MatraSport Forum

Having messed around during the winter months on small bits and bobs I am now getting down to the business of sorting the bodywork. I have added a few pictures but what I have been doing is basically adding a layer of glassfibre tissue over the exposed glass fibre strands and filling and sanding to make smooth again; once the body was in some sort of shape I have sprayed the shell with upol reface - this is basically a primer filler with a hardener, it is not too difficult to rub down but I must admit the novelty is beginning to wear off!

You will notice that on some of the panels  I have sprayed a tell tale light coat of coloured paint to show any low spots when I sand down the primer filler layer.

Regards
John

PS The photographs are unfortunately out of order.

Nice work.  It'll be good to see another 1.6 back on the road, so keep it up.

very impressive!  :)
are you redoing the doors aswell ?

my car needs that attention asap  ::)  can I swing by and drop it off ?  ;D

I am redoing all of the panels - it seemed like the correct thing to do when I started!!!
but I am sure it will be worth the effort in the end.

What is even more crazy is that I have a Lotus Elan +2 which also needs this treatment when I have finished the Murena, but at least I will have a fun car to drive while I am doing more filling and sanding.

You can drop your car off when I need a retirement job!

Regards
John

John,

Your work is most impressive and very interesting as my 1.6 has been promised a new coat since taking ownership. I've sent you a PM.

Titus.

Hi All

Well I do not know about spring end new enthusiasm, as we are now only a couple of days away from the longest summer day it seems that I have been dragging my feet. At last I now have a car that is green or should I say a lot of green parts! Now I have to reassemble the car and refurbish those parts that I have completely forgotten about. I am aiming to get the car ready for the MOT by the end of July so that I can at least get a few days out in the car before the end of the summer - time will tell.

Regards
John

Well spring is long gone and after more late nights my Murena is back on the road. There is still work to do but I decided to go for the MOT test to see how the car would fare, my concern for the brakes all being new and not bedded in properly was unfounded as they passed the test with no problems; with the addition of road tax and insurance I was out on the road only for rusty pulleys shredding the fan belt after about half an hour, a quick call to my son who arrived with spare belt and spanners and we were back on the road. Generally the car is OK apart from an annoying rattle from the front offside brake caliper even though I took great care with the anti rattle springs and getting used to the relativly heavy steering, or have I just gone soft driving modern over assisted power steering cars!

Regards
John

Fantastic job John - car looks great.  8)

Paintwork looks good! Almost makes me consider keeping mine green! ;D

Very nice work!  :D

Hi John.
Super job on the car. I am jealous  ;) as I still need to get to the painting part of my restauration project. Mechanical issues have plagued the progress.

About the rattle from the caliber, check the wedges that sit between the caliber frame and the piston housing. If they are worn too much you will have a rattle. They should fit so the piston housing can slide smoothly, but not move up/down.

And steering, make sure you have the correct pressure in your tires. The lower, the harder it is to turn. But it should not be over inflated either.

Impressive job, John.  I look forward to seeing it at the Wobbly Wheel.  New wedges are available for the brake calipers.  I find the steering a bit heavy, although cleaning at lubricating the rack helped a lot, but I assume you've done this already.

Lot of hard work done with a nice result.
Nice to see another one back on the road.
great job

Agree, I can feel a noticeable difference if the tyres are just 0.2 bar underinflated. Correct pressure front is 1.8 bar, rear 2.5.

Great looking car, well done!

Looking very nice! Excellent job! And are You going to renovate also the wheels?  ;)

Yes I will renovate the wheels over the winter, there are still some jobs to do but I felt that I needed to get the car on the road and use it and keep the enthusiasm going.

Regards to all

John