[CroPatrol]

When washed and looked at the car from below it was all rusty. I was very disappointed. I wanted to give it for recycling, or to the scrap yard. I talked to the experts and looked on the internet. Friends have convinced me that such cars last an eternity and are easy to repair, which is not the case with newer ones. The rust was only superficial on the chassis. (The rest was not visible then.) Sandblasting is very well known on ships. It is a very well known procedure to me. My friend just then opened a small sandblasting company. He agreed to fix the bottom of my car. The first thing you need to do is place the car on a safe surface so it doesn’t fall on you while you work.

This is what the car looked like.

This rust was hidden under the paint.

Junction box. I will say more about that in the next post.

Front differential

The rear differential rusted more. The cabin was rusty only in places.

First he sanded all the parts that were more infested with rust with an angle grinder, with sandpaper.

Here you can see one of the few screws that broke in the workshop.

 

[CroPatrol]

One crossbar bolt is missing. Whether it fell out on its own, or someone took it out, I don’t know.

Another broken screw. How they are broken I have described here. New members

Cropatrol

In short I have been a member of this forum for a long time, but so far I have not introduced myself. My Nissan Patrol produced in 2002. I have been the owner since 2007, and I started doing various works in 2010. I believe I will describe all the work I did on the car. I guess it's in the...

www.patrol4x4.com

I'm sorry but I don't have pictures of the blasting process.
It was sandblasted with quartz sand with a pressure of 10 bar.
Painted with a special paint for car body, green color.

Half green and half gray can be seen here. Gray is a paint is for protection.

Painting is complete. A year later I will see that the paint is not as good as it was declared.

 

[dan ahern]

Dude, you haven't yet seen proper rusted chassis so🤣 my last Patrol went to 600k and my chassis litterly all fell apart on the rear end with the rear pan hard drop section box mount sitting on the road one day🙈 I got it all fixed up though before I sold it and it was as new!
As I always say chassis is something that can always be repaired.
Sorry to say though,yours here is just surface rust at best which is harmless.
Good job on the paint👍

 

[CroPatrol]

Now the car looked nice and tidy, but I knew things were never what they seemed at first glance. I decided to dig a little deeper and it was the right decision.
I removed the fender flare.

I thought I was going to pass in unconsciousness in surprise. Again, I wanted to take the car for recycling. Now I laughed, and decided to have fun.

There was a lot of mud under the plastic. Then I decided to dig further.

The joints rusted.

The screw broke, as many will break in further disassembly. But then I realized that all the cavitys are full of mud and require cleaning and painting.

Here you can see the light gray surfaces that are sandblasted to bare metal.

Here you can see how it is painted with green primer.

It can be seen here that it is painted with a gray finish.

But I was still not satisfied ...

 

[CroPatrol]

I wondered what was hiding under this cover.

Front left wheel

How is it possible for so much garbage to get under the cover?

Cleaned and sandblasted. Then painted and closed.

The fender rusted too.

I didn't fix this part because it can't be seen. The welding process causes the paint to burn and the metal to weaken.

I decided to disassemble the front as well. There was occasional rust. Everything is sandblasted and painted.

Interestingly, the brake disc rusted in 1 day because everything was washed with water.

The rear of the car was not seriously attacked by rust.

Here you can see the right back side painted.

But I was curious what was hiding under the plastic protection.
My recommendation is to control and disassemble in two ways.
A. Disassemble the entire vehicle if you have the conditions and capabilities to do so.
B. Disassemble one part at a time.
If you do it according to the B system then divide the car into sections.
1. Front left side.
2. front right side.
3. Rear left side
4. Rear right side.
5. Front bumper.
6. Rear bumper.
7. Passenger cabin from below.
8. Remove the fuel tank and paint everything from below.

 

[CroPatrol]

I disassembled this bumper marked in red.

Below was a bracket.

I found this under the brackets.

Sanded and painted. I recommend everyone to check out this position.

I found a small dent in the left rear door.

I took off the plastic protection and found a piece of a blinker from a car inside.

The plastic brackets broke.

I cut two pieces of aluminum and bent them.

With a little resin and fiberglass, I fixed it. Set in place and then drilled a suitable screw hole. From the other side I put a screw.

 

[CroPatrol]

I inspected the front balance bar, or (stabilizer or sway bar ) It seemed to me that there was something suspicious, so I took it off and disassembled it.

When I removed it, it looked like this.

There was rust under the supports.

The carrier was also rusty.

The ball bearing was worn out and falling out.

Cleaned and sanded - grind-ed

My supplier could not obtain the original part that day. So I took the most similar part from a car and welded the screw at the end.

To make the joint a little more elastic, I put a rubber seal under the brackets.

Everything mounted.
I'm thinking of taking off the stabilizer. What are your experiences and opinions.

 

[rgren2]

I'm thinking of taking off the stabilizer. What are your experiences and opinions.

I believe that would be illegal in Australia.

 

[AndrieK]

I'm thinking of taking off the stabilizer. What are your experiences and opinions.

Legalities aside, why do you want to do this?

 

[dan ahern]

Taking off the stabilizer will make the Patrol dangerous In a bend and could 'Roll over' in the worst case.
I'd let it on...

 

[CroPatrol]

Thanks for the opinions to: rgren2, AndrieK, dan ahern.
Two stabilizers are factory-installed on my Patrol.
The front one is fixed.
The rear stabilizer has an electrically controlled on and off position. There are two positions on the button: Stabi on and of. Following this logic, everything works without.
Reason why I want to take it off: I made protective plates under the car and the front stabilizer doesn't allow me to have the plate in one piece.

 

[CroPatrol]

The main rear fuel tank began to show signs of leaks, after I removed the tank protective sheet to clean the mud. I had several options. Patch up an old tank, get a new one, make a new one, or ... I looked at what other options are on the internet. I found that Australians put extra tank under the car on the right side. I couldn’t get a tank like that, so I decided to make it my way.

First I made a cardboard model and checked to see if it fit into the space. I got a 2mm stainless steel plate.

In a specialized workshop the plate was Cut to measure, bend welded. Left side

Back side (Rear side) with with fuel oil inlet, outflow to engine and return.

Front side.

Cleaned, valves installed.

Front side installed.

Rear side installed. Specification: Volume 88 Liters. Screws stainless steel. Valves 3/8". 3 Side support.

View from the right. I'll measure the sizes tomorrow.

 

[AndrieK]

Thanks for the opinions to: rgren2, AndrieK, dan ahern.
Two stabilizers are factory-installed on my Patrol.
The front one is fixed.
The rear stabilizer has an electrically controlled on and off position. There are two positions on the button: Stabi on and of. Following this logic, everything works without.
Reason why I want to take it off: I made protective plates under the car and the front stabilizer doesn't allow me to have the plate in one piece.

The swaybar disconnect is there to increase rear axle wheel articulation when going OFF-ROAD. The swaybar must be reconnected when driving on-road as the vehicle stability is seriously compromised at higher speeds without it.

If your swaybar disconnect still works, take the vehicle for a drive around a roundabout at about 30km/h with the swaybar connected, and then do the same with it disconnected. You'll soon realise why it's there...

The OE swaybar disconnect is known for failing and are quite expensive to replace. If yours is not working, you can replace it with the standard fixed version at a fraction of the cost.

The swaybar disconncect was never available in Australia on Y61 and frankly, unless you're doing serious off-road work, it's not really required. The fixed swabar is perfectly fine for most off-road use.

 

[CroPatrol]

To AndrieK Thanks for the additional information.
The size of the auxiliary tank is: Length 720, Width 400, Height300 mm. Volume is 86 Litres.
You will wonder how it is possible to accommodate that height. Here is the answer:

I added more rubber seals between the original cab brackets and the chassis.

The original screws were removed because they were short.

This image shows the Rear Left Bracket. The bracket can be seen because the main rear fuel tank has been removed.
It can be seen that this place was not sandblasted, because the tank was hiding it, that's why it's still rusty.

This is the bracket on the left behind the front wheel.

After painting it looks like this. All screws are made of stainless steel.

Here are marked the screws that I put in the original holes, and they serve to install the rear bracket of the small tank.

This is a cabin holder that I lined with rubber.

Does anyone know what these two weights are for. I guess to reduce vibration?

 

[CroPatrol]

Now that the cabin is raised in relation to the chassis, I continue with the work. Picture before the start of work:

1. I removed the rear factory bumper first, with rear stop lights. I don't have a picture.
2. Removed tank protection.
3. removed towing hook.

4. Removed main tank.

5. This is what it looks like without a tank.

6. The left side.

7. I cut off part of the chassis.

8. Middle part.

9. Left side. The picture is not brilliant, sorry.

10. Right side.

11. The cutting location is marked here.

 

[dan ahern]

Really fantastic job you are doing man!! Impressive effort

 

[CroPatrol]

The initial idea was to buy a rear bumper. I liked ARB the most, and some more, mostly from Australia. It was very difficult to obtain in Europe at that time. The second reason was that this very different bumper could not pass the technical inspection in Europe. It was complicated in Italy, impossible in Croatia. The reason is that both countries are in the EU. The only option was to make my own bumper and fit it into the existing plastic original bumpers from Patrol. Easier to say, than done.

First I bought a 100mm square tube with a 3mm wall. Length is 1840mm. The picture also shows a cardboard model of a new larger tank.

The picture shows how to attach to the chassis. The white painted part.

Detail seen from above.

Bumper mounted, no tank, no bumper cover. The exhaust is moved all the way to the left.

The exhaust is temporary. Side view. Still not satisfied.

Below is added another piece of tube 1200mm long.

The extension for mounting the tow hook is welded.

The bracket is made of 8mm thick stainless steel.

For reinforcement, I put an 80mm L profile.

 

[CroPatrol]

Such a major modification results in many adaptations. It was necessary to adapt the stop lights from decorative to functional. No pics for this, but members now from other threads how to do this.

There are no turn signals on the stop lights. I got the turn signals from Audi. Unfortunately, they could not fit in the planned place.

So I had to cut them off because they were too long. I opened the hole on the side and inserted the LED.

I pulled the wires out and connected them to the existing installation.

The spare wheel carrier also needed to be removed.

Raise the position of the wheel, as the lower part hit the bumper.

Rebuilt and welded.

The cardboard tank model touched the upper part of the cabin.

To get some more space I curved the lower cab joint upwards. It can be seen here.

 

[Slo4x4]

Too bad you didn't look for rear lights like this... they are bolt on, no modification needed... This store is here in Slovenia, but I'm sure you could find them in Croatia too.

Zadnja luč Nissan Patrol GR 98-01

Zadnja stop luč za Nissan Model: Patrol GR Letnik: 1998-2001 Žarnice:12W/21W/P21W

www.silux.si

Otherwise, a like all the work you done on your Patrol

 

[CroPatrol]

Thank you Slo4x4. The works I described were done 10 years ago.

First I made a cardboard model of the tank.
Acquired a 2mm stainless steel sheet board. I cut out the board according to the sizes of the cardboard.
In the workshop bent according to cardboard models.

Left and right sheet.

Anti-wave separators can be seen inside. 2 pcs.

The position and welding point of reinforcement can be seen here.

Visible curves at the bottom.

Pre-assembled. Spot welded.

Float sensor from original tank.

Tank welded with installed pipes.

Left side with bracket.

Rear bracket welded.