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That old boy with the Jowett at the top of this thread probably wants to drive it again before he pegs out so if I come round to yours @grumpynorthener with a few tubes of 'No More Nails' we can lash that up? Nothing would please me more to see the Javelin listed at the start of this thread returned to the road along with the owners confidence in the workmanship of the classic car restoration industry - give me 12 months and I will ensure that it happens. I run with an open workshop / open house policy and you are more than welcome to call at my place anytime at your convenience along with anyone else come to that - the kettle is always on. Whilst drinking your tea / coffee you can view / discuss the projects that are in the workshop at the time in order to understand the methods & techniques employed. The 'No More Nails' & lashing looks painful so I'll pass on that - thanks
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moglite
Part of things
Posts: 815
Club RR Member Number: 144
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Regardless of bodge and blame, I find it quite touching that grumpynortherner and the owners club have jumped in to help. But yeah if the owner is 88, crack on, my Dad is 10 years his junior, and I don't see him driving for another 10 years.
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1967 Morris Oxford Traveller 1979 Toyota LandCruiser BJ40 1993 Daimler Double Six 2007 Volvo XC70 2.4D
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Got plenty examples of "professional" bodgery on the GT6 I'm doing at present. Oddly enough the bodger used braze and quite large amounts of lead - and then covered them with even larger amounts of filler.... some of the "highlights" The rear deck (no pictures can show how awful it was) had been crash damaged, hacked off complete with the lower part of the hatch aperture, beaten roughly back into shape using a selection of rocks and logs and then welded and brazed back on before smothering in lead (1/2" + in places) and then a generous helping of filler. Same car features a kink in the chassis leg just behind the wishbone mount just to prove that safety wasn't the number one priority and some interesting dents in inside panels where a portapower has been used with abandon. Our go at it may not be of the very highest standard but it's going be a country mile ahead of the last attempt. Heard a fairly shocking tale of woe involving a Mk2 Jag recently. £ 25k bill for full body restoration (including sills etc) and deemed unsafe to drive home by the MoT tester due to catastrophic rot in the front chassis legs.... Nick
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1967 Triumph Vitesse convertible (old friend) 1996 Audi A6 2.5 TDI Avant (still durability testing) 1972 GT6 Mk3 (Restored after loong rest & getting the hang of being a car again)
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the time that took to do badly could have done it right in half the time and money
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i done a split screen crew cab years ago , it came from usa, when i went to cut the outer sills of , it snowed white dust lol , turned out that some fixed the panels before by gluing and pop riveting the panels on
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The best advice I can give to anyone that if you are having a car professionally restored do your homework / research on said restorer - just about anyone can make a classic look good on the outside with shiny paint - but it's what is under the paint that matters - make sure that your restorer of choice knows that you will expect to visit unannounced and view the work on a regular basis.
Should you be doing the work yourself (and there is nothing wrong in that) but if you are unsure / don't know - then just ask - there are a good few professionals on here that can offer advice freely and would much rather assist with the advice in order to see a repair / restoration completed correctly & safely.
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Last Edit: Jan 7, 2018 20:30:46 GMT by Deleted
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whs i take loads of pics of before during after
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I feel your pain, part time I also do restros and one I'm currently doing, A 1930's Austin Big 7 sixlite has taken me four years so I stopped taking in more jobs then promised to restore a Dolomite which I've had for three years. Both owners are aware that that were going to take a long time and they get regular updates. I also got involved in another Austin belonging to an elderly gent but that's staying at his house as I work on it, he had the engine 'rebuilt' by a specialist and they somehow managed to not only use the wrong big end shells but also have tightened a lot of the bolts too much cause the engine to jam up but also didn't torque the headbolts causing HGF.
I have also seen some very dangerous work done by a local triumph specialist who sold the car as restored, it broke less than 100 miles away but one thing that's really annoys me is when a car goes wrong (modern and classic) and it ends up at another garage because something else has gone wrong and they then proceed to slag off the work done when its just not to their liking or they would just had done something a different way. 'oh look theres filler in that panel we would had stripped it back to bare metal, welded in a new panel' type comment.
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I feel your pain, part time I also do restros and one I'm currently doing, A 1930's Austin Big 7 sixlite has taken me four years so I stopped taking in more jobs then promised to restore a Dolomite which I've had for three years. Both owners are aware that that were going to take a long time and they get regular updates. I also got involved in another Austin belonging to an elderly gent but that's staying at his house as I work on it, he had the engine 'rebuilt' by a specialist and they somehow managed to not only use the wrong big end shells but also have tightened a lot of the bolts too much cause the engine to jam up but also didn't torque the headbolts causing HGF. I have also seen some very dangerous work done by a local triumph specialist who sold the car as restored, it broke less than 100 miles away but one thing that's really annoys me is when a car goes wrong (modern and classic) and it ends up at another garage because something else has gone wrong and they then proceed to slag off the work done when its just not to their liking or they would just had done something a different way. 'oh look theres filler in that panel we would had stripped it back to bare metal, welded in a new panel' type comment. I can only but agree - we all have our own way of doing things and I am mindful that owners also have a budget to work to - I will help / advise anyone - if the owner wants a 2 pack paint finish that allows me to go over sound existing paint then that's fine - it will save the vehicle from being unnecessarily bare metaled whilst saving the owner money - equally If the client wants a bare metal restoration to concours standard then that's not an issue either - I am all for compromise and sourcing a good workable solution to any issue - but I categorically refuse to cut a corner / just blow a car over etc
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I was given a 74 Beetle for my 18th birthday by my grandparents as having been restored but needing a respray. Looked great. Got it running nice as it had been laid up in a garage for a while, then took it for an MOT.... part of a Stop sign constituted the drivers floor pan under a load of underseal, discovered when the tester (big chap) sat in it and the floor caved in. The welding constituted of expanding foam that had been sanded back and undersealed, after a few suspect areas were poked it was gone over with a fine tooth comb. In all 2 pages of corrosion related fails, lots of holes, a really disappointed 18 year old, a really curse word off grandad who wanted to rip the guys throat out, it was sold for spares 10 years ago. I MOT checked it randomly a few weeks back and it got a ticket in Maidenhead in May, so if anyone knows of RKA 686N, get in touch. Be nice to see it now it's been restored.
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I was once going over a mk2 Astra before the mot (an hour later) and thought I would check the sills for rot as well as the lights and horn etc. Managed to poke my thumb straight through in one place! Had a welder but no steel! Found a 2p was the perfect size and welded no problem. After a liberal dab of black sikaflex we were sorted, got pass! Happy 18 year old me! Not a cowboy, just a young lad with no funds doing anything to keep his freedom. Probably how lots of these nasty repairs come about. And I guess the only reasonable excuse for it too
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That GT6 looks a mess! on a different note it shows we still need some sort of annual safety/MOT style of test for all cars!
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79cord
Posted a lot
Posts: 2,615
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...need some sort of annual safety/MOT style of test ! Ignores how comprehensively bodged some of these cars are, such that they may have subsequent MOT to give owners & buyers a false sense of security. These problems did not just 'develop' like rust, wear or even accident damage, but were deliberate or badly conceived efforts to hide problems, sometimes with an ironically great deal of effort & time involved. As always owners & those that repair them are ultimately responsible for cars condition, not testers. Annual checks are no guarantee in such cases, & may merely escalate the efforts to hide problems.
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Last Edit: Jan 8, 2018 12:45:01 GMT by 79cord
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düdo
Part of things
wide as house
Posts: 770
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No MoT at all really gives one a great sense of freedom
I was once underway in Hobart in a 70s Japanese van, that I'd already 'restored' by fitting some $5 garden furniture I'd bought at Hobart tip shop to replace the entirely dog devoured driver and passenger seats. There were large holes in both front wings, where the rotations of the bald tyres could be enjoyed. The engine was under the cab between the front seats and the rad could be topped up with water as you drove along to stop it over-heating. A real living classic.
Then some police officer had the cheek to pull me over. He came up to the window and said : Put yer seat belt on Cob.
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It's difficult not to be sympathetic in this case - but it's the poor name that the cowboys give to the trade in the first place - not sure how they sleep on a night if at all I've come to realise that it's not as clear cut as people just being inherently bad and cowboys. I think some people just have ambitions beyond their means and quickly become overwhelmed. Rather than facing that reality and taking the best way out for everyone (which would admitting they are out of their depth or have simply taken too much on whilst chasing wealth and business growth ambitions) they bury their heads in the sand and hope it all works out in the end if they stall some projects and rattle their way through others as quickly as possible without taking due care. ==== Optional anecdote... I've probably typed this story out before, but I had an experience a few years ago that I could never understand and still can't. A bloke down in Somerset had set up a very respectable looking business called Retro-Engines Ltd. He had a huge workshop, he had all the equipment you could need. He followed up enquiries swiftly and with courtesy and was very well informed. I wanted him to drop an Essex V6 into my Bedford CF2. Looking back I was very naive as I had simply purchased an old Essex v6 off ebay for £70. It was unknown, untested, and un-inspected by me. I simply took delivery of it on a palette and eventually drove it down to this bloke in Somerset in the back of my van, and left it with him. My naivety was really limited only to the state of the V6 engine though. In every other respect I had been as meticulous as I could. I'd been in conversation with this bloke about the job for weeks, and had travelled down there beforehand to inspect his workshop and see some of the things he was working on before committing to the project. It all seemed good. he had a couple of blokes working with him. They had all the equipment to strip down and wash/refurb/rebuild the engine including one of those huge washing machine things to (acid?) wash the components. He had a bunch of retros, classics, customs, hotrods in various states of disassembly. A beautiful chrome hot rod V8 engine being rebuilt on a workbench, about 12 customers cars all parked up in individual bays. It all looked really impressive. One week after I'd left my van and engine there and paid a deposit to start the process, he went awol. He'd evidently bitten off far more than he could chew. I quickly found out he'd imported, rebuilt and provided an entirely incorrect engine to a customer who had paid £8k before he'd received the finished work, and had then started trying to get his money back....which I think had tipped this bloke over the edge, and he'd locked up the workshop and done a runner. The amount of effort he had put into getting his business up and running though didn't quite square up with the idea that he was just a cowboy and a con-man looking to dupe people out of down payments and deposits. I do think he had every intention of being a great classic/specialist workshop. He had been hosting open days for the previous year, and RetroFord were going to do a cover story about the place. It was WAY too much effort just to bilk 20odd people out of their deposits. I can't help thinking that he at least believed he could do all of this stuff. Some people did lose car parts and I think one or two never found their cars again, but even so... I can't help thinking he just over-reached and got into a mess. === In relation to this Jowett though, the thing for me is... I do have to question how wise it was to leave a car with somebody for 18 months without checking in on progress. It literally took me one week to realise that something was not quite right with my van project. I cannot imagine leaving something for 18 months in somebody else's hands. When my Humber went north to have the gearbox issue investigated I got very anxious after a month, and that was a month where I called the guy every week to ask what was happening. I appreciate this chap is quite old, but I can't help thinking it was in some part his responsibility to make sure his restoration was going according to the agreed plan, and some of the eventual mess was probably avoidable.
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Fair points.
You've also got to remember that tools/units/equipment can be rented, maybe he gave the front of being professional but underneath it all his intentions were transparently directed towards self-gain at the expense of others in both a financial and moral sense. It's only a matter of time before it catches up with them. Heard loads of stories about well respected businesses ripping people off out of BIG money and nothing rarely comes of it in terms of recuperating losses.
There was a man named Bruce who was known as the GTO doctor. Had a well set-up garage, worked from home also and had a huge detached house, a well spoken and respectable man who had built up a good reputation over the years.
For whatever reasons (I'm guessing financial) he started ripping owners off- selling faulty engines, bodged/unfinished repairs, not sending parts at all to over-seas buyers... I know someone off GTOOC who had given him his car and paid £10k up front to modify his GTO to his desired spec... Several years later there is no GTO or £10k and not that it should make a difference but worth noting the lad had just come out the army and it was his redundancy package...
No morals or ethics. I think a persons personality is just as important as their appearance (tools/garage etc) when trusting them with your pride and joy and a ton of money.
Appearances are deceiving, never judge a book by it's cover, judge it fairly by it's contents.
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some of the best work ive seen are what are DEEMED back st garages , some of the worst has come from specialists , do your home work as already mentioned on the vendor , speak to other owners and look into the perevious works , lots of people on here do smashing work , for people self taught , listen to advise, ask questions , if not sure ask more .then ake into account , could i do that level of work and skill, do i have the equipment to do it ,
BEST ADVICE SPEND AS MUCH AS YOU CAN ,BUY AS BEST YE CAN . ITS CHEAPER IN THE LONG RUN , DON T THINK YE CAN BUT A £500 BEETLE AND DO A FULL RESTO ON IT FOR £1500 THINK OF A PRICE TREBLE IT THEN ADD 2K MORE ,
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Yeah true. Even if one's original intention wasn't to rip people off... how one subsequently deals with spiralling/bad situations is as much a gauge of your character.
===
Another optional anecdote...
I just remembered another experience I had absolutely years ago when I first moved to Sussex and wanted to re-ignite my interest in cars after two decades away. I originally wanted a classic Mini. There was a bloke set up somewhere down here... can't recall where... and he was a well established and well known/ respected Mini geezer. He was one of the key Cooper people working for years with John Cooper's company. When that ended he was able to set up with various official blessings and some original assets from the company as he was quite a key figure.
I went to see him as he was advertising a lovely Innocenti Mini Cooper. I didn't really know the difference at the time (for anyone else who doesn't know, an Austin Mini produced in Italy under license and had a few nice unique touches that made it a bit special). We went for a test drive, and it was lovely. He was keen to close and get me to hand over a deposit and he would make sure the car was properly recommissioned for me to collect.
Fortunately I had deliberately not taken any means of placing a deposit down, knowing how easily I can be seduced by a car. But I had the money available. I think he wanted about £5k for it, maybe more. Might have been as much as £8k. Whatever it was, I had the money. I did also have two other cars to go and see although frankly the Innocenti with its cool Innocenti badge had seduced me completely.
Anyway, I got vaguely cold feet. Something made me hesitate. I don't recall what, but I said I'd go back down thereto complete the transaction. he seemed quite desperate to get me to give him a deposit upfront. It didn't seem quite right. I didn't give him anything.
Two weeks later he'd also done a runner, taken a bunch of people's money, run off with a load of people's car parts and cars that he'd actually sold. It turned out the Innocenti he was trying to sell me wasn't even his to sell!
Lucky escape. But he'd been around for years and had a fine reputation before that.
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There is a new Car program starting on Quest Salvage Hunters Classic Cars and Drew Pitchard strikes me as being like the guy Quatermas has described after seeing how he rips people off and pressures them into selling under his terms when buying antiques it would not surprise me if the same this is not tried in this program.
Arthur Daley would be more honest than him if he were real.
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samta22
Club Retro Rides Member
Stuck in once more...
Posts: 1,276
Club RR Member Number: 32
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==== In relation to this Jowett though, the thing for me is... I do have to question how wise it was to leave a car with somebody for 18 months without checking in on progress. Think I can top that by some margin - try nearly 8 years... (not sure whether to laugh or cry on this one!) I won't go into full details as there are circumstances around this and the individual is on this forum, plus in fairness it's not been that amount of time without contact... although even that has gone quiet the last few months. Unfortunately every time contact has been made there is a new excuse as to why there hasn't been progress, I could and probably should write a book on them. The guy was supposed to be the best in the marque and had produced several centre-show display vehicles, hence the desire to hang on until 2018... sadly the time has come and one empty promise after another will instead mean that 2018 will see me going up there with my trailer and pulling this one away to be done elsewhere.
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'37 Austin 7 '56 Austin A35 '58 Austin A35 '65 Triumph Herald 12/50 '69 MGB GT '74 MGB GT V8'73 TA22 Toyota Celica restoration'95 Mercedes SL320 '04 MGTF 135 'Cool Blue' (Mrs' Baby) '05 Land Rover Discovery 3 V8 '67 Abarth 595 (Mrs' runabout) '18 Disco V
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