Raise the roof!

Here is the donor roof i found, doesnt look in great shape but it'll do the job once i've repaired it and refashioned the rear end to ft my low doors.

The following pictures are from chopping the roof off. It was a gruelling job which could have been done much faster with better tools. i.e. an angle grinder. I later discovered one of my friends owns a generator which he would of happily lent to me!!! argh!

Once I cut it free my friend arrive (to inform me of his generator) with his long wheelbase van and we lifted it clean off. It was heavy with all that metal still attached. We put it in the back of his van along with the struts and skylights and ratchet strapped the doors as they wouldn't quite shut.

It took me a good day to clean it up ready for repairing. I used an angle grinder to cut the bulk of the metal off and then used a combination of stanley knife blades and saw attachment with my trusty hammer and screwdriver ofcourse. I completely cut the back down by about 15cm as it's off a long wheel base bus and is too long for my bus. the windscreen metal was the hardest to get off. it was sealed with 2 layers of adhesive and very stubborn! Everything i tried resulted in me further damaging the fibreglass. I eventually tried the angle grinder which also damaged the fibreglass, however, the heat from the angle grinder turned the adhesive soft and it practically peeled right off!

Next job, repair, rebuild, re-fit!

I brought a standard fibre glass repair kit from Halfords complete with resin, hardener and 1sqm of matting for £12.99. Halfords wouldn't usually be my first choice but this actually wasn't a bad price. I picked up an extra pack of matting too for £3.49. Having never fibre glassed anything before I was slightly nervous but that wasn't going to stop me after all the work I had put in so far.
First off I put an 80 grit flap wheel (sanding disc) on an angle grinder and began tidying up the cracks / breaks / holes; getting rid of any sharp edges and sanding back the underside to give the repair mating something to sit flush to. (well that was the plan)
Do not under estimate how messy this gets. mixing the ingredients is easy and quick but having a second person to help clean as you go would have been greatly appreciated here. The process is quite simple really. Once you've mixed the resin just brush it on to the fibreglass, stick your pre-cut matting in place, brush resin over that so it's completely saturated and repeat the process until you've reached the thickness of the original fibreglass.
Once dried I used the angle grinder again to reshape the repair and sand it flush with the fibreglass.

I've still got the big hole to fill, a small break on the edge and a big crack to repair. After that I need to fill the repairs flush on the other side, prime and paint.

A few weeks later and all the fibre glass repairs are finally done! I used fibre glass paste for the smaller imperfections as it's much quicker and a lot less messier.
unfortunately fibre glass does leave an uneven surface so the next job is to use filler to get that smooth finish ready for painting.

I finally got a day off work when it wasn't raining so i've tackled the roof again. i took the sanding disc on an angle grinder smoothed over the rough spots ready for the filler. The filler surprisingly easy to work with, I layered it up thick, waited for it to dry and then took a sanding disc on a cordless drill to it. It's now mostly ready for primer and painting.
Top tip: always leave the guard on the angle grinder, it can hurt otherwise!