BECOMING A SWAN

This New Zealand–new Daimler SP250 is in the final stages of restoration. Kevin Lindsell found the car on Trade Me in 2015, located in Wanaka. It was a 1960 matching-numbers model, with a factory hardtop and new wire wheels, and, at least from the photos, looked to be in reasonable condition — and it had a WOF. Never buy a car unseen! The worst surprise was a Ford diff with drums, but there were many more! The car was originally registered on 19 December 1960 and sold by Coutts of Newmarket. Kevin purchased the car on 8 August 2015 and drove it back to Auckland from Wanaka. It was roadworthy (just), but had the aforementioned wrong diff, petrol leaking from both ends, bolt-on wires, and a host of other problems. It is now back to its original colour (it was black when Kevin bought it but Ivory White when it left the factory).

Kevin attended the 2016 Ellerslie Classic Car Show and the Daimler SP250 Club stand with Simon Crispe’s beautiful car, as featured in the July 2016 edition of this magazine (Issue No. 307). He sourced a complete diff unit with brakes through the club, but it was his neighbour Steve Marten who inspired him to do a total rebuild. A retired super-yacht builder (he worked on the America’s Cup yacht on the hardstand in Auckland Harbour), Steve offered to help with the fibreglass body shell, and also ended up doing the paint. With most of the work being done by Kevin and Steve, the ugly duckling is becoming a swan.