The daily Post

Well my luck was in on ebay, I won a rear bumper for £46 and the people I won it from are a bodyshop, so for an extra £60 its being sprayed the correct colour. This will take a couple of weeks, when its being painted and send down, I will fit it and put the photos on here of what it looks like on the car, but in the time between this happening here is a photo of the bumper before being painted.

Today I started to remove the sound deadening material that is all over the car (its like a tar/bitumen, sticky panel, and helps to make the panels not resonate)<

I went outside at about 9.30 to start the job after some research on the internet, some people just hit it with hammers, and chisel it off, others use dry ice, but the majority of people seam to use some form of heat gun.

Problem number one I do not own a heat gun, and buying one to be used once was not high on my priorities, so the girlfriends hair dryer, a wooden spatular from the kitchen draw and off we go.

The first panel I attacked was the passenger side floor, it took me about 4 hours to clear one part, it was slow progress, looking at the time and the amount I needed to do I was thinking it would take me about 2 days to get it out.

But the next panel was under the rear seats, this just fell off with a little heat and persuasion, so I was back in with a chance to do this in one day (depending on light)

Drivers side footwell was next and this was in the same state as the rear seats, it came away with ease, and only tool me 2 hours to do the footwell.

I still have a couple of little panels to do on the rear shelf and some in the boot, but I am generally pleased with progress made today, even though my hands hurt.

Next step is to remove the residue of the sound deadening panels, I am going to try autoglym tar remover first, and then move on to the white spirits etc, but this will be next time.

Well the list of items is going down slowly, I still need to buy the brakes, suspension and get a cage fitted.

For the cage, I think it will be a custom cage, its just getting the right person to fit it, custom cages can fit it themselves, but there are other options.

To get the cage in the car, the windscreen needs to be removed, and as its got a chip on the top (near the roof) I think it will break when removed, also with me removing the heating system, I think a heated windscreen will be fitted, this will give a facility to clear the screen and also save weight from the removal of the heating system.

The new bumper is fitted, I brought it from ebay a couple of weeks ago, and had good luck that it was painted white.

Took about 1 hour to fit, and makes the front of the car look a lot better, don’t know if its lighter than the old standard one, but I like it.

Also continued to strip the interior, with the glove box, under dash parts and the wiring for the stereo being removed, also started to remove the headlining.