a main road into Totnes and there was 2 fatal crashes plus many minor ones so I got to see what happens to rusty cars when they get walloped, its not nice and you want all the metal you can get around you to avoid the grim reaper.
Strangely all the other roads into Totnes had safety/speed/cash camera's on them but one near us did not!