Got the 62 Coupe back from the paint shop yesterday.
I have owned this car since the mid 70s and restored it in 1979 and
drove it to the Namgar GT (5?) in Lake Tahoe that year, as well as
several others up until 1990 when I put the car in storage and somehow
never quite got around to using it again. I wanted to return to Tahoe
for GT 24 in 1999 and actually got the car out of storage in 98 to get
it going, but ended up taking a Jensen Interceptor instead when I
didn't find the time to resurrect the coupe.
I finally got around to fixing the minor rear hub seal leak (yes, 5
years to install a speedisleeve) and took a good look at the car. It
had been stored inside ever since I got it, but the paint was
suffering a bit after 25 years, and I had always wanted to convert it
back to the Mk 2 tail lights (I had a Mk 2 and Mk 1 coupe at the same
time and chose the best bits - the rear body came from the Mk 1, so
I'd kept those taillights).
I decided to treat it to a new paint job and replace the lights at the
same time, so I sent it off to a painter, who got carried away and
stripped and primed all of the panels off the car as well as the sills
and posts. He called me and told me he was ready to spray it, but
because he'd done more than he'd figured on doing, I now had the
opportunity to change the colour from Old English White to anything I
wanted, but I had only 2 hours to decide.
Paint colour decisions usually take me about as long as it takes to fix a
rear axle seal, so I was hard put to make up my mind, finally deciding to go
with a red (the interior is red).
Lots of 'omigod what have I done' moments, worrying that the car would
look like a giant cherry (we used Porsche Arena Red, a colour I had a
chance to see on a car - paint chips just don't do it) , but now that
it is home, it is growing on me. A dusty picture of the car is at
http://www.rhodo.citymax.com/albums/album_image/112402/394774.htm
The car before is at
http://www.rhodo.citymax.com/albums/album_image/112402/375966.htm
It is not a true Deluxe, BTW - I just had the opportunity and parts to
build it that way when I first restored it, and had the Twincam race
car, so knew that I liked the brakes. Being so used to the 5.5"
Dunlops on my race car, the stock narrow rims just don't look right. I
think I have a spare set of wide Dunlops, so I may fix that later.
Now a winter of repainting the boot and under the bonnet without
removing the engine (lots of fun), and sticking bits back on it, and I
should have a nice MGA driver for the first time in a long while.
I use a dead stock MGB 3 main engine, and will be installing a few
bits I've had around for years like a front sway bar, but will leave
it mechanically alone other than rebuilding the masters and such.
BTW, I was looking around on the net for Coupe stuff and visited
Barney Gaylord's site for the first time in quite awhile. Barney, I
want to thank you for what you do there - I run a few websites and I
know what a labour of love it has to be. Your site is probably the
best I have seen in terms of organising MGA information as a useful
resource.
I have also been digging through my old files and find that I was
corresponding with Jim Alcorn, Lyle York and others back in the 70s
and 80s when Twincams were obscure 'problem' cars unloved by any but
the true cognoscenti, Nice to be doing the same thing, with many of
the same people, decades later.
Cheers.
Bill Spohn
|