ROVER P6 ESTORA
This 1973 Rover P6 Estora was originally an Almond Yellow P6 that in 1975 was sent to Panel Craft to be converted into the Estora through the dealer, HR Owens. The car has had many owners over the years, some who sold and later bought it back. At some point in its life the original engine was swapped for a 3.9 EFI engine with a BMW ZF four-speed automatic gearbox fitted to it, plus it had some welding work done. A couple of years ago it fell into the hands of youtuber Sheldon, and Andrew Huxley and I decided to purchase it and take it on. We bought the Estora sight unseen, but we were lucky because there are a few videos of the car on the net, plus we got chatting to previous owners who told us a lot of its history
After we paid and had the car delivered back home on a car trailer, it was pushed into the garage so we could see why it wouldn’t start and begin to fix the problems. We then let the car dry out and get rid of the pools of water that had collected inside after being stored in a field for six months. In March 2022 we were asked if we could exhibit the Estora at the NEC that November on the Rover P6 Club stand. We agreed.
Andy and I agreed that neither of us liked the colour Almond, and so we picked the colour Aintree Green, a Land Rover colour. I took the wings off the P6 to see how much welding we might need to do, but we were surprised to find it was solid. The wings were taken over to Andy’s to get ready to be resprayed in Aintree Green.
Come July, we started to send bits off to get refurbished ready for the deadline. We ordered a new carpet set, re-dyed the seats, sorted the engine bits and bobs, found new wheels and sent them for powder coating. In August, the Estora was delivered to Andy’s to finish the respray ready for the NEC in November.
Work started with the help of Harry who took the vinyl roof off to see what lay beneath. All the old glue was removed, as were the doors and bonnet. The tailgate needed three of us to lift off, it was so heavy. With the windows removed, it was ready for being taken back to bare metal. Inside the door shuts and rear wings were then resprayed ready for the reassembly. The roof was left until last, because with the sunroof welded up and filled in, we could have a smooth roof which then was resprayed. With only a week or so to spare, Andy had a enough time to do a shake down to see if there were any problems with the Rover before we headed to the NEC Classic Motor Show, where it was parked next to my ex northamptonshire Police Rover P6 V8S.
Chris Jones