the full story, part 8
I had been put in touch with David Baker, proprietor of DB
Conversions Ltd, a bodywork company specialising in buses, coaches, horse
boxes, car transporters and so on. Very fortunately David was a manager for
Plaxton’s at their Ware (Herts) outpost in the 1980s and so was familiar with
repairing and maintaining the bodywork of vehicles of that era. He is a skilled
panel cutter and has the folding machines for the older-style ‘clenched’ panel
joints. He employs specialist fibre-glass workers so everything I needed was in
place.
Three months maximum – suits me, sir; free storage for the winter!
Three weeks later, at the beginning of December 2013, David called me and asked me to come over. A section of the panels had been removed revealing a frame in an advanced state of decay. All the main plates that essentially hold the body to the chassis were rusted right through and barely attached and some of the principal irons were all but flapping in the breeze. I was on the verge of a panic attack; I had carried members of the public let alone my closest family en masse in this brittle cage. Images of Fred Flintstone’s method of car propulsion sprang to mind.
Initially we considered plating, patching and repaneling – maybe £10,000 – but a few wallops with a hammer and it was possible to cause main members almost to disintegrate. This wasn’t a bag full of rust; it was a bag made of rust.
So for the second time in this saga, it was time to consult with my long-suffering wife Rosie. We (we??)…sorry, I had just about run out of money; I could muster the £3,000 originally estimated for the bodywork but nothing like £10,000, which we already knew was not going to do the job by a long way.
Suddenly I was reminded of Cyril Kenzie’s first words to me on that freezing morning ten months previously (part five of this story): “Ten grand won’t go far”. And so did his next words (after a lot more poking around and a long silence): “Don’t you want to start with something a bit better?”
The bank thought they could see me right for £20,000 so I made an appointment for the following Saturday. In the meantime, Rosie tripped up at home and smashed her upper arm bone (humerus) to pieces! Comfortable enough by the Saturday, I went to the bank leaving our daughter to look after her.
Seasoned preservationists will already have worked out the next part of the story. As more and more framework was revealed, the amount needing to be completely replaced increased rapidly, with the added problem that some of the ironwork cross-section specifications are no longer produced. The boot frame was barely attached at the rusty joints; the back seat was effectively dangling over mid-air as the underframe was detached at the ends; internal rails and fittings were attached to frame parts that were not themselves attached to anything else. Essentially, just about everything below the windows was rotten beyond repair.
With all external panels now removed, it was time to take up the flooring inside to reveal…you guessed it, the internal panels were also beyond rescue. In effect, the full thickness of the entire lower body needed replacing. In fact, so decayed was it that it had to be held up on jacks and blocks before any work was done because as soon as any of the structure was removed, it all started distorting and coming away from the chassis. I’d carried 40 people on that.
After all the hours I had put in on de-lettering, patching, masking and painting the body, trying to make loose components good and secure...almost everything I had done was now piled up on the workshop floor ready for disposal. 'Mary' was little more than a skeleton in very poor condition. You could see right through her!
Three months maximum – suits me, sir; free storage for the winter!
Three weeks later, at the beginning of December 2013, David called me and asked me to come over. A section of the panels had been removed revealing a frame in an advanced state of decay. All the main plates that essentially hold the body to the chassis were rusted right through and barely attached and some of the principal irons were all but flapping in the breeze. I was on the verge of a panic attack; I had carried members of the public let alone my closest family en masse in this brittle cage. Images of Fred Flintstone’s method of car propulsion sprang to mind.
Initially we considered plating, patching and repaneling – maybe £10,000 – but a few wallops with a hammer and it was possible to cause main members almost to disintegrate. This wasn’t a bag full of rust; it was a bag made of rust.
So for the second time in this saga, it was time to consult with my long-suffering wife Rosie. We (we??)…sorry, I had just about run out of money; I could muster the £3,000 originally estimated for the bodywork but nothing like £10,000, which we already knew was not going to do the job by a long way.
Suddenly I was reminded of Cyril Kenzie’s first words to me on that freezing morning ten months previously (part five of this story): “Ten grand won’t go far”. And so did his next words (after a lot more poking around and a long silence): “Don’t you want to start with something a bit better?”
The bank thought they could see me right for £20,000 so I made an appointment for the following Saturday. In the meantime, Rosie tripped up at home and smashed her upper arm bone (humerus) to pieces! Comfortable enough by the Saturday, I went to the bank leaving our daughter to look after her.
Seasoned preservationists will already have worked out the next part of the story. As more and more framework was revealed, the amount needing to be completely replaced increased rapidly, with the added problem that some of the ironwork cross-section specifications are no longer produced. The boot frame was barely attached at the rusty joints; the back seat was effectively dangling over mid-air as the underframe was detached at the ends; internal rails and fittings were attached to frame parts that were not themselves attached to anything else. Essentially, just about everything below the windows was rotten beyond repair.
With all external panels now removed, it was time to take up the flooring inside to reveal…you guessed it, the internal panels were also beyond rescue. In effect, the full thickness of the entire lower body needed replacing. In fact, so decayed was it that it had to be held up on jacks and blocks before any work was done because as soon as any of the structure was removed, it all started distorting and coming away from the chassis. I’d carried 40 people on that.
After all the hours I had put in on de-lettering, patching, masking and painting the body, trying to make loose components good and secure...almost everything I had done was now piled up on the workshop floor ready for disposal. 'Mary' was little more than a skeleton in very poor condition. You could see right through her!