Appia furgoncino - A fettler's voyage

[Sliding Pillar]

Looks great Simon. What colour did you paint the wheels? Did you colour match or go for the Ford Alpaca beige. (The colour looks very similar to the Ford colour)
The tyres suit the van very well too, which make are they?
I presume you still have to peel the backing (or front) off of the sign writing? or are they magnetic?

[simonandjuliet]

Ade, I colour matched the wheels. Several had perfect paint on the inside so I am confident they are near as dammit. I have a recipe but no name

The tyres were a headache, I was keen to retain the narrow, upright, high profile, plus I wanted a "commercial" tyre, so I went with a Camac 600-16C. The other option was a Michelin X , but not quite right to my mind, nor was the 16 " London Taxi tyre

The commercial tyre means that I can carry plenty of "precious cargo" as well, I think the van is homologated for about 800 kgs or roughly 800 bottles of wine - No mean tasque task ! (sorry)

And yes, the sign writing is magnetic and still needs to be trimmed

Another little job is to do the red stripes,  still debating paint or the "Blue Peter" special - sticky backed plastic .......

[simonandjuliet]

Finished re-plumbing the house and re-doing Mathilda's bathroom and have booked a CT (MOT) for a week on Tuesday !

Still lots of detail to do, but nothing like having a deadline .....

[simonandjuliet]

First job is to get the passenger door seals fitted, so the plastic 'u' channel was formed by flipping the formers used for the driver's side and molding the channel using a heat gun

Once done the rubber section was pushed in using one of the myriad of new dentist's tools I have - I bought the contents of an old dentist surgery ....... any one have any ideas for uses for crowns and denture molds ??

Channel/rubbers glued in place

Dog is coming here tomorrow evening to help hang the door

[frankxhv773t]

Given all the skills you have acquired so far on this journey I imagine conquering dentistry would be a doddle so with all the right tools now you ought to set up your own practice. The money is supposed to be seriously good and as a unique selling point you could supply copious quantities of wine as a natural anaesthetic.

[DavidLaver]

Lancia sign looks good on the inside of the garage door...

[stanley sweet]

The furgoncino looks immaculate peeping out of the garage door. As you seem to slighlty overlap projects and this one is almost there what about hunting around for a 3RO for those bigger wine deliveries? Hope you're going to spray a bit of champagne over the bows of the furgoncino if all goes well with the CT and I'll be very surprised if it doesn't.

[tzf60]

Simon, I have a dental appointment for next week. Having just seen your pictures, I think I'll cancel.....
 
Lovin' the voyage!
 
Tim

[peteracs]

Hi Simon

Amazing stuff as ever, hope the posts will just keep coming.

I too bought some old dentist tools a few years ago (not the complete set thankfully) and it is amazing what you find use for them on. The last car job was getting old seals and spring out of the Beta front calipers.

Peter

[Neil]

I see you have fitted yellow bulbs or filters to the Furgoncino's headlamps, surely not required for a CT any more in France?

[simonandjuliet]

It is a bit of an affectation ..... I really like seeing yellow headlamps at dusk/night because it means that something interesting may be coming down the road

With decent, new lenses they should be half decent as well

Good couple of days in the garage, just waiting on some bits to arrive from Italy. I will post a few pics later. I was amused to see that I am not the only one to buy up old dental equipment - my wife thinks I'm mad

[lancialulu]

I was amused to see that I am not the only one to buy up old dental equipment - my wife thinks I'm mad

Maybe the amusement will be seeing the queues of Aude ex pats wanting to have their teeth done post Brexit!!!

[simonandjuliet]

Tim, I even bought all the white coats , so I will look the part as well ..... plus the drill makes all the right noises !

Gradually working through my (lengthy) finishing list. The most time consuming has been the door seals. They keep fighting back. The knack has been to glue a section in place , leave it to dry and then move on to the next section. I just don't have enough hands. I have been using Sikaflex this time, no Tiger Seal available, I found that using best quality contact adhesive didn't really work and was messy.

There are enough other things to do to allow drying time.

Similarly, I have found a nice solution to fitting the vertical door seals. They were originally fitted onto a cardboard insert in the door channel, but I have used a soft foam rubber, self adhesive (see "not enough hands" above) section and then fitted the rubber and aluminium trim. The good thing is that it gives you some adjustment, the lip can be pulled in or released by tightening/loosening the screws.

Lovely detail is the little stainless bracket that holds the top 1/2" in place where it extends beyond the channel

It does mean that once all the seals are fitted the doors need a firm push to close .....

There are 2 elongated coil springs per door that hold the door wide open, they fit on the top and bottom hinges and took a little while to find the best way of fitting. After that everything was waxoyled and the covers were replaced

The door mirrors are a delight. Lovely chrome-backed mirrors (convex on driver's side) on long , sculpted arms attached to cast aluminium bases and pivoted on brass bolts and domed nuts. Economic madness !

The bodywork is now completely re-assembled - too much detail to note - and headlight retaining rims and new rubbers fitted etc etc

This afternoon has been spent trying to get the petrol gauge to work, but I think that may be another "indicator-switch" story and will need to wait until I have a few minutes to get my head around it

Last couple of jobs have been to make a new petrol cap seal and fit the suspension oilers and sliding pillar caps

[stanley sweet]

It looks a real beaut Simon. It surely has to sail through the CT with this level of attention. Any idea how they dealt with the door seals originally? Or are you working with a non-original type which are causing the difficulty? Then again, knowing Lancia, they probably did let 12 men spend three days just doing the seals. Profit? What profit?

[lancialulu]

I hadn't noticed how pointed the indicator lenses were. Weird but delightful