Our new baby, silver '94 XM 2.0i SX auto estate

[ekjdm14]

Finally some progress to report! Had very little time of late to do anything of note on the XM but today I managed to make a start on getting stuck into the rot. Here's some photos of the couple of hours work for you all to roll about laughing at (it is rather rusty!)

Having said that, it's not as bad as it could have been and at least now I can do a proper repair to the ailing metalwork where the floorpan/footwell/outrigger/inner, outer sills and strengthening plate converge. As opposed to the years of half-assed patching that's been done just so satisfy the MoT man virtually every year for the last 6-8 years.

Looking forward to getting more time to devote toward the old girl now as the weather (PLEASE!!!!!) improves, and once I finish cutting out the crusty bits I'll formulate a plan of attack re which bits need to be zipped back in first. I'm thinking footwell, outrigger, floorpan/inner sill, then strengthening plate (esp. around the B pillar & seatbelt mount) before closing it up with as close to original looking of an outer sill as I can make followed by a thorough cavity waxing and re-undersealing.

By the way don't worry about the dangling LHM pipes, I've popped the channel & clips off to get everything out of the way of the grinder & heat

[ekjdm14]

Couple more pics, can only load 5 at a time

The wing itself is in decent condition on the lower edge, I removed it for proper access to the front corner of the sill so I can make it all last a good few years yet.

This Y4 XM is in stark contrast to our N2 ZX which is solid as a rock and has never been welded, hoping to take that off the road once the XM is alive again & strip/rebuild it properly since it's a nice car under the tatty exterior and being such a solid shell I think it deserves giving every chance to be a survivor.

[sdelasal]

Wow - brave / talented man to tackle that. Out of interest, how do you manage to get such clean cuts at the right angle for example in IMG0567A.jpg? STeve

[fakeconcern]

Looks a lot of work, glad you've been able to get stuck in, hope the weather is kind.

[ekjdm14]

Yeh it is a lot of work but the car is reasonably straight bodywise and the interior needs details sorting but isn't bad, engine has had a head rebuild a few years ago too so to me it's worth it, especially being an estate and automatic too (my better half's preference), tbf it's worth it to my mind simply to keep another XM alive and in a good solid, tidy (and most importantly safe) condition even if I'm not aiming for concours haha!

On the cutting out, thanks for the compliment *blush* but it's just a roughly chopped out viewing "window" for the moment really made with a 4" grinder. Now I can see behind the sill & gauge how far up I need to open out to access the good metal on the central reinforcing plate, when I make that cut I'll scribe a line to follow with the grinder and do it more carefully. The more accurate/straight the final cuts back to good metal are, the easier it will be to form the repair sections to fit nicely.

It's nice to have a good solid concrete base to work on for a change, most of my life I've made do with working on gravel/dirt or nasty soft tarmac so having a solid point to jack/support the car is a boon, not to mention it dries quicker after rain too!

[sdelasal]

How do you get a 4" circular disc to make such a nice cut in that final 90 degree bend - the one which ends on the lower sill lip in IMG0567A.jpg ? I've heard of people using cutting discs but I always struggle in the tight corners - i must be missing some trick!

[ekjdm14]

Ahh I get you, well in truth if you look closely it's not at all neat and I've plunged the disc through the central part of the sill, since it's rotten anyway and then run the disc down vertically just taking care not to rip too far into the lip. To be fair I don't think theres much else one could do even if the centre was sound, you'd just have to slice through it and weld up the cut after anyway if you're using a cutting disc. Maybe a smaller dremel disc would be a neater solution but would take a while to cut through good metal,

[Dean]

That must be the fastest 16v XM estate in the world, looks like a stage three chassis weight reduction!
Good luck with it, i bet your itching to get started.

D

[markgenesis]

That is a scary amount of rust, pleased to see you are fixing it properly though

[ekjdm14]

That is a scary amount of rust, pleased to see you are fixing it properly though

It is, but then again I've had a hand in rebuilding the entire lower 18" of cab on a Dodge S75 skip truck a few years ago including making full floorpans, sills, footwells, wheelarches, mounting points door bottoms etc so far from the worst rust I've had to tackle although not being a work vehicle it will have to be a neater finish on the XM not just solid and "rugged" as the old dodger was