0008 Rear axle & more painting

0008 Rear axle and more painting
17th November 2019
In which Clementine goes for a (small) outing !

Sealing seams

Dirty interior light

Once I had my fine pitch bolts for the LH front steering arms, I got the
LH side back together and finished off the rest of the steering. All the original seams around the car are sealed with old material that after 49 years has gone hard and was crumbling, so I had to chip it out wherever I found it.  New seam sealers are totally different, more like a silicone, and relatively easy to apply with a gun, and this has to be done for all seams, to re-waterproof them, and ensure they will last for another 50 years.  The inside around the footewells was done, as well as the rear wheel arches inside the car where about 4 panels all meet.  Also cleaned up the little interior light which was all rusty, corroded, and filthy, but a couple of hours with WD 40, toothpicks, ear buds, and other similar fine tools soon had it (almost) as good as new.  Hard to buy now, better to recover the original German VW parts wherever possible. Tested it on a battery, and all working properly !

Clementine gets some fresh air

With the front wheels back on, Clementine was mobile for the

Renovated trim panel vs old

first time in a while, and it was time to turn her around so I could start work on the back half !  She rolled out the garage no problem, and after turning her round in the road, pushed her back in.  A short but momentious trip !   I have started work on one of the door trim panels a couple of weeks ago, and when I put it side by side with the other one, it was easy to see the improvement - The old one was dirty and warped out of shape from all the water that had got into the car while it has been standing for the last several years.  I have all the bits I need to start work on the other one shortly.

Dean helps remove axle nut

Once the back of the car was jacked up and axle stands were positioned, I took the wheels off - And that wasn't that easy !  The wheel nuts were incredibly tight and rusted in place, so that was an hours work to get them all off !  Once off, I removed the split pin that locates the axle nut - and found I needed to go to the tool shop to buy a 36 mm socket !  Once bought, I tried to undo the axle nuts - To no avail.  I soaked them with lubricant over night - still no good.  In the meantime I started to dismantle the broken bump rubbers, and removed all the brake lines so I could renew them.  2 days later, my friend Dean came over wih a very powerful impact drill that he said would take a truck apart.  Over an hour later, and a big cup of coffee while the impact drill cooled down, the two axle nuts were still not moving !  Eventually we got some of Janet's eucalyptus oil, and 2 hair dryers, and sat there for 20 minutes heating up the nut, and occasionally beating on it with a big hammer to try to break the seal.  Eventually the right hand wheel nut came off, and some time later, the left hand one startedm very slowly, to move.  Success, but it was a good job we weren't out in the desert - the threads were just so rusty !  These nuts had evidently not been off in a while, and they will be well greased in future.

Grand daughter Hayley

In the middle of all that, we got a lovely photo of Hayley from Amsterdam, all dressed up for the cold
and going out to sing songs in the neighbourhood to celebrate the tradition of Sint Maarten, a bit like Halloween.  She is so excited.

With the axle nut off, we were able to take the brake drum off, and I then started to take all the brakes apart, taking a photographic record so I can hopefully get them back together again later !  Once everything was apart, I started to clean the parts up - First of all cleaning off the years of dust and grime, then sanding the steel parts back until all surface rust was removed, and then treating them with phosphoric acid to neutralise the rust in

Brakes before dismantling

preparation for painting.  For the brake parts, I am using a high temperature paint because obviously they will heat up considerably when in use.  Painting takes several days because drying time for each coat is often about 8 hours so I usually have a system going - One piece being sanded, another being acid treated, and another part being painted.  In that way I always have a number of parts being renovated all the time while I am simultaneously working on other parts of the car.

In this case, I started to dismantle the rear stub axle, as I want to

Painted brake parts

replace the wheel bearings because I don not know how long they have been in there.  This was not too straightforward as it was stretching my mechanical knowledge, and I had to get my VW manual back off Steve, and also read up "how to" on the internet.  Finally I got everything apart, but it took me a while !  While pondering on this problem, I was also removing the rear left hand wing so I could de-rust it -

Taking axle apart

And this came off quite easily now I knew how to do it after the first one !  The inside of the wing was about the same as the RH one, with quite a lot of surface rust, but nothing too serious.  Also two small blocks of very sticky disintegrating foam that help block air from escaping at the ends of the engine cooling vents.

Inside rear wing

After sanding the whole area down, I treated it with acid as usual,

After acid treatment

and once it was wiped clean with water, followed by a wipe down with methylated spirits, I let it dry before using the Sikaflex 227 seam sealer.  I had previously used black sealer, but had inadvertently bought a tube of white, but as I am painting over it,
the colour is unimportant.  I applied this to all the seams - easy on

Seam sealer applied

the accessible ones, but rather messy when I have to reach into spaces and apply it with my finger.  It gets everywhere, and I go through a lot of rubber gloves in the process !  Eventualy all done, and I moved on the the wing itself, repeating the entire process.  While these were drying, I moved into the rear boot area of the car, and used acetone to

Inner wing painted

remove a lot of the glue residue that had been used to locate the original sound deadening cladding.  Some rust also needed to be treated, but while rotating between the several jobs, I was able to get everything painted with one coat of rust inhibiting underseal.


Last job for this week is to remove some of the rear suspension rubber bushings, which appear to be very old (maybe original ?) and quite perished.  Once again, this is stretching my mechanical abilities quite a lot, so I need to call the parts supplier and make sure that I can get replacements before I pull the existing ones apart.  I was going to get this work done by a proper garage after I got the car back on the road, but while I have all the rear axle parts off the car and the engine out, it seems logical to try and do all this now, rather than later when we would have to pull everything off a second time.  So this will be my task for the next week - To work out how to do this - I may have to call in a mobile mechanic to help me ! Stay tuned !!

Rust Seal Paint decanted

A couple of side jobs.  The Rust Seal paint I used to inhibit future rust inside wheel arches etc is horrible stuff.  You can't clean the brush, but have to throw them away after they go hard in about half an hour.  If you get it on your skin, it won't come off without also removing a layer of skin.  And it dries so hard that if you put the lid on the paint can and there is ANY paint residue around the rim, you will never get the lid off again !  So I decant the paint into multiple glass jars with just a little paint in each jar, and have to put a sheet of plastic under each lid so the lid won't stich to the rim of the jar !

And lastly, because we are going to Perth next week for a friend's funeral, we are taking lots of things for Christmas for Damien, Poppie, and Meisha and her kids.  One of the items is an old wooden bowl that Damien made when at school, that had got broken.  So I mended the bowl carefully, and then gave it 3 coats of gloss laquer, which brought it up beautifully.  We intend to return it to Damien !

Rest of the photos are here :-  https://photos.app.goo.gl/yiK1MYVGZbyK9mYe6