Chroming

I received the front and rear bumpers back from The London Chroming Company this week - absolutely excellent, the photo doesn't do them justice as all the specks of dust look like marks which they are not.

Also souced a vinyl paint, KolorBond, to refinish the original 62 style floor mats and will be spraying them once the paint arrives.

I haven't seen any progress at the body shop as it was closed this weekend due to Easter holidays, hopefully there will be more to report after next weekend.

Paint progress

There has been some good progress on the paint work. Three coats of primer have been applied this week and all doors, bonnets prepared as well. Next week sees the final pre top coat stage with hopefully final paint going on over the following 2 weeks.

Roof trims

I bought a pair of roof trims from Type3 Detectives. They arrived today, no major dents, no scratches and certainly no chance of being bent in the post as the guys had wisely not tried to remove them, just cut off the bit off the roof they were fitted to and sent them on - Thanks guys, a final vital part of the car now sourced.

T3D also sent me a replacement rear hub seal cover. Mine has been refitted 3 times, using new VW seals, RTV sealant and Blue Hylomar to stop fluid escape but it still happens. I have checked the existing cover, it doesn't appear to be distorted but I am going to replace it and see if that stops the leaks.

Ninove, Belgium meeting

Just got these photos, amongst others, from Mike Dempster who went across to the Nonove meeting in Belgium over the weekend. Looks like a wet but great meeting with quite a few good looking T34s. The Fastie belongs to Mike, a very nice car which be bought back last year after selling it and has spend some time undoing the lowering that had been done to it - it has a great Pigalle coloured interior.

March looks promising

I went to the body shop this morning. The car has finished being prepped and will be undercoated on Monday. With luck another 2 weeks should then see it sorted ready for spraying. I'm hoping it will be back home for the start of April but not getting too excited yet.

Here is a shot of it last week taken by Mike Dempster when he called in, hard to spot the progress but there was some.

Every little helps

I called in at the body shop this morning. Rubbing down of the filler primer coat has at long last been completed and the primer coats are to be sprayed on and flatted down this week.

Here is a photo of the rolling chassis with the seats and fuel tank temporarily in place.

Plating and pleading!

Here is a photo of one of the spot lights rebuilt with its rechromed rim and derusted\repainted internal ring. The spot lights I am using are the original ones from my 1965 model T344, I replaced them with NOS ones about 15 years ago and kept them in the boxes, lucky as the ones on the 1962 were beyond using.

Also a shot of the passenger side quarter window frame, this has had the hole that was drilled all the way through infilled with brass and is now ready for rechroming.

Having dropped into the bodyshop last weekend to find little progress again I called the owner during the week to put pressure on for more progress. he tells me he has a new man starting on Monday and my car will be given priority, keep your fingers crossed.

Mid February update

I went to the body shop today - a small amount of progress but small indeed. Some more prep has been carried out on a couple of panels but that is about it.
In the meantime I rebuilt the foglights with the newly rechromed rims and derusted & repainted the inner mount rim. I have also carried out the few small corrections to the front seats that I needed to carry out and have mounted them on the chassis for the time being.

Seat back rake adjuster knobs

Got these back from the platers as well. As mentioned before these were fitted only to the first few months of the 62 models. They are solid brass and weigh about half a pound each. They look superb rechromed and have now been fitted to the seats. This will hopefully inspire me to finish off redoing some of the trim done to the front seats by the trimmer and then the seats will be finally complete.

Car Jack restoration

As I got back the parts I took in for passive plating I decided to put the jack back together. I had all parts blasted and then painted the head in as close a correct shade of blue as I could match to the original. I had the mechanism and spring that were previously passive plated refinished and it now looks tons better.

January progress update

I made some reasonable progress in January. I used the POR15 kit to treat the fuel tank with and also replaced the front wheel cylinder balance pipe. I also replaced the rear wheel bearing seals again with a genuine VW seal kit - it still leaks! This is despite using sealant instead of the paper gasket and using a sealing compound between the main outer bearing housing and the large seal. Looks like I will need to change the main outer bearing housing so I have one on the way from T3D.

No progress yet with the reanodising as I am still trying to make my mind up on the way forward; the good news is I collected all the small pieces I took in for rechroming and passive plating and they look good. I dropped the bumpers off for replating at the same time.

here are a couple of photos of the refinished parts.

No progress with the body shop as far as I know, I'll be dropping in at the weekend in the hope of some progress.