A310 V6 1978 rebuild and then some...

I thought I'd share some pics from a madman trying to resurrect an absolute shed of an A310. V6 1978. I bought the car about five years ago and let it mature in a barn while I waited for time to do it. I've been into Renaultsports for years and as I'm maturing the older cars are becoming more interesting! I bought the car from a chap in Kent who had the good intentions to do it up but gave up early on and I picked it up with many bits already piled up in the car. It looked ok and was cheap so I loaded it up and got going. So far the body has come off and oh dear. It's not a pretty sight.
The whole front end has been replaced and half of the nsr quarter panel. By the looks of the whole body could have done with skipping. Any way I'll upload a few pics and I could do with some reassurance that everything will be ok as so far it's just gone from bad to worse!
The more I look the more I find and it isn't good.

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[Alpineandy]

Hi mustbemad, it does look like it's had a serious whack at some time. If the repair is on straight then the few bits you've pictured may be time consuming but I don't think they're difficult. The more important thing is, Is the chassis straight and relatively rust free?
Provided you got it at the right price then you may not be mad. The early cars up to (and including 78) are the more sought after cars with the stainless window surrounds rather than the black surrounds, so it should be a good investment....... should be

[BIG_MVS]

Wow nice find, all repairable I hope? If you speak to Paul Sage he should be able to help with pointers for repairs - he may even know the car to give you some history on it.

Keep us upto date with progress

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The car has very low miles, (about 35k miles) if I remember correctly as the gauges are off being refurbished. The story goes it was brought into UK in 1982 and never motd or taxed so has been off the road since then. There's little history so not sure if this is true but condition of chassis would say it hasn't been on salty roads very much.
It's definitely had the body off to be repaired a long time ago and most of the new glass hasn't stayed attached! The chassis is very good, some rot on the front top cross member and radiator mounts but all easy repairs. The osf outrigger has been replaced previously and has rotted out but other outriggers are good. I think the rusty stuff is non original and the rest is amazingly good! All the perforated plates will get replaced and I'll make a new roll bar too as the baseplates had reverted back to iron ore.
I've had a measure up on the chassis and its all straight. I think it must have been mainly cosmetic damage.
I've had the wheels done already and they look great, thumbs up to Platinum Alloys, great service and top notch job.
A mate of mine works for a boat builders so he's showing me the ropes with the grp. It should all repair ok but it just looks so bad at the moment I can't imagine it ever looking good again!

[Alpineandy]

It sounds like you have a interesting project there then.
Tell your boat builder mate that Alpines are a bit unusual in the fibreglass car world as they mainly use woven rather than matted f/glass which is a bit stronger. Often finished/strengthened where necessary with mat so it's not always immediately obvious.
As MVS mentioned, it's definitely worth sending Paul Sage a quick message (I think his wife Cynthia is usually on here) as it's very unlikely he hasn't heard of the car at the very least. He was the only A310 man here for many years, so he was the first port of call for anyone wanting parts..
Roughly whereabouts in the country are you?

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Had some good progress today. Got the engine and box out and stripped down the rear suspension.

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Had a suspension Bush stud seize in the lower wishbone and couldn't get it out for love nor money, so I weighed up cutting the stud or the mounting, and opted for the latter as a bit of laser cutting and five minutes of welding beats trying to find or make a new stud!

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Got the whole arm off and pulled the offending Bush out and a few tonnes on the press soon got it out.

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Found some more rot where water had got in through a rivnut holding the water pipe on. Looks a bit tricky to cut out and replace but should be ok. All the rest is solid around the rear suspension and engine bay.

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There's been a bit of progress but all a bit tedious stripping of bits, cutting of rusty nuts and lots of hammer and chisel action going on!

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All the bits have been going to be blasted and everything will be zinc plated prior to an epoxy paint.

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The throttle pedal was not for coming off and I gave up drilling the grub screws out after blunting so many drill bits! God knows why they made them so hard. I opted for measuring the pedal and lever and cutting it off with an angle grinder. I can then get the pedal in the bench drill and weld the lever back on!

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Finally stripped the whole chassis and got it off to the blasters before repairing it all. Just out of interest does anyone know if they tend to have a small distortion in the main chassis box section just where the outriggers weld on at the front? It looks like weld distortion as its pulled down about 3-4mm on the exact point where they join on but not too sure?!

Well done you look like you have made great progress so far. How difficult was it to remove the body?

Trevor.

Thanks Trevor. It's going well so far, not started glassing yet though and that's the bit I'm unfamiliar with! Body was easy to get off especially as I wasn't too bothered about scratching the paint! I couldn't remove the pedals so I just cut a hole in the floor to get it off and repair that later. All the rest of the body removal was pretty straight forward. I did have better results dropping the chassis out rather than lifting the body off.

Well you've done very well so far and please take plenty of pics. I ask as I have a similar job to do but been advised not to remove the body due to refitting issues which makes sense but I can't see how I can do a proper job on the chassis and feel it will always bug me if I come up short.

Trevor.

Yeah, I was a bit intimidated to start with and was being ultra careful with everything but soon realised I needed to stop faffing about and get the grinder out. Once I got stuck in it was fine and I didn't really have a choice as the body is pretty bad.
I always had the intention of doing a nut and bolt restoration and I'm enjoying it now I can see some progress.

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I saved a neighbours racking that was going to the tip so cleaned it up and sorted out my new and just plated parts.

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My local motor factors are ace and more than happy trawling through part numbers so got some bargain parts. Febi balljoints for £5 each, wheel bearing kits with FAG and SNR bearings in for £25 a corner, pads for £5 and lots of meca bits I couldn't find anywhere else!

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Just ordered my spray gun and going to do all the plated bits in a coat of epoxy mastic too. I've just ordered the bilstein dampers too as I'm quite lucky I have an account with them. Can't wait to bolt some bits back together!

[BIG_MVS]

Cool carry on.

Have you got front and rear wheel bearings for £25 each? That's a good price as I seem to remember they are supposed to be Renault only at £100 ish?

Yeah I did a bit of digging and got some parts numbers and then our local motor factors did the rest and I ended up with reboxed FAG and SNR bearings so well chuffed!

Be careful as I got some wheel bearings that where 35 each and looked the part and fitted ok after cross referencing numbers. But I have dun about 5000m thought I had a drive shaft gone, dropped the engine out for upgrading, and both bearings are shot completely.

They are laser etched with FAG and SNR and come from a kosher company so I'm confident they're the real deal!
Picked up the chassis today from the blasters and looks like hardly any rot but the front isn't on straight. Maybe needs more work than I thought!