When our cars were affordable.
Posted: Wed Feb 03, 2021 3:53 pm
Remember the days when your Elan was an affordable plaything instead of an investment?
Having gone to the loft to make a running repair to a felt overlap i ended up looking through a box of old Elan paperwork. I'm easily distracted.
Does anyone here remember Robin Alabaster? An old style bodywork man working out of premises that todays bodywork chaps would blanch at
I went to Robin after what can only be described as a pit prop fell off of a lorry to the left and in front of me as I exited a roundabout on a dual carriageway.. Fortunately it fell lengthwise but was still bouncing as i went over the top, resulting in damage under the nose, exhaust and rear scuttle. The lorry driver was oblivious to the incident but was chased down by a work colleague on his motorbike who had witnessed everything.
On the way home from work I recovered the pit prop and for many years used it to chock my cars when working underneath ... the overlap on the Elan track was getting on for 12 inches. Heaven knows what damage would have been caused if it had fallen across the lane or if I had accelerated just a fraction harder and it had hit the car before hitting the road.
Some years later a discovered the dreaded front turret rot. The original Lagoon Blue paint work was very poor by this time, no shine and in places a finish like crocus paper. I could see no point in fitting a new chassis to a tatty car so I went back to Robin for an estimate.
When I look back at the figures quoted I am amazed.
In the end I opted to have the body work done by Mick Miller, my last call on an epic one day 600+ mile tour around 3 other fibre glass specialists. Mick turned out to be a few hundred pounds more than Robin but at the time his paint shop was state of the art by comparison.
Having gone to the loft to make a running repair to a felt overlap i ended up looking through a box of old Elan paperwork. I'm easily distracted.
Does anyone here remember Robin Alabaster? An old style bodywork man working out of premises that todays bodywork chaps would blanch at
I went to Robin after what can only be described as a pit prop fell off of a lorry to the left and in front of me as I exited a roundabout on a dual carriageway.. Fortunately it fell lengthwise but was still bouncing as i went over the top, resulting in damage under the nose, exhaust and rear scuttle. The lorry driver was oblivious to the incident but was chased down by a work colleague on his motorbike who had witnessed everything.
On the way home from work I recovered the pit prop and for many years used it to chock my cars when working underneath ... the overlap on the Elan track was getting on for 12 inches. Heaven knows what damage would have been caused if it had fallen across the lane or if I had accelerated just a fraction harder and it had hit the car before hitting the road.
Some years later a discovered the dreaded front turret rot. The original Lagoon Blue paint work was very poor by this time, no shine and in places a finish like crocus paper. I could see no point in fitting a new chassis to a tatty car so I went back to Robin for an estimate.
When I look back at the figures quoted I am amazed.
In the end I opted to have the body work done by Mick Miller, my last call on an epic one day 600+ mile tour around 3 other fibre glass specialists. Mick turned out to be a few hundred pounds more than Robin but at the time his paint shop was state of the art by comparison.