BodyworkGuide

Ash-Framed Doors & Tailgate

The Aceca is the closed version of the Ace, and the roof brought wood with it. The doors and the rear hatch are built on ash frames under their aluminium skins. This guide explains where the timber is, how to check it without taking anything apart, what can go wrong, and the choices an owner faces when a frame needs repair or replacement.

A note on sources

Very little has been published about the Aceca's doors and hatch specifically. Where a point comes from the Aceca itself, it says so. Much of the practical advice below comes from other ash-framed cars that have a large repair literature, chiefly the Morgan, the MG T-type and the alloy-bodied Jaguar XK120, and from professional coachbuilders. Those points are labelled with the car they come from. The principles of ash coachwork carry across; the details of any particular car do not always, so treat other-marque advice as a guide and confirm specifics with an AC specialist.

Where the wood is, and where it isn't

Doors and rear hatch: ash. "Unlike the Ace, the Aceca has timber-framed doors and tailgate" (Classic & Sports Car). Other model histories say the same, describing wooden frames "for the tailgate structure along with the more substantial doors" (Supercar Nostalgia).
Roof: timber reported. An owner who stripped his car to bare structure describes wood in the doors, hatch and roof. No published source confirms or contradicts the roof, so treat it as likely rather than certain.
Everything else: no wood. According to the AC Owners' Club, a series of small steel tubes supports the aluminium bodywork, and the bulkheads between engine and cabin and behind the seats are glass fibre. No source places ash in the pillars, sills, wings, scuttle or floor.

That is good news for an owner. The timber sits in the parts that can be taken off the car and worked on at a bench, not deep in the structure, as it is on a Morgan or an MG T-type.

Why the wood rots

Ash is a durable coachbuilding timber when it is kept dry. It rots when water gets in and cannot get out. On a door or tailgate, that usually means:

The bottom of the door. Rain runs down the inside of the skin past the window seals and collects in the bottom rail. If the drain holes are blocked, it sits there.
The hinge and latch posts. Morgan restorers warn that rot "can begin and spread around the door hinge posts" (Lorne Goldman, gomog.com). MG T-type guides single out the bottoms of the hinge and latch posts as the usual weak points (Classic Motorsports).
Damp storage. A Morgan rebuilder notes that the door pillar joints "are usually in poor condition, particularly if the car has been stored in a damp garage, or not garaged at all" (morganrebuild.co.uk).
Previous repairs. One MG TC restorer found the wood "had indeed been replaced … but with firewood" (ttypes.org). New wood is only as good as the timber and the sealing behind it.

Inspecting your doors and tailgate

None of these checks needs a tool more advanced than a torch.

1. Look

Shut lines. Are the gaps around each door even, and does the trailing edge sit level with the body? On a coachbuilt car, slightly individual gaps are normal and not, on their own, a sign of damage. A gap that has changed is.
The rear bottom corner. On Morgans, "the doors can bubble down by the rear corner" (Classics World). Blistered paint along the bottom of the skin may be rot underneath, or it may be electrolytic corrosion of the aluminium. Both need attention, for different reasons.
The hatch. Look along the bottom edge of the hatch and around the Perspex window seal, where water can sit.

2. Close it

A door should shut with a gentle push. A door that is tricky to close that way is "another indication the wooden body frame is past its best" (Hagerty UK, on the Morgan Plus 8). It is not proof on its own: worn hinges or a misplaced striker do the same.

3. The lift test

Open the door and lift its trailing edge gently while someone watches the hinges. "Vertical movement could indicate a rotten door rocker or hinge post. Maybe both!" (morganrebuild.co.uk). Where the movement happens tells you why:

What moves	Likely cause
The hinge pins	Worn hinges, not rot
The whole hinge, against the body	A loose body-side mounting
The hinge, against the door	Hinge screws losing their grip in the door frame: suspect the wood
The door itself flexes or twists	The frame's own joints are loose or rotten

4. Feel

With the door trim removed, "press it with your fingernail. If there's any give, the wood is probably due to be replaced" (Hagerty UK). Concentrate on the bottom rail and the bottoms of the hinge and latch sides of the frame.

5. Know about the diagonal cables

The auction description of a 1959 Aceca records that its "adjustable diagonal cables have been replaced in the front doors" (TheMarket by Bonhams). Adjustable diagonal bracing is a long-established way of keeping a timber door square. If an Aceca door has dropped, check whether its bracing needs adjusting before concluding that the frame has failed.

Rot or corrosion?

Two different faults can look alike from outside. Rot is in the wood under the skin: softness, movement and door drop. Electrolytic corrosion is in the aluminium itself where it meets steel: bubbling paint, white powder and pinholes along edges and seams. Many cars have some of both. See Body & Ash Frame and the body and corrosion guide.

Repair options, from smallest to largest

Re-securing hinge fixings

Where the only problem is hinge screws that have lost their grip, the wood around them can often be made good without a new frame. One MG TD restorer drilled out the old screw holes and glued in "3/8 inch fluted hardwood dowels" with waterproof glue, then re-drilled for the screws, and used stainless threaded inserts where holes were stripped (Hiram Kelley, ttalk.info).

Consolidating soft wood with epoxy

Penetrating epoxy sealers, such as CPES, soak into soft timber and harden it. Restorers of alloy XK120s have used CPES to seal new frames (classicjaguar.com). It has firm limits: the maker's own guidance is that "if you press the wood and water emerges then it's too wet" to treat (Rot Doctor). Opinion is divided on using it to rescue rotten wood. Some restorers call it "just a bandaid over a problem" and replace anything "larger than a dime"; others treat consolidation of wood that is "intact but soft" as legitimate preservation (AACA forum). For a structural door frame, it is best seen as a way to save sound-but-tired timber, not to rescue rotten wood.

Replacing only the damaged sections

A good coachbuilder will replace only what has failed. One UK coachworks describes its approach as sectional repairs that "replace only the damaged or weakened sections", with the policy "We retain and restore wherever possible" (Longford Coachworks). A rotten bottom rail can often be renewed while keeping the rest of the original frame.

A new frame

When the joints have gone throughout, or several members have rotted, a new frame is the honest answer. At least one Aceca has been through this: a 1955 car restored by David Royle between 1995 and 1997 was given "new Ash frame doors", described in its sale listing as "vital when undertaking a project this size" (Redline Classic Cars).

How a door frame is rebuilt

This is the general coachbuilding process, drawn from the sources below. It is skilled work, but it helps to know what a specialist will be doing and why.

Record the geometry first. Before anything is taken apart, make "accurate templates…of the parts requiring renewal" (morganrebuild.co.uk) and note the gaps on the car.
Strip the door. Remove the trim, window, latch, hinges and seals.
Lift the skin. The aluminium skin is folded over the edge of the frame and fixed. On the alloy XK120 the edges are "hammered over and secured with panel nails" (classicjaguar.com). The fold has to be opened carefully so the skin is not stretched or creased and can be reused.
Make the new frame. The old frame becomes the pattern. Coachbuilders use seasoned ash, "mortice and tenon joints", "hand-cut joints and dowelling" and "frame jigging & alignment" (Longford Coachworks).
Glue and fasten. There is a real debate here (see below). Epoxy fills gaps; traditional resorcinol needs tight joints and high clamping pressure (Storer Boat Plans).
Seal the timber. New ash should be sealed before the skin goes back on. XK120 restorers sealed frames with CPES and then "black epoxy primer, as it had been at the factory" (classicjaguar.com).
Hang the bare frame first. Fit the new frame to the car and set its gaps before reskinning, because "adding metal can at best only maintain its shape and fit but never improve it" (Bob Lyell, MG TC, ttypes.org). He aimed for a consistent bare-frame gap of about 6 mm, which the skin then reduced to a snug finished gap.
Reskin. Re-form the edges of the skin over the frame. Lyell annealed the aluminium frequently and used formers so the fold would not crease, and insisted the skin "must not be allowed to move by a fraction" while being dressed. Where aluminium touched ash, he keyed the surface and applied etch primer to prevent corrosion.
Refit and adjust. Hinges, latch, striker, seals and drainage go back, the door is aligned to the body, and the diagonal bracing, if fitted, is adjusted.
Paint. The reskinned door is painted and blended into the surrounding panels.

The doors are the fiddliest part of any ash frame. A Morgan builder who made a complete frame wrote, "I think I have as much time in the two doors as I did in making the laminated arches" (sawmillcreek.org). Lyell found the eight door panels on his MG TC took about as long as the rest of the tub.

The choices, and what people disagree about

Repair or replace? The coachbuilding consensus is to keep as much original timber as is sound and replace what is not. A new frame is right when the joints have failed throughout.

Glue everything, or not? Some builders glue every joint: one MG TD restorer screws and glues all wood-to-wood joints so the structure works "as a unit" (Hiram Kelley); a Morgan builder used epoxy throughout so that "the fasteners will be functioning as clamps" (sawmillcreek.org). Others warn that gluing everything "makes the body too stiff. The car will squeak, groan and some of the wood might even splinter", while some reply that "the stiffer you could make it the better" (AACA forum). A door is a small, self-contained frame, so the argument matters less there than in a whole body tub, but ask your coachbuilder which approach they use.

Treated or untreated ash? Morgan began treating its frames with Cuprinol after 1986 (Classics World; gomog.com). Earlier cars had little protection, and Morgan enthusiasts advise that, "provided the wood is sound, there is no reason to reject a pre-1986 out of hand" (gomog.com). For a new Aceca frame, sealing or preservative treatment is the sensible modern choice. Ask what your coachbuilder uses.

Which timber? Morgan states that "English ash is the most suitable type of wood and is exclusively used" (Morgan Motor Company). Other builders have used American ash successfully. Coachbuilt bodies from other makers sometimes used different hardwoods; one Jaguar specialist notes beech in some early bodies (jag-lovers). For an Aceca, ash is what the sources record.

Metal instead of wood? It is possible. Jaguar itself replaced the wooden door framing of the XK140 with steel in its final year, which helped stop the skins "oil-canning" (jag-lovers). On an Aceca, though, the hinges, latches, trim and seals are all designed to fix into timber, and a metal frame changes the car. For an original car it would count against originality and should be disclosed on sale. It is more at home on a modified car.

What it costs

No published price exists for an Aceca door frame. The reference points from other ash-framed cars show that the timber is the small part of the bill and the skilled labour is the large part:

A complete new door timber assembly for an MG TD costs £395.89 (Hutson Motor Company).
Individual Morgan door timbers, such as a hinge post, cost from £36.23 plus VAT (Melvyn Rutter).
One UK classic restoration workshop charges £62 an hour plus VAT (ADO Restoration).

The cost of a door depends mostly on how much of the frame has to be replaced and whether the skin and paint survive. Ask two or three AC specialists for quotes, and ask each to say whether the price is a repair or a new frame, and whether paint is included.

Keeping the wood sound

Store the car dry and ventilated. A damp garage is the enemy of both the ash and the aluminium.
Keep the drains clear. Make sure water can leave the bottom of the doors and hatch.
Look after the seals. Window and hatch seals keep water off the timber.
Dry the car after rain. Don't put it away wet, and don't cover it while it's damp.
Check once a year. The lift test and a look under the trim take minutes and catch rot while it is still a repair, not a rebuild.

Sources

Last updated 1 October 2026

Written by Jon Cosson

About the author

A lifelong classic-car enthusiast in North Yorkshire, near Thornton-le-Dale, who owns and maintains an AC Aceca, writing the single-model reference he always wished existed. Read the full bio.

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