All told, it’s actually structurally very solid, with a lot of the welding work having already been done (and properly at that!) although we accept that until it’s stripped down you never know what horrors might await. Most of the car is complete too, bar the engine, but we’ve got a few of those kicking around. So apart from the dash clocks, front grille, front lights and indicator lenses it’s pretty much there.
So, phase one is as follows:
. remove subframes and strip to bare shell
. remove front, wings, A panels, and scuttle, and replace
. complete any other welding
. prep and paint shell in red oxide
Budget: £300 (£200 for panels, £100 for paint/consumables, and contingency)
Timeframe: 3 months (starting from when we’ve finished and MOT’d a clubman estate that is taking up the garage space)
As it’s being built for a 17 year old to insure, it will have to remain pretty standard (so no roll cages, harnesses etc) and the idea is to put disks up front and run it on 12” minilites (the 10” Dunlops are for sale to help pay for the new front panels).
The plan is to have a rolling shell by the end of the year, with freshly refurbished subframes, all new bushes, shocks etc. That doesn’t sound particularly ambitious, but we also have 2 oval circuit mini’s to upkeep and race which eats into a lot of time.
Lawrie’s main focus for the last 24 hours has been studying every picture in MiniWorld for the last 3 years (thanks Leaky!) for paint colour inspiration; I think he’s probably exhausted every know permutation now, but building a “stealth” grey/black car seems to be a consistent idea, or maybe orange, of maybe blue, and so it goes on!
Do wish him luck; will post up some pictures of the extent of the tinworm once it’s up in the air and stripping starts.
Mike (Dad)
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