Toomanyprojects' workshop / garden / *Insert other* projects

It's that time of year again...

With the rare sighting of a strange orange orb in some blue sky once more, plans were afoot once again to progress the garden project(s).

This weekend it was the unfortunate result of a section of privet hedge succumbing to the mite/infection that seems to have affected a lot here. As such it had to be removed and replaced.

As this section backed onto the patio area, the plan was to make a screen to partially reduce some of the road noise we get too, hence it may have been a little over engineered

Once the hedge had been removed, albeit saving what we could, timber collected and coffee drunk, it was on with post hole digging and setting in place


The joys of soft soil at this time of year and quick setting postcrete meant I soon had a framework


Quite pleased with that, although as you can see SWMBO was intent on clearing the hedge as fast as possible with fire, and the other quality inspector wasn't that bothered either...


Now that over-engineering bit... well to reduce the road noise, it was decided that it would be a good idea to turn the fence into an acoustic panel, for that reason the leftovers from the pond lining were utilised


I must confess it was actually rather effective and a damn lot cheaper than the sections you can buy online. Happy with that, it was time to get busy with the nail gun and some roof battens, which after careful spacing and nailing left me with the following


Turned out better than I had hoped, and more importantly, SWMBO was happy - another job off the list!

A long weekend for Easter meant only one thing... how could Mrs TMP come up with a list to keep me out of the workshop

Joking aside, it was time to tackle a job that was long overdue, the rotting front fence. First job was to remove what was left


Which took a lot less time than I anticipated as it, quite literally, fell apart in my hands


What followed was then ground prep, cutting of posts, digging holes and slowly piecing together. Alas despite it being on the verge of British summer time, the darkness soon fell and when it got to the point where I couldn't see the bubble on the spirit level, it was time to call it a night


So Easter Sunday started with a tidy to break up the old fence, then to add the last couple of sections


Much better. After a few other jobs such as mowing the lawns and visits from family and friends, there wasn't much time left for the workshop, but the following day was finally looking promising... more 'over there'

Some more workshop work over the weekend... including painting up something that ended up being a belated birthday present from Mrs TMP, after seeing something on our weekend travels that I'd spotted the week before


Any guesses?

It looks very cosy now!

It's that time of year when the distractions come thick and fast, if it's not the garden it'll be something related to it

Earlier in June it was finally time for the aforementioned 'milestone birthday' of SWMBO. As such preparations were needed, and as the weather was being typically british and we had no idea if the day was going to be dry, it was 'decided' that my workshop would be requisitioned for the war birthday effort.


oh and the spray booth too


Elsewhere the garden got a marquee


and a firepit


Come the day, the lift was transformed into a cheese table, and some familiar forum members were soon catching up


Suffice to say it was a busy but thoroughly enjoyable weekend. The trip to Scotland after to recover was definitely needed!

Since then things have returned to semi-normality, I've still not got near the Celica though as something a little bigger is currently taking up my time


I'd been putting it off for a while but a few things needed attention, first replacing the coolant bottle as the previous one had let go along one of its seams, but to get to it requires a full front end removal




That job done, it was then time for a full service, time to make it fly ready to get the belly pans off


So you can access the sump bolt and trickily positioned filter


and proceed to make a right mess...


every bloody time

Thankfully all straightforward once cleaned up and I've changed the air and pollen filters too, not yet done the plugs as I need to order some more first.

Finally onto the job I've been avoiding, rear beam replacement


Once stripped down you can see the issue


but to replace requires a fair bit of surgery, including lots of cutting and welding, so for safety and access sake, I'm removing the LPG tank


The chassis will also get a good cleanup and treatment while I'm there and I'm also upgrading to a 13 pin set up for towing. I'm sure other jobs will also soon become apparent...

More soon

Yup, a new one has already been acquired along with 13 pin conversion harness


The fun bit will be tying it back in with the fixed hitch, as well as welding to where it locates on the chassis with these two 'joins'.


Guess what I'm doing this weekend

Plan B was to break out the back up tools


and after a few strategic cuts, it proved rather effective, you can now see the offending balance weights that are right in the way


In the cold light of day, it was definitely the right decision to replace the beam


Next battle will be to extract the removable tow bar section


I've never had a key for this, however there are ways and means that the more unscrupulous discovered to bypass the lock when borrowing them on a permanent basis - you simply knock out a roll pin, yes really. However... the pin in the above is unsurprisingly and annoyingly solid, and I can't get a drill near it to get it out that way either, so for the sake of a relatively inexpensive new locking cap and mechanism, it's getting butchered sliced off.

As you may see from the above, I also now need to modify the beam to take off the brackets it comes with before I can get it into position.


The rest of the area will get a good clean up and probably some chassis black, I'm also going to order some underbody protection, potentially lanoguard or similar and some cavity wax to put down the chassis while it's open.

All good fun... I think... at least it's considerably better than the well-into four figures I was quoted to do this job by a local LR specialist

More soon

That workbench is too clean and tidy.

I had forgotten about that.