Chris_Collins

Found a photo of when I finished resetting all the strings Attached Thumbnails

Overnight in the electrolysis bath and they are ready to fishoil and weld in when the opposite is removed. Attached Thumbnails

Another small area that needs converting back to Tilly spec is a section of the side footwell. The car has stamped holes in the panel whilst the Tilly is solid. Only the large holes are filled with masonite so the stamped holes would be still visible. The rusty of front end collected from Len Watkins can donate these bits, including the straight flat bar welded on to accomodate the fire extinguisher bracket Attached Thumbnails

I clamped the pillars in situ and they seem to look ok. Will try the roof and hang the doors when they are both ready before welding the pillars into place permanently. Attached Thumbnails

The tops of the B pillars are modified to join the roof. Crush tubes are inserted in the pillar with small pieces of pipe and the trafficator opening was welded over and the pillar capped. Attached Thumbnails

The cages were welded through the holes drilled each side and the cuts rewelded. Attached Thumbnails

he B pillars on the wartime Tillys have six caged nuts inserted in the rear of the pillar to attach the rear body. Converting the car pillar required the same but as it is a sealed peice I had to open it up to insert the cages. I folded the cages from 2mm sheet.

Another area that requires modifying on the chassis is the seat mounts and passneger floor. The car was fitted with an under floor toolbox. Strangely that appears to have been a feature of the prewar cars as well but was removed from the Tilly. The floor was patched over. As the wartime seats were different and simpler the mounting is different but can be simply swapped over from the rusty Tilly. I would have thought leaving the toolbox in situ would have made more sense for a military vehicle. Attached Thumbnails

As I was completing the A pillar joints I noticed the 1946 car was finished off with nicely applied lead filler around the door frame and guttering. The wartime Tilllys got no such treatment so I melted all the lead from the entire door frame with the oxy torch. I didn't like the look of the rust behind the guttering so I unpicked the spotwelds and removed the guttering. It wasn't rusted through the body anywhere but I can now clean the guttering in my electrolysis bath and sandblast the body properly before reattaching the guttering. Attached Thumbnails

A couple of other modified pieces from damaged roofs were also removed to be fitted into the new roof. All the timber pieces will need to be replicated from the intact originals. Then all the pieces will be sand blasted before being reassembled. So out of four authentic Tilly rooves, plus the car roof I can salvage and complete two Tilly rooves. Next I moved onto relocating the B pillars. The car pillars are simply relocated back to accommodate a bigger door. I cut the sill around the pillar, wiggled the pillar until the internal spotwelds gave and removed the whole lot. The gap is filled with a patch just as the originals were done. I did cut the right side a bit too long so an extra patch will be required. I wil grind up the weld so it can't be seen. The rear curved section of the pillar is cut away to square it up. Attached Thumbnails

I removed the roof from the complete Tilly and stripped the timber from it so I could take measurements and comparisons in replicating a Tilly roof from the car roof. It was cut to length and removed from the car chassis and a 20mm fold formed up with pliers. B pillar upper sections from the damaged roof were removed and grafted onto the newly formed roof. Attached Thumbnails

As these Tillys have the removeable roof, the A pillar on the car needs cutting and fitting with plates that bolt together. I welded some braces to the pillars so the windscreen stayed in place when cut. I cut up the required sections from 2mm plate, slipped them in situ and tacked them in place. Attached Thumbnails

I am happy that this section will all go together well. I will get it all sandblasted and primed while all the pieces are open and accessable to blasting before it is reassembled. I also took the opportunilty of installing new shackle bushes in the chassis rails while they were easy to handle. Attached Thumbnails

Once the unwanted material from the opposing pieces was removed I clamped them all up to see how they lined up. Attached Thumbnails

Once the floor was removed I cut off the rear chassi rails of the Tilly complete with the rear side mounting points. I then altered the floor pan of the car to match. This only required squaring off at the rear most end. A folded section was removed from the Tilly that goes under the rear to brace the end of the floor. I then cut away the outside skin of each chassis rail to the sill leaving as much of the inner section as possible. Attached Thumbnails

The floor panel was removed by drilling out all the spotwelds. It is pretty solid still with one small area rusted through. The rear section is badly rusted and will need to be replaced. Chris wants to tow a trailer so I will replace the rear section with some heavier 3mm sheet re-enforced so I can incorporate a stronger section to mount a tow bar. Attached Thumbnails

These photos show the rear floor layout of the Tilly showing where the sill is chopped and the B pillar located, and the main mounting point for the rear body sides. All that has to be relocated or fabricated onto the car chassis. Attached Thumbnails

The Tillys share the same B pillar as the car, it is just moved back a few inches to accommodate the wider door of I think the Morris 8. The roof is the same, just chopped, folded and re-enforced with timber. The rear floor is a different panel so I had to remove that from the original and after repairing that it will be fitted. All the surplus sheet metal from the car was removed. I found that repairs had been made roughly to the rear chassis rails so that presented a problem but the rear chassis on the original Tilly seemed salvageable. Luckily Tillys are small enough to work with on a bench. Helps having a small excavotor. Attached Thumbnails

So after assessing what we had we decided that although the first chassis was restorable, the amount of work did not warrant it and a replacement would be a better option. We located a 1946 model car which shares the same chassis and with some modiification came be made to look identical. That is Chris posing next to what should have been his new pride and joy. Shame it was to be sacrificed as it was quite restorable itself. Attached Thumbnails

Chris was very fortunate when a bloke from West Australia (Andrew Curran) contacted him via the Tilly Text magazine with the offer of the remains of the fourth Tilly that he had salvaged many years ago. It was crated up and shipped over. Attached Thumbnails

As you can see I have a very robust portable workbench and overhead gantry. It was easier to lift the front hald up in the air and drop the engine out from the chassis. Bit like slaughtering a beast. That front half is not much good but wil provide a few bits and possibly some rust repair patches before its carcass hits the scrap heap. Attached Thumbnails

We were short of an engine with this original Tilly hence the lead to Len Watkins and the purchase of the complete Tilly plus the remains of a second which had a complete engine still in situ. We got the complete vehicle running, and the engine was stripped from the othe remains. Attached Thumbnails

more photos Attached Thumbnails

More photos Attached Thumbnails