After 10 years in a glasshouse BMW e3 restoration begins
Discussion
The project continues. There was no progress on the car for a little over a year due to a wedding and then waiting for a slot in our local bodyshop.
A the last update (Sept 2012) we had reached as good a preparation as possible for the amateur enthusiast and required a professional to spend some time getting panels perfect before painting. The car looked perfectly straight in the matt black primer finish but there is always a danger that a bright paint finish in natural daylight would show the true unevenness of panel finish. It took a while to find the right man for the job (local bodyshops tend to steer clear of classic cars and specialists were a bit of a distance). We found an Italian with decades of experience of car preparation and he set about applying and removing less and less filler until he was satisfied. Then it was off to the spray shop.
Note the yellow stick holding a funnel and pipe for manual gravity feeeding of fuel into the carbs - a new fuel tank and piping is still on the to-do list....
6 weeks later (including a break over Christmas) and it was ready to go, I am loving the colour. It's original, Malaga Red. Looks great.
Loaded up onto the trailer (carefully with winch)
And off we go...
Spent the remaining time that day getting the car into the shed and cleaning all the trim pieces ready for remounting
The pitting on parts of the bumpers is very bad in places; these will have to be replaced/re-chromed at some stage.
So, the plan now is to re-assemble the car and present it to my Dad in two weeks (this project is being done without his knowledge, the car was his daily from 1992-2000). Once he receives it we will work on the mechanicals together (he is the expert) and get the car on the road.
I always mean to take more pictures during the restoration but never do (or they're terrible quality) but I did manage to capture some other interesting vehicles at the weekend;
Barn stored Jag 240
Daimler v8
Jeep Cherokee 4.0
And a fabulous, 2 owner Rover P5B. On axel stands for years and then recommissioned, in daily use too. A real gem of a car...
Next update in 2 weeks when the car is re-assembled....
A the last update (Sept 2012) we had reached as good a preparation as possible for the amateur enthusiast and required a professional to spend some time getting panels perfect before painting. The car looked perfectly straight in the matt black primer finish but there is always a danger that a bright paint finish in natural daylight would show the true unevenness of panel finish. It took a while to find the right man for the job (local bodyshops tend to steer clear of classic cars and specialists were a bit of a distance). We found an Italian with decades of experience of car preparation and he set about applying and removing less and less filler until he was satisfied. Then it was off to the spray shop.
Note the yellow stick holding a funnel and pipe for manual gravity feeeding of fuel into the carbs - a new fuel tank and piping is still on the to-do list....
6 weeks later (including a break over Christmas) and it was ready to go, I am loving the colour. It's original, Malaga Red. Looks great.
Loaded up onto the trailer (carefully with winch)
And off we go...
Spent the remaining time that day getting the car into the shed and cleaning all the trim pieces ready for remounting
The pitting on parts of the bumpers is very bad in places; these will have to be replaced/re-chromed at some stage.
So, the plan now is to re-assemble the car and present it to my Dad in two weeks (this project is being done without his knowledge, the car was his daily from 1992-2000). Once he receives it we will work on the mechanicals together (he is the expert) and get the car on the road.
I always mean to take more pictures during the restoration but never do (or they're terrible quality) but I did manage to capture some other interesting vehicles at the weekend;
Barn stored Jag 240
Daimler v8
Jeep Cherokee 4.0
And a fabulous, 2 owner Rover P5B. On axel stands for years and then recommissioned, in daily use too. A real gem of a car...
Next update in 2 weeks when the car is re-assembled....
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