It’s showtime!
The team pull put all the stops for our Rebel with a Cause
We left you last time just a week away from the PC Classic Car and Restoration Show, where the Rebel was set to be unveiled on the Classic World Arena. However, the bodywork was turning into a time-sponge and the 261 polyester spray filler had only just been applied to the body.
After a day off to let the 261 harden fully, Steve Brown, Technical Manager for HB Body was back at CBR and joined by Matt Tomkins and CBR’S Jon Bentley for a day of blocking. Steve had sprayed a guide coat on top of the 261 to help identify any low spots and the chaps set to work. First, 320-grit paper was used to shape the car before 500-grit abrasive was used to remove any scratch marks left by the courser grade paper. Inside, the car was hoovered then blown out and final repairs made to ensure that the interior finish has a good surface to adhere to.
The following day, Steve set to work applying HB Body Toughliner to the interior of the car. This is a very hard-wearing product, developed for the beds of pickup trucks and other high traffic areas but, tinted to a grey from the NHS colour palette, it looks splendid inside the car. Applied using a 2.5mm primer gun, Steve sprayed it on a very low pressure to create a stippled effect, mimicking the texture of the original finish, providing a hardwearing surface that should be more than up to the job of surviving a few clumsy size nines.
Feelin’ blue
As soon as the Toughliner had dried, it was time for the shell to receive its NHS Blue top coat, colour matched to the Pantone codes on the NHS website in HB’S own 2k direct gloss.
Suddenly, the bodyshell was transformed, but there were now just days before the show and the bonnet, tailgate, dashboard and doors still needed prepping and painting. We’d need a miracle and a miracle we got. Working long hours and over the weekend, Steve took the panels away and prepared them at home before popping down the road to Paint Fusion where MD Tony Pryce gave Steve free reign of his workshop and booth. The hours ticked by but the day before the car was set to leave for the show, Steve was finished. Absolutely perfect inside and out, the panels were loaded into the bodyshell, by now temporarily dropped onto the rolling chassis, for careful transport from CBR’S premises to the NEC in one of the firm’s covered transporters.
It’s showtime
The show itself, and if you were there I’m sure you’ll agree, was a roaring success, with the
project attracting a massive amount of attention throughout the weekend. Joined by a crack team including Lewis Buchan and Adam Turpin from the Reliant Owners Club, Friday saw the rolling chassis stripped bare once again and each assembly carefully checked before being reassembled. The engine fired into life with little hesitation once the points had been cleaned, but it was the coming together of the body and the chassis that afternoon that really made the most impact. PC alumnus Fuzz Townshend was presenting the session and demonstrated his dexterity by taking weight of the offside front wheel arch as the body was lowered onto the chassis while commentating on proceedings.
Suddenly the Rebel looked like a car, an easy project, perhaps, but not so. Saturday morning was where the hard yards started. We were joined over the weekend by detailer Rich March who was deployed cleaning every component thoroughly before it could be refitted as well as flatting and polishing the bodywork.
In went the steering column and ’box, freshly filled with semi-fluid EP grease. Meanwhile the dash was fitted with its gauges – its crackle finish effect beautifully produced by Steve using the same Toughliner product splashed all over
the interior, but in black – which were then plugged into the new Autosparks loom.
Dashboard in, doors could be fitted then built up – colour matched paint in an aerosol deployed by Lewis on the door tops that hadn’t made it up to CBR with the rest of the body panels. Weather strips were riveted on and the tailgate hung, with just a small but terrifying mod to the upper hinge rebate required to perfect the gap all the way around. Sunday, the glass went in. Front rubbers are the same as Regals, so that was a part I supplied along with the chromed plastic insert, but rears are NLA, so Rich cleaned and dressed an original that Matt and he soon had fitted up.
Nick Mckenzie and Charlie Mccalla from the Macbeth Adult Education Centre joined us for the last session, where a flurry of activity saw the lights fitted, bonnet in place and the engine roar into life. It’s been a fantastic project so far and now needs just a little finessing before it’s ready to hit the road, leading road runs over summer before finally being prepared for sale to raise funds for NHS charities. I’m sure I’ll be reporting on it again soon from the PC workshop, but for now… time for a well earned rest.
■ practical.classics@bauermedia.co.uk