First post on here for a long while been way too busy sorting cars for other people and house work but I have finally found a few hours to drag out the shed and have decided to make a start on him. You all will have seen the video of "George" being extracted from his grave in sunny Kent a good few years ago now. George is a November build 59 Austin deluxe he had been sat in the garden since 1977 due to failing mot on a wheel cylinder of all things according to the old paper work that came with him. he was bought new by Hall & co coal merchants Croydon. he was then passed around a few owners in the Kent area finally ending up in Chatham. the name comes from the previous owner George wooding who apparently was in a jazz band in the 70s pretty popular band locally apparently in the 70s. George is in a very bad way, most people say the shell is beyond saving but i strongly disagree there the roof still has strength and is surprisingly straight with no creases, the complete floor is rotten along with bulkhead, boot floor etc. My plans are to build a jig from another early mk1 I've got a 60 basic then build up a new floor, boot floor and bulkhead then drop what will be left of the side panels, front windscreen surround and back panel and start to reconstruct everything from there. enough waffle from me here are some pics of the task in hand, ohh and to make it more interesting and give myself a dead line I want to take it to the IMM in Lewes next August
The rough 60 that i will be using to build a jig from this needs very similar panel work to the 59 shouldn't have bought it really but listened to my heart over my head with it as usual
Progress will be slow for a few months as I'm waiting on surgery but hopefully come the winter I will be back to full capacity and get cracking along with it
Liam
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