But when a dolphin grey tech 2 became available on here a month or so ago, my heart spasmed and i couldnt resist going for a look.
The viewing turned out to be hellish, mainly because of a heavy night out the night before viewing, a heavy dose of traffic and a tight schedule. But the car was advertised as only needing paint, with some resto work already having taken place.
Anyway to cut a long story short the car looked pretty good underneath and round the arse end, the front of the car was covered in 5 years worth of dust, and as a worse case, i knew i could frag it for more than the asking price. A deal was done.
Had the car recovered on a low loader, although it started and drove, the rear crankseal was pouring oil and the brakes were partial seized.
However it didnt look too bad in the summer sun.
It boasted a few new panels...
And one side was already part prepped...
Pretty grubby inside...
But as always, these cars hide their horrors quite well. If an hour with a pressure washer and TFR raised suspicions...
There was no mistaking once the stripdown began.
This car is rotten.
Very Rotten.
You may just be able to see the floor, through the floor.
After a few days spent wallowing in self pity, i explained to my brothers tha id break the car for parts and cover my losses. However we have a rather proud record of fixing things that most would condemn, so i bowed to peer pressure and began to fix the sodding thing.
Basically, the cars not that bad. (From the A posts back, or so i keep telling myself). The front third of the cars foo barred. Mainly due to previous owners 'repairing' rotten areas with a mix of silicone sealer, tiger seal and tin cans.
I have no idea how, or why, but this area seems to have been repaired by some kind of trained chimp on work experience. Id never seen an entire corner of a car held together by 3 spot welds and 4 tubes of tiger seal before.
I began with taking the car to bare bones, so all interior removed, windows out, dashboard removed.
A better look at the driver side front inner wheel arch repair, hand crafted with gloop
And the top of the drivers side inner wheel arch/front bulkhead/into front battery tray area.
With this outstanding repair trapping water, the damage was quite substantial, travelling from top to bottom of the A pillar.
The seam between inner wing fitch panel and inner wheel arch tub was literally pulling apart
With the damage visible from the engine bay, in the battery tray area
It all had to go.
Leaving quite a large hole, which i briefly considered leaving as an inspection hatch (in the same style as a glass hulled sight seeing cruise boat). After several rounds of tea i spent the next two days hand fabricating some thing that resembled new panels.
So that was that. Ill get some more pics at the weekend, but basically from floor to windscreen is now all new metal, pedal box bolts all welded back in, battery tray area repaired so its onto the other side when i get some free time.
Luckily, its in slightly better condition under the fusebox.....
Cheers,
Matt
