Status Quo

[Durango2k]

Bonnet to be painted within 8 weeks, Pilkington told me my windshield will be delivered soon, so maybe after 13 years…

Carsten

[Gfhug]

Keep up the good work, Carsten. And playing their music
We look forward to seeing the finished car on the road.

Geoff

[Durango2k]

…. Music-wise I‘m off to Paris tomorrow. On 3.7.21, 2 days after my 50th, I‘ll be visiting Jim at Pere LaChaise.

Carsten

[PeterCrespin]

Well done. As soon as I saw the front in primer I thought of my picture from last week - a car which uses the body tag and title thst once applied to your tub.

[Robbiee]

Peter
Just a thought
What’s the original diameter of a Dtype/XKSS steering wheel (if indeed they used the same wheel)?
Robbie

[PeterCrespin]

The 16” D uses inverted Y 120 degree spokes to see the offset dials more clearly. The 16” E has dials dead ahead, so keeps the top half clear to view them. The D wheel is much stiffer, as is the column.

[Durango2k]

Uh well, life got a bit in the way, but now, bonnet is primered.

Hope to have it back in a few weeks. But as Covid figures are exploding hereover,
that may be just a wish.

We bought another classic in the meantime, an U427.115 (no thats not a german sub), its a Unimog. We‘re building an offroad camper to go travelling…. So I have something to do whilst the Jaguar is „being painted“.

[Durango2k]

It‘s still at the painters…

[Durango2k]

Well we are here now…

Carsten

[Durango2k]

It is getting close…

Carsten

[PeterCrespin]

Was the Dark blue body paint damaged?

[Durango2k]

Hi Pete,

Yes, in too many small places. Plus we had the problem that it was absolutely impossible to match the paint, even with modern scanners and computers. It never was perfectly right, closest was a mitsubishi paint from the 80s, but just.

Plus there was the useless antenna hole in the front plus some rust under the roof. So we decided to do a light overspray… I‘ll keep you all posted how it came out.

Carsten

[Durango2k]

It came out rather well… just look at it, Pete… I still remember the morning I stopped at your place, to buy the chassis / tub, you opened the door, it was maybe 8 am ? and a bird dropped a huge spot on my Merc, and you looked at it happening and said „welcome to England“…




Kind regards,

Carsten

[vee12eman]

Hi Carsten,

Beautiful colour, going to be a beautiful car. I’ve followed this for many years, ever since you started posting and I saw you had a 2+2, like my own (even though mine is a S3 V12) glad you nearly there now. I fully remember the excitement when I saw my car in a similar condition to that.
Congratulations.

Regards,

Simon

[Durango2k]

Hey Simon,

I bought it back in 2008, and thought I‘d do it in 3-4 years. Its now been 14 years, and it‘ll be 15 in the end…

Those pesky Citroens I did before never took longer then maybe 3 years, because when you bought them for the same amount of dough, you did get an actual car and not a pile‘o‘rust with soooo many problems….needing almost any part either intensely overhauled or replaced (which I tried to avoid as much as I could). Plus Citroen stuff was cheap back then, lots of wrecks (iirc I had like 15 or 17 Citroen SM…all parted out for cash).

So I thought, do it, shelled out the money we saved for the kitchen overhaul, came out of that stunt shy of a divorce, and then it took ages. In fact I did other cars in between, like the 2500 Euro Citroen 11 I was told was left in a garage for 23 years (which it really was and now it drives so nicely), or the finalizing of the Imp- powered Centaur kit (to be able to drive it at least more then 2 miles), but giving up the E- Type never was an option.

I now hope I can finance putting the E on my red „collection“ german numberplate by next years with everything skyrocketing hereover / time will tell. Maybe time to hand over the Centaur to a museum, after its complete resto plus 30 years in my hands.

Carsten

[Durango2k]

Some more…









…. And yes, thats Felix unloading it…

Carsten

[DWW]

A lovely job there, hopefully soon to b driven.....

[Durango2k]

… Uh well… I had to restore a Unimog in between, finish the Centaur to sell it to a museum to finance a house roof (partially), overhaul a modern mercedes 5spd automatic box (no fear…), maintain an MX5… so this is where I am now.

Felix will be 21 in June, and he keeps nagging me to let him drive… I‘ll try to make it possible, with me in the passenger seat of course.

Carsten

[Durango2k]

Ok front right complete. Took me another 3 hours. Sooo fiddly.

Some X years ago I put all the bits in boxes, one box per front bumper part etc. Now, I found 2 identical bolts with captive nuts- anyone an idea where these should go ? I am sure they are E- Type. All the other parts where there - and I have no clue where to put them. One per side…

Will continue on the LH side over the weekend. Are the long detailing pieces for the bonnet which cover the joint usually like 1.5 inches too long ? I had to cut mine. And they do not go under the lamp surrounds, the just hit against its edge. Else the surround stands proud.

Kind regards,

Carsten

P.S. - I know, but… pardon me for that, but the french got the glass mounting system much better then the E has it. It‘s not a problem in a DS, and even less with the SM. But it was sooooo fiddly to get all 6 small screws into the lamp surround and have them all grip their nuts…. Just a bit of rust and it‘s a hell to take apart I bet.

[Mich7920]

Hi Carsten

From memory, I think I saw 2 captive nuts on the brake reservoir mounting bracket.

Mich