After three-and-a-bit months, many email exchanges, long phone calls, and bank transfers, Barry had completed his work on the shell.
As the roads a salty at the moment, I opted to rent and enclosed Renault Trucksmith Loloader (
http://www.loloader.co.uk) from my local Kendall van rental.
First I had to stop by Jonny Hart's place and pick-up the dolly that I had bought from him.
Here he is with the dolly. Ye Olde Dolly of Ages - an ancient artefact, steeped in DDK lore, which has been passed from generation to generation of restored 911 over the years.
Jonny showed me his beautiful resto-rod SC, plus some clever electronic stuff he is working on for IB cars. If you have an IB car, he should have some irresistibly cool things available in the near future.
Dolly loaded, and with a family lunch deadline to meet, it was time to utilised the special time-travelling capabilities only found in a Rented White Van.
As found on arrival. Fresh!
Off the jig, using Barry's patented method, and onto its new wheels:
At this point I had the same mesmerised, can't-quite-believe-this-is-my-car feeling that I get when I look at the work that Dude has done on the engine. I had been worried about a few things, namely whether I should really be spending all this money on 'just' a 912, and also whether the shell had gone rusty in the year that it had been sitting around, stripped of its paint.
If you look at some of Barry's photos from earlier in the thread, you will see the shell looking pretty grotty and brown. Enviro-Strip had coated the car with a water-dispersant wash after it was dipped, and I was worried it had rubbed off, or evaporated. Anyway, it turns out the grottiness was simply surface rust, which wipes off, with a bit of POR-15 Metal Prep, to leave beautiful clean metal underneath. This revelation was a huge weight off my shoulders and made me very happy.
The money thing is a bit more complicated, but essentially boils-down to "do it once, do it right". I could do it myself, but it wouldn't be right. I could find someone to do it cheap, but it wouldn't be right. I've shipped the thing half way around the world. It has to be right. I really don't want a rusty car.
Anyway, I still had to get home for that lunch, so up into the truck for the obligatory I'm-not-bloody-smiling shot of Barry stood next to his masterpiece:
. Cool car indeed.
