I didn't have chance to post these pics before the National so here goes:

I've been doing a bit more of the bodywork every so often & have been putting off replacing a piece of wood that's been delaminating under the driver's door sill.



As with all the panels that I think about replacing, I sand away the paint to reveal where the rivets are that hold the panels on first. Seeing as there were only 3 rivets holding this piece on to the main internal longitudinal box section and the wood panel is only superficial, I decided that I could remove it & tidy up the metal behind without having to replace the wood in one go.



This is what I found underneath, just surface rust & easily tidied up.



A generous helping of red oxide primer and the area will be ready to accept some new wood next week.

Ive got some spare laminated wood flooring in the shed if you fancy covering the whole car? not sure about how well it would stand up to rain though!

Ah well cleverclogs, remember - it's not what you use, it's how you cover it. You wouldn't weld in new metal in & just leave it would you?

Here's a quick post to mention what I thought was going to be a tricky repair but wasn't.

I'd previously wire brushed a rusty area below the windscreen but had recently noticed rust coming back through the paint so I decided a bit more digging was required. After sanding back a bigger area with a flapper disc on my angle grinder, 2 holes appeared so I cut a squarer hole round them to make it easier for welding.

This is the resulting hole



and the repaired area

Well I'm ashamed to admit that I haven't given Belinda much attention over the winter apart from starting her a couple of times but today I've given her a run in preparation for Firkin Freezing next weekend. It took a bit of cranking & a bit of petrol in the carb but we got there in the end.

I've taken her for a couple of trips out over the weekend & was brave enough to try a 6am trip to work this morning. The frost on the windscreen was surprisingly quick to demist (yes, DEMIST!!!) but the cabin is still a bit chilly due to draughts getting in around the roof. Although Mehari owners will produce the smallest violin in the world at this point, I may spend the next couple of weeks running some draught excluder around the base of the detachable roof & revisiting the idea of sound proofing (and therefore insulating) the bulkhead.