Ouch my eye!

So I took a few minutes this weekend to give the chassis a quick bath to get off any soot and loose dirt to get a better idea of the condition. I managed to get a few pics too.

As it turns out, the chassis is in remarkably good condition, considering its history.  Despite having been in a fire, and having been neglected for several years, the chassis appears to be completely salvageable. I have to give credit to ULS for making one high quality, solid chassis. These things cost over $10K new, and they certainly didn’t skimp on the quality of materials. The chassis is fully welded, and made of heavy gauge steel. If I had to guess, I’d say it was built to withstand [or more specifically, contain] a fire. Given the history of this unit, I’d say it passed with flying colours. Probably the biggest weakness in the design was the large acrylic window on top, that melted in the fire. I plan to use glass instead, and from what I can tell ULS has done the same on their current offerings. The next weakest point was the control panel, that didn’t have adequate protection from the fire, and burnt up as a result… I plan to address this somehow as well.

As for damage to the chassis itself, beyond the rust, some scalloping has formed on the long horizontal seams where the bottom and walls met, likely due to the heat from the fire.  Some similar scalloping is at the joint of the upper deck and rear wall as well. I should be able to bang these back,and seal any remaining gaps along the base.  Then there is the warpage on the top door, and edge of the upper deck… both relatively minor, and should be easily fixable. There are some other minor tents in the bottom, likely from [mis]handling after the fire. Nothing so far seems to be a show-stopper.

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As it stands now, the chassis is ready to be stripped, and then painted. However, I’m going to hold off until I have finalized how I’m going to handle the replacement control panel in the font, as well as any other changes/upgrades I may want to perform. In case they require modification to the chassis. I could strip it now, but I’d rather leave it painted as long as possible, to minimize new rust formation.