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MG Midget and Sprite General - Front Wing Repair?

Hi All

The front wings on my MKII have rusted at the lip area, otherwise they are repairable.

As this us quite a complex shape, has anyone got an idea how these could be repaired? I have thought of, dare I say it, fibre glass, by taking a mould off a good wing and then using that to get the shape on the the one that needs the repair?

Has anyone tried this?



Tony Brough

Why would you make a mould when you can purchase them quickly and easily?
rachmacb

Maybe because a new wing is nearly £400?
Dave O'Neill 2

FG is a nice idea, but I'm not sure how long the join between the original wing and the FG aould stand up, would be annoying to get a crack there! Might be OK if you went up the inside a bit to strengthen it, but my tyres are very close to there so there's not a lot of space...

on one of mine, dad welded a vertical strip round the bottom and then patched the rest up, on another we cut the bottom off a different wing and spliced it to the original like so

http://www.flickr.com/photos/34910348@N08/3306538367/in/set-72157613098281666

you can see the fix on the bottom part of that one as well, but you might not have enough left to do that

Rob Armstrong

Never seen one that expensive!
rachmacb


Hello Tony. I did something somewhat similar to Rob.

Below is a picture of my front wing with a non existant bottom lip.

I bought a very cheap second hand wing that had rusted at the rear but was sound in the bit I needed.

The way I did it was (clever idea courtesy of my dad, can't claim credit for it myself):

we made a wooden jig which bolted through the headlamp mounting holes and sidelight mounting holes.

cut through both wings roughly along the line I've drawn on the photo.

bolted the repair piece in place through it's sidelight and it was firmly held in the right place, and I could weld it in, confident everything was in the right place.

I was very pleased with the result, and I think it cost me about £20 instead of the cost of a new wing.


Hope that gives some food for thought? I'm always in favour of a bit of bodgery to save a few quid.

Mark

MarkH1

Tony, it depends on what tools you have access to and how good your welding skills are. If you have access to a shrinker stretcher and a small sheet metal brake then you can form the edge piece pretty easily. If not then I'd work in very small pieces, say an inch or so at a time. Cut out a small area and form a patch for that area using the two sides as a guide for the shape, and then repeat once that bit is welded in. Time consuming, but once it's ground down it will be quite solid and with a thin skim coat of filler should be undetectable on the car.
B Young

watch out though, 1500 wings seem to be a differnt profile down there, at least mine were : the yellow one in my picture had it's bottom cut off to supply a better condition wing that turned out to be a 1500 one, hence the stitching back together of the yellow one...
Rob Armstrong

Hi All

Thanks for the replies and ideas, it has given me a bit more to think about. I have another set of wings that are in a lot better shape, but they are off a MKIII so the side lights are in a different place and to be honest far to good a condition to sacrifice.

I think the way that Rob / his dad made the graft is probably within my skill set, so I suppose I will keep an eye on ebay for some MKII wings with decent fronts.

Thanks again

Tony Brough

bought a section of a front wing from the classifieds here, it welded on well and is too low for anyone to notice the slight imperfections.

BH Harvey

This thread was discussed between 05/10/2011 and 07/10/2011

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