When I bought the car, it wasn't in that bad a condition. Paint was really nice and still pretty fresh looking. The paint I haven't grinded off still is!
Wind back a year and half, this is what I said at the time:
Contrary what it may seem, I did give a blood good look over it before I bought it. Those arches and door bottoms were crusty but not particularly bad. I did give them a good poke and while crusty they weren't decomposing. At the time it looked like it was just dirt that had got behind them and buggered them up on the lip area. I knew they would need doing but thought they'd last a fair bit longer. I also knew about the A and B pillar bases needing work. But they're not particularly bad bits to weld up and aren't visible until the door is opened.SiC wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 9:22 pm Body wise she's in pretty good nick really (for the money). Some the drivers floor and boot floor will need welding. Bubbling of the arches and door bottoms too. But they aren't as crunchy as they look. I'll get a video walk around at some point soon as it's easier to show. Nothing as bad as some on here thought it may be!
My intention was always to get it back MOT'd and the little bits welded then use for a bit. Then flog on or do bits as they needed to be. Very much like Richard has said.
So where did it all go wrong?
Quite simply the house move fiasco fucked things up for me royally. When I got the car, I was supposed to be moving a couple months later. So I did a few bits and then prepared to move. In the end there was 4 different buyers dropping out and 2 houses we didn't buy. In this time period I was forever expecting that it'd be a month or two before we'd move and getting a garage. We'd loose a buyer, get another a few weeks later and repeat. Or then a new buyer but need to find another house.
Essentially it meant that the car was left out over last winter degrading. Water got into the crusty bits which naturally froze then defrosted. Rinse and repeat over the space of 6 months of bad weather, this broke up the bubbles into even weaker ferrous oxide. Why didn't I put it away in storage? We were always only a month or two away from moving every time...
Thus the bad bubbly bits degraded much more rapidly and we are now where we are. These issues have been compounded by the previous "restoration" of welding repair panels directly over the top.
The other issue is getting too worried about affecting it's value. I just need to get it done up and remember as the Rev says, it'll always be a ten-foot or similar car. It's done high miles, 11 previous owners and a bit tatty interior. Now the external bodywork will be tatty too. But that's no bad thing of course if I want to use it. It's also why I paid well under book price even when I did at the time.