Full refurb planned - advice, recommendations, appreciated!

[andydw]

After a happy year of ownership I am starting to plan a full-on refurb of my 2003 SP6 Cerb, not quite no expense spared but I want it to be better than original and as perfect as I can make it. I'm not a DIYer, I don't have the time or the patience to take this on and each and every job will be given over to the best specialists. So I'm looking for recommendations and the order in which to undertake jobs.

The intention (prob starting end of this year) is a total chassis refurb and powdercoat, new cables hoses, bushes etc.

Full respray (colour change)with potentially some body mods (rear lights set in to the body work for instance, and very keen on the open- mouth look seen on a stunning yellow Griff on here recently - I forget the owner. It MUST be watertight too!

Complete interior refit with full leather and carpets, hopefully a new dash as well (I'd like a veneer one - current is stainless)

Finally some engine work, though that might wait. I'm quite keen on the RG FFF/syvecs route and they are local to me. For the other work I'm prepared to travel.

So I'm thinking Surface and Design for the respray, DC Trim for the interior but no idea on the chassis - would S&D do that too? Do DC and S&D liaise with each other?

And do I need to get these done in some kind of order or can they be effectively done in parallel? Seems sensible to do the interior with the body off for example.

And can I see swatches for leather colours, and body colour examples to make my final choice? At the moment I'm on reflex charcoal with cream/ocean green interior, but want to see some other options to be sure I make the right choice.

Any other highly recommended mods? As you might guess originality is not an issue for me, I'm just trying to make something personal to me, not to sell on.

Finally, cost. I'd like some estimates based on peoples experience of not doing anything themselves at all. I have a ball-park in mind, want to reality-check it with people who have forked out before!

Cheers for any help, pics will be aplenty once the work gets underway!

[coetzeeh]

If this was my project I would set aside £15k - respray (£5k), retrim (£4k), chassis (£4-5k) and £2k incidentals/odds and sods.

[Mark.]

Your a year (or more) ahead of me, S&D and DC Trimmers get my vote for the cosmetics.

You are not far from these guys www.southwaysautomotive.co.uk I've seen the work they have done on a Chimaera and it is 100%, they will be getting the mechanicals for sure.

Trouble is, I want to do both of mine!

[andydw]

Mark. said:

Your a year (or more) ahead of me, S&D and DC Trimmers get my vote for the cosmetics.

You are not far from these guys www.southwaysautomotive.co.uk I've seen the work they have done on a Chimaera and it is 100%, they will be getting the mechanicals for sure.

Trouble is, I want to do both of mine!

Thanks for the link, they look like a good outfit for the chassis. I guess I'd have to put the body back on the car then drive it up to DC for the retrim? (at which point it will all have to come out again which seems a bit of a waste of effort). Still may be the best option. I'm assuming I should do the chassis first, it just seems to make most sense that way round?

Good luck with both of yours!

[Gazzab]

Like your style, I would say that the rear lights and front nose mods have been done a couple of times before and the results aren't very enhancing to me.

[camel_landy]

Like with everything in life, I believe in getting the foundations right... Get the chassis & drive train sorted first (body off, outriggers, powdercoating, bushes, etc...), that way all of the hard to access stuff can be done & dusted and not get in the way of the other bits. Everything else can happen as & when.

I'm in the process of getting my outriggers done and as part of that job I'll be sorting the rest of the chassis... Feel free to ask questions but there is loads of useful info available on these pages with a quick search.

M

[Mark.]

Chassis first for sure, but the body only needs come off the once, Trimmers/painters will do it all in situ.

Give Rich or Steve a call and talk it through, they are super nice blokes. Not sure how long the queue is though as I know of a Wedge going down there for the same treatment, and I think another Chimaera is/has/going there too.

[andydw]

Gazzab said:

Like your style, I would say that the rear lights and front nose mods have been done a couple of times before and the results aren't very enhancing to me.

Yea I know what you mean. I'm unsure about the rear lights tbh, but I'm not that keen the originals either. I'll look up some pics. The bonnet mod looked blinding on the griff, would it suit the cerb? Not sure, but the conversations will be interesting!

Thanks all for the advice and help so far - keep them coming.

[Brummmie]

Beef up the diff mounts, weld plate over the top of the existing front mounts and re-fab the rear out of some meatier stuff, dont know where your anti roll bar mounts, mine was over the top, and was showing signs of stress, so i welded extra supports for that. Poly bush the lot, 5 years on they are all still intact.

[Mark.]

Not sure if the Cerbera is the same but when I get the Chimaera done I'll be having plates welded between outrigger and chassis for the seat to both through.

[cerbera8]

I am quite suprised that you should feel the need to modify such a gorgeous looking stunning late cerb.

Personally I think that beyond 18" spiders and a front light upgrade that these cars are just stunning and yours looks the business (from your profile pic). Your car is a 2003, one of the last of the line and the era of shot blasted and better powder coating on the chassis & outriggers, does it really need doing? Also the era of stunning interior as standard..IMO of course.

I think the military spec screw in rear lights on the later cerbs are just the best originality oh yes... lego afterburner rear lights no...no...

I have recently used D&C Trim for a steering wheel & floor mats and it was top class. Have also seen their work on a retrim, stunning, highly recommended. proper ex factory.

Has your engine been rebuilt does it need one?

Advice & recommendations, hopefully appreciated & just my opinion

[Gazzab]

Good points...if you have money to lavish then why not look at a 4.7 upgrade rather than lights etc...?

[Tang Soo Tim]

I thoroughly recommend RTRacing for body off chassis restore, he is doing alot of work on my car at the min and when i went to see them in Sheffield the quality of work is impressive to say the least !

rtracing.co.uk

Chaps name is Richard Thorpe

[Gazzab]

Tang Soo Tim said:

I thoroughly recommend RTRacing for body off chassis restore, he is doing alot of work on my car at the min and when i went to see them in Sheffield the quality of work is impressive to say the least !

rtracing.co.uk

Chaps name is Richard Thorpe

They are near to me - never used them, are they good? What are they doing?

[andydw]

This is all good stuff - cheers!

Cerbera8 - thanks for your comments, yes the car is a stunner but I always wanted a black or near-black cerb and the interior is a bit tatty, and again would like different colours. As for body mods I'm undecided really but I was blown away by the griff I mentioned, so it got me thinking. Afterburners though? Probably not. As for the chassis, well it's going to need doing at some point anyway so why not before a respray - and I want to upgrade cables, hoses etc and get the thing watertight(it isn't now), so in for a penny and all that, lets do this thing properly.

The engine has been rebuilt by Austec and is a beast. It is much too fast enough already but I would like it to be more tractable, its very lumpy at low revs - especially cold - and has all the torque up the rev range. Not a priority at the mo, but syvecs interests me as does FFF perhaps.

Preferred suppliers just about identified I think, time for some phone calls to get onto waiting lists - thanks for the heads up on that one!

Dark clouds on horizon though as wifey has started muttering about swimming pools - this is a very worrying development and would scupper my plans somewhat. Any advice on that one chaps!?

[Gazzab]

Is that the mid blue cerb that was converted to red rose spec etc by Austec about 7 years ago or so?

[Pursyluv]

andydw said:

Dark clouds on horizon though as wifey has started muttering about swimming pools - this is a very worrying development and would scupper my plans somewhat. Any advice on that one chaps!?

Yes, divorce her............well someone had to say it

[anonymous-user]

Gazzab said:

Tang Soo Tim said:

I thoroughly recommend RTRacing for body off chassis restore, he is doing alot of work on my car at the min and when i went to see them in Sheffield the quality of work is impressive to say the least !

rtracing.co.uk

Chaps name is Richard Thorpe

They are near to me - never used them, are they good? What are they doing?

Spoke to these guys a couple of months back, I believe Power send them their cerb chassis refurbs and they make the new Griff/Chimp chassis's. Spoke to Richard and they reckon they'll be producing Cerb chassis by year end (however this has been said before and not come to fruition I've heard)

[Mark.]

andydw said:

Dark clouds on horizon though as wifey has started muttering about swimming pools - this is a very worrying development and would scupper my plans somewhat. Any advice on that one chaps!?

You only live about an hour from the sea - bloody massive swimming pool that. And you can drive down there in a spanking Cerb and what's more it's summer today so by the time the pool is built it'll probably be an ice rink anyway.

[andydw]

Gazzab said:

Is that the mid blue cerb that was converted to red rose spec etc by Austec about 7 years ago or so?

No, its arena red and always has been according to the logbook. Interestingly though the logbook says its a Speed 6 'S' and it had a crappy-looking S sticker under the boot badge, origin unknown.