Stuart Cleverly – Full Restoration
£800 brought off E bay!
The breakers yard didn’t really know what it was, and had purchased the car from someone in Manchester with no history, only the V5 & one (original) key, and the Mot expired in 2013.
After jumping the car, it started first time!, inside was ruined, someone had slashed the roof when it was sat in a car park in Manchester, and this is where it sat for well over a year. The passenger door would not open either. Amazingly everything worked inside, aside from the CD player (no surprise) After offering a cheeky £800 (starting price on EBay was £650) they accepted & even delivered the car! We were aware this was a huge risk, and many would walk away, but the car was solid underneath & seemed to run well.
Everything else is noted on the post, it’s taken us about 6 months to get the car to where it is now, it has been a joint project with my Father In law Martin, and we have learnt a lot along the way.
Jobs done so far:
- Replaced Dash
- Replaced Carpets
- Replaced most interior panels
- Replaced Many Rusty Switches
- New Cambelt & Water Pump
- Brakes all round
- New A/C fan
- New Aerial Motor
- Repaired rear screen panel (was crumbling away)
- New exhaust
- New Gear selector (someone has forced it into gear without pressing the button & snapped locking pin, meaning key would not release)
- Full Re-Spray (original colour)
- Clarion Upgrade
- Re-Chrome Bumpers
- Engine Clean Up
Charlotte went to Facebook in search of the previous owner, amazingly found him, and who kindly sent us loads of history on the car that he’d forgot to give the breakers yard. We even have the original import invoice & alarm invoices. MOT time, we feared the worst, however we were almost pleased when it only failed on a CV joint & track rod end. We’ve covered around 1,000 trouble free miles since finishing, and enjoyed every minute.
We wouldn’t have been able to do many of the job ourself if it hasn’t been for this forum or the assistance from the members.
