New to the forum, I know how everyone likes to see a few pictures so I will add plenty below to show my story. I will be looking for PLENTY of help and advice in the next five months so please do feel free to point out any thing I over look or need to do
I am getting married in September, ten years ago or so when I first met my fiancee, for Valentines 04 or 05 I can't remember to be honest, I bought her a mini on ebay. We have all been in that position, late at night you see a listing, think it looks good ignore the scant description and the ten feet away pictures. This is it on the ebay listing
Looked pretty solid to me, a wee bit on the quarter should be fine I thought. Bearing in mind I had a few mini's before and should have known what they hide and I was buying and selling cars all the time at that point
So on went the bid Booked the flights sight unseen and two days later got the mail auction ended you won..
So off we headed two very excited very Naive 20 year olds, over to Brentwood in Essex. I wasn't all that wet behind the ears or green, but I must have had clouded judgement that day. When we arrived you could say the car was a pile of :censored:
Having a very excited girlfriend, an unhelpful (insert lying sellers parents) and no seller in sight when we arrived and no chance of getting back my deposit I ploughed on and bought it. Straight away I knew it needed massive amounts of welding, but In my head I thought ok scrap the shell save the rest move on.
The car was bears arse rough, rotten in all the wrong places but it did drive and had a few weeks MOT and tax, so off we set for Pembroke. When we arrived home and I had a proper look over the car it was as bad or worse than I expected.
You haven't seen the gutter rails, the inner arches, floor pans, inner sills, subframe or rear strut tops but you get the picture. This thing had spent time sitting in a tidal estuary.
So life got in the way and it sat in my shed with other abandoned projects (at that stage I was importing a lot of cars from Japan, and was drawn away by big power and easy valet and sell on jobs) but my other half always pined for her mini.
So fast forward four or five years and I took a mad notion and bought a good original Irish shell, proper old brown paper log book one old lady owner, it even had tins of fruit in the companion cards dated 1991.
Now the whole thing was set to go, I bought any panels the red shell needed, a lot of interior stuff about a grands worth of parts and started stripping it. This was 2007 I had a good job, car imports and sales as a sideline things were good. Two weeks later I got laid off
So no big deal that happens, I started a new job, we got our house, etc but the Mini was well forgotten.
Now to this year so with a wedding rolling round, I am back selling cars again have a bit of savings, etc and my wife to be still cries over her lost mini, every car show we attend or every mini she see's on the road.
I decided to sideline a few grand and do the Mini. Problem 1 she know's both Minis are in my parents yard (we have a farm at home so loads of space to store all my "scrap" as they see it) but I can't remove either Pink or red shell un-noticed.
Insert the latest iteration,
I bought this last week, it's solid in the right places, but does need welding but has a 1275 and drives well with low miles and looks to have been well loved.
So with the panels I already have, a raid on mini spares and my credit card and a few secret trips to collect parts this week to Minifix and home for panels, I gathered bits like the seats below
I now have more panels than needed but I want it done right and to last
Panel wise I have
2x Sills
2x Inner Sills
2 x Wings
2 x A panels
Front panel
Scuttle panel and inner corners
Rear valance
Door skins
Door frame repair sections
Door A post R/HS
A lot of which was bought for the pink or red shell but will be used if needed on the blue (the red I may use myself in the future) I also have a few hundred quid worth of assorted screws, nuts, bolts, washers, gaskets, seals, rubbers, trims and badges, all new brightwork including handles hinges, wipers mirrors inner door furniture, I have a new carpet set in cream which will be a nightmare to keep clean..
The car is off to a well known Mini restorer Waterford Mini restoration for the welding works and will then be back to my panel beater for a full inside and out re spray in a light pink with an old English white roof
I have been haunting yahoo Japan lately after James in Minifix put it in my head about Jap wheels on a Mini as I can buy parts from Japan and have almost decided on a nice set of 12 inch SSR mesh but they are hard to find so may settle for star formula. I was actually tempted to just import a mini but the fact I would have had to respray anyway the timeline was too tight, I literally just decided to do this two weeks ago.
Wheel choice is a bit away
So if i can afford it It will be finished and done top to bottom in the one go. Subframes will come out, new brake lines, new fittings etc and it will be a top down resto.
Engine wise it needs a clutch so naturally I bought a lightweight flywheels as well as you do, then I thought sure buy a stage 1 kit. Now I started thinking suspension needs an over haul so the list grows...
So if you stuck with me through probably the longest intro ever thanks for reading this far. September 24th is D day and the car needs to be painted, NCT, taxed and road worthy by then what I thought would be a 2=3 grand project has already stretched to 5k and I expect it to grow. A lot being down to me buying parts that I could do without but to be honest I want to do it once and do it right
