I’ve been cleaning up under my '62 MkII with plans to install a new fuel tank. I noticed a long crack in the left side fender well. It was around the area where the exhaust bolts to. I got the area around the crack cleaned up and welded up. I have the factor service bulletin N20 about bracing up the area where the Panhard rod mounts to the body so, while I had the welder out, I thought I would go ahead and fab up and weld up that brace. The shock on that side looked to be in the way of getting the welder in there so, I removed the shock. The bolt hole in the body where the upper end of the shock bolts to was elongated. So, then I removed the other shock to see what shape the mounting hole was in on that side. It was fine because it had a thick washer like piece of metal spot welder to the body to add support. That thick washer piece was missing on the right-side upper shock mount. I made a copy of the support washer out of carbon steel on my lathe. I then made a top hat shaped sleeve with a hole through it to locate and hold the new washer in place with a bolt for welding. When I cleaned off the paint and dirt around the hole for welding, I found two more cracks from the bolt hole going outward. These cracks were caused because nobody bothered to install the missing support washer around the bolt hole. The odd thing was there wasn’t any cracks around the Panhard rod mount. Are there anymore areas that are known to crack on these cars?
To answer my own question I have found that some of the areas that are known to crack are listed in the Moss catalog’s replacement suspension parts. While cleaning the rear spring hangers I found one had the rear lip torn half off and the other one was broken from a corner to the center hole.
The Car must have had a rather hard life. What part of the country did it inhabit before you bought it?
looks like a “desert” car
over here, that means when they get driven, its over miles & miles of corrugated dirt roads, which are hell on earth for suspensions (and interiors), but good for rust
Does the car have (or has it had) a tow bar? I had this many years ago on an otherwise very sound one owner 3.4 MOD which had done a lot of towing.
Worse than the metal work damage, the rearward movement had resulted in the diff rear cover wearing through against the axle well and dropping all its oil, requiring a new diff…
I bought the car from a friend in Kansas. The roads in Oklahoma where I live are pretty bad in some areas. The car had been in storage for the past 20 years. I think maybe Bo or Luke Duke may have trained on it. The car didn’t have the extra Panhard rod mount bracing done to it and there weren’t any cracks around it. While I was repairing the cracks I found, I braced up the Panhard rod mount.