Aprilia Diary

[chugga boom]

Simon if its sound leave it alone , if not replace it with 2>3mm plate, if you look at it its the tail end of the chassis leg so is pretty important , it is a rust trap however if sealed up properly when repaired will be fine j

[simonandjuliet]

Thanks James
That bit of the chassis leg is perfect , it's the extra plates  (welded to the "X") on the floorpans I was wondering about. Here i the one on the rear floorpan as an example

[ben]

My car is S1 of course but does not have that extra reinforcement.
I would be surprised if it were original.

I am following with great interest as I have a complete set of floor panels from Bill Lewis waiting to be installed when my(?) tame welder comes out of winter hiberhation!

[the.cern]

Ben, please help me by ensuring that Jim never gets to hear of the concept of welders winter hibernation !!!!

In the meantime I am enjoying your Aprilia engine rebuild posts.

                          Andy

[simonandjuliet]

Regards the reinforcement, I would be very surprised if it wasn't original, it is too well done and too consistent across the 4 floors to have been done later. It would take someone even more dedicated than Chugga to do it !

If anyone else knows more .....

More pictures later tonight, maybe

[simonandjuliet]

Dog had some more time today and the floor is nearly ready to go in, just the reinforcement plates to make now. The last picture with the remains of the old floor show that the plate is not just a flat sheet, but a pressing that is spot welded in place.

Other photos show the small dog-leg plate repair to the sill then the cardboard template. The new floor is a bit of a fiddle because it sits on a ledge on the sill side, but is underneath on the gearbox side


The front of the seat box section has an old, solid plate which needs to be tidied up, but is re-useable

Final detail is the rolled edge at the back of the floor where it joins the rear floors

[chugga boom]

i'm sort of with Ben on the reinforcing but also with Simon , its probably an s2 thing , I've never seen it before however all the cars I've worked on and looked at are s1 , however it does look very original and I can't see why someone would have modified the car like that for no reason , personally I would try and save them and put them back however if this is not possible then I can't see any drama in not fitting them , this is how a standard s1 floor should look , I have seen an s2 floor with louvers in the tunnel, obviously original yet totally different, j

[simonandjuliet]

Welding is so much easier like that !

In case you think there has been no progress ...... passenger side is finished and just starting on the driver's side

Picture of the finished cross-brace on the floor panel. I will not share with you how long it took, but needless to say they cost more than the replacement floors themselves !

Interesting to note that the braces do not form a chevron, ie the brace on the passenger floor and that on the driver's floor point in the same direction and are therefore parallel, and the ones on the rear floors point in the opposite direction and are also parallel. Just a detail ......

We have recreated the rear fold as well so that it ties into the other side. As I said above,the only thing that I haven't done is replace the piece under the passenger seat, it is very solid replacement panel, done properly some years ago. The pressings are not right , but it is too good to spoil.

The central louvres have been straightened up as well and finally the other side has been cut out ready for the same treatment

[simonandjuliet]

As always, there is something that rears its ugly head !

The patch on the floor section under the driver's seat hid a nasty corner. I had expected a small corner repair but once the paint was stripped, half the section was very thin.

A quick call to Bill Lewis and a pair of repair sections (the other one is on the shelf - just in case) arrived at the end of the week - THANKS Bill ! In the meantime , Dog has cleaned the rest up and pre-shaped the front floor. It looks as if water has sat in the footwell, worked its way through the front corner of the seat frame and then out under the seat ! Fortunately, the sill is untouched.

A small repair section was needed at the front of the seat box, but the rest is straight forward because the section around the pedals is perfect. Whilst the car is in the air I will take the pedals apart and clean and paint everything.

We are making and welding new tags along the floor and I will replace the rubber fuel pipe with the correct copper.

Hopefully be finished by the end of the week and I can get back onto the Appia .....

[the.cern]

There is always something lurking somewhere to make more work!!!  You were so lucky that the sills were not rusted, that was your silver lining!!!

That is looking good and will soon be as solid as a rock, good luck.

                                       Andy

[DavidLaver]

Sorry to hear it was worse than hoped for all it sounds like you expected "another bit somewhere".

I struggled to work out quite where it needed to be patched.  Is that a vertical section just under the driver's right knee close to the sill?

The gills in the floor.  Under the gearbox?  Where might they be pulling air from?

David

[DavidLaver]

So the patch that hid it was on the inside of the car?

Home straight now.  Perhaps time to think about another car for when the Appia is done, and the two vans, and the work on the R4

David

[DavidLaver]

...and the Moto Guzzi tipper.

[simonandjuliet]

David, thank you for reminding me of the backlog, although I think that some of our friends in the cold wastes of Wales have more significant workloads ......

The patch was, as you identified, under the accelerator knee.

Meanwhile, whilst Dog was joggling, I pulled the pedal assembly to pieces. Some nice detail as always, including drilled locating bolts for the pedals so that you can oil the bushes , so when did you last oil yours everyone ?

The brake actuator pivot was seized making dis-assembly more difficult, but apart from that, fairly straight forward. Everything degreased, cleaned and painted. Some of the bits should probably be plated, but I don't have that capacity yet.

The angled bracket on the brake actuator is the return stop and the brake light switch is non-standard. The bottom cover had been bashed a bit over the years and "modified" for non standard wiring, so I straightened it all before painting and will modify the wiring to be more discrete.

[chugga boom]

looking great Simon, well done