Hi all I'm a newbie here

[Sloany]

 Hi,
I'm Garry from Cumbria in the UK.
I have just bought a 1978 Spider to restore with my son (he's 15) as he wants one for his first car!
The car is silver, 2 owners from new with only like 28K miles, been in Spain for a while and dry stored for over 10 years.
Bodywork is pretty good, I knew the floor was rusty but was a bit of a shock once we started to strip it, pretty bad!
I have looked all over for replacement floor panels but no one seems to do these?
Will have to just get new ones made and welded in.
I have someone to re-trim the interior locally.
Son wants to change the colour to red and black interior.
Any contacts for spares etc. much appreciated as my list is getting longer!
Looks a great little site here, I was on a similar one for my old BMW M3, which was great for spares and advice..
I was gonna post some pics of car but struggling how to!
Garry

[HFStuart]

Hi and welcome.

Some pics of the car would be good but I suspect I know which one you bought (reg starts LWL )  The best way for me is to put them on photobucket then you can just cat and paste the IMG links here.

Spiders rust from the inside out as a result of not being watertight. Floor pans tend to go as do the bottom of the A & B pillars, screen surrounds and inner rear arches / turrets. You'll want to check the sills too and the special channels where the floor and sill join that are especially designed to trap water.

As far as I know there are no off the shelf floor pans unless Mark ( https://353652584127257704.weebly.com/ ) has a source. Patch repair may be possible or indeed your only option depending on how far gone they are.

If it's the car I think it is then it's a pre-facelift model, it's just my opinion but I'd want to keep the original 1970s interior if possible, it's rarer than the later type and far more distinctive. Pretty comfy too.

An hour on here will turn up lots of links for parts  - but be prepared to have to get bits from all over the world.

[peteracs]

Hi Garry

Welcome, hopefully you will get some answers to your questions. One or two from me....

To add photos you use the Additional Options just below the text box. Click on it and then use the Choose File option to select a photo on your system. There is a limit to the number and overall size, so try to keep each photo to around 100k or less.

I and others have had to have the floor pans replaced. There is no one I know of who offers them 'off the shelf'. My guys made them as others have which is pretty much what you will have to do for most of the panels both internal and external, though you may find some on Ebay and subito.it, though they can be costly even for ones taken from scrapped cars. I used fibreglass wings as unable to find new or decent old ones.

If the floor panels are poor, also check the front inner wings carefully and around the rear turrets both under the rear seats and in the boot.

Peter

[rossocorsa]

You need to need to talk to Bill Lewis about panels he might well be able to help

[Sloany]

How do I contact Bill?

[rossocorsa]

I've  sent you an email