OMG Morning blues

The following morning.
After arriving back from Basingstoke it was late before we had off loaded the van and locked up the garage in the dark.

The morning bought a new sense of vigour I was up and at the crack of dawn and at the garage waiting to see how things sized up.

I opened the doors of the garage to the site shown in the picture. I had to get a picture, as I did not believe what I had done.

The body did not fit the chassis it had warped and was approx 2” off the middle section of the chassis.

This had obviously occurred whilst it was in his cluttered garage propped up by the previous owners life collections. I placed my hands in my face and shut the garage doors. I new I would either have my work cut out to finish this project in the time.

Fortunately another friend was to step in Ben.

I had very little experience in fiber glass and had no idea how to solve this problem.

A van, Darren, £50.00 for petrol & a pocket full of dough

Three weeks later.

Meet Darren, he is one of the nicest people that I know he has a wonderful heart and has one of the most interesting jobs that you can imagine. He works in the city area collecting furniture and valuables from house clearances. I first met him in a pub in Hawkhurst. I met the entrepreneur in him trying to get out and was soon seeing him starting a second successful career in music.

After moving from Hawkhurst. Darren moved shortly afterwards as well and I lost contact I hope he is well and his life is full.
We travelled up to Basingstoke stopping at Clackets services for diesel. Darren mentioned that he had a few bits from his business still in the van but he was sure it would not be a problem. The trip was packed with fun as I always enjoyed Daren’s company because we where never at a loss for something to talk about. We reached Basingstoke and thanks to my Nokia 6630 and the Tom Tom GPS unit we found the address easily.

We reached Basingstoke and Daren opened the back of his van. It was half full of furniture! I phoned Catherine and Gabbled a short message to her saying the van was full how on earth was I going to get the buggy bits in there.

The gentleman was selling the contents of his garage as they where obviously moving. He had a range of other strange objects inside including a piano. His partner Donna had obviously asked him to get the bits out in the anticipation of our visit.

I asked Daren how and why and what he said he had a drop in the early hours and he thought the buggy bits would fit. Never tell a man with a van his job, guess he was right :-)

The general condition looked on the surface not to bad. There were two large holes in the rear seat area, the engine cover was broken and the rear seat area had a brake in the fibreglass. Some holes in the fibreglass where evident everywhere but I thought it was possible to make it fit my chassis and do the repairs. The gentleman who I believe was Andy told me that the car had been on the road in the past and was a head turner but unfortunately it had got into bad repair and it was evident that his family and forced move where talking every bit of cash he had. Still from his dreams to my own maybe this is how they pass without us knowing I can only say that we travelled back home in the van and I must have had the largest grin on my face that was humanly possible.

I must say Catherine has always been behind me and has always shown that she fully believes in what I can achieve. I am sure my family thought I was mad especially when they saw what I had spent my money on.

Choosing a dash board layout

21st July. 2005
I started to do up the buggies dashboard by stripping the multiple layers of paint from it with wet and dry silicon carbide paper. The process was lengthy but the result was good and I was soon able to have a nice finish on it to start designing my new layout. There where already several holes that had been cut into the dashboard principally for one dial a steering column and another curious hole that was unknown. I started by grinding out the holes so as to get a good key for my new fibre glass to get a grip onto. The result was good and i started to fill up the holes and fill in from the back. The fibreglass was then sanded down to a fine finish.

I came up with five designs for the layout of the new dash boards dials and submitted them on a forum on http://www.beachbuggy.org.uk This was especially useful as the whole buggy group helped and gave comment. The options where as below:
Choice A though to Choice B.
Choice C The MOST VOTED, through to Choice D

Choice E.


The most voted choice from these was layout C which scored the highest number of votes. I had made the layouts to fit around six gauges 4 x 40mm sensors : Fuel Tank;Pressure, Volts; Temperature, The two 80mm gauges where a speedometer and rev counter. These where all VDO and came from the the Classic range.

I bought two Starrett hole cutters and an arbour which they fitted from Travis Perkins in Cranbrook , these worked out to be quite cheep at around £14 for the smaller ones and around £19 for the larger. I marked the position of the dials according to my template and cut the holes. The Starret hole cutters where wonderful. I had previously used them to cut the hole for the petrol filler so new they cut beautifully. The new holes look great.

I had decided much earlier that I wanted a stereo and as I knew I would have to build an area for this I thought it would be a good idea to build an area to take the hazard light and light switch at the same time. The finished dash board although it was in need of a respray looked great. I was so pleased with it and just had to add some indicator bulbs for high beam; indicators and alternator and it was finished.

I was now looking forward to rubbing down the paint work on the tub and cleaning up the bottom painting it with a fresh gel coat.

I would be doing this next and had been out to buy new supplies to start the next day with.

A solution, or an impossible task

9th July 2005.

Whilst creating my eBay post on turbolister I was searching for a suitable category in which to advertise my Beach Buggy Chassis, I came across item number: 4561230995, this was listed as a project beach buggy kit car and was located in Basingstoke. It had started at £50.00 and was soon up to £200.00 and had 5 bids. It was just the tub, roll bar and front bumper. The seats the wheel rims and other items where unusable.

The front looked amazingly like an American car the Corvette. I fell for its looks immediately. The only problem was a severe lack of time, 3 1/2 months before my family moved and if i took this leap of faith then I would have to have the whole thing rolling/running by the 26th October 2005. On top of this I had to win the auction something as of late I had not had much luck with.

During the course of the last 20 years I had tried twice unsuccessfully to purchase the GP Beach Buggy body top. The first was faltered as when I approached GP the company had been sold. The second time 29 June 1999 a gentleman called Adrian House in Aldershot had purchased the moulds and was able to supply the parts I sent him a cheque in the post with a list of items that I required and the letter and cheque went missing in the post. By the time I had allowed for postal times, stopped the check and contacted Adrian. The company was in trouble again and I believe he no longer had the moulds. My GP Beach Buggy had passed me by, however a new dream a corvette look a like beach buggy was sparkling on the horizon.

Bidding on ebay is a art form so my friends told me you have to sit and watch the auction until as near as the end you humanly dare and have another window set up with your bid ready to go at the press of a button. This is ok until its something that really matters. I had decided that I was going to give it a shot. I new I could afford to work for 5 months on the project and if I had not made enough progress the project could still could be sold. There was a glimmer of hope and the anticipation was immense as I watched with Catherine the time tick by and the auction remain at £200.00. As the auction reached its end time the bids slowly started to rise and each time I stood cool and waited 20s from the auction end at 10:33pm the race was on, amazingly even though I thought I had lost the auction I had won it by 1p.

Cash in place I need to find a way of transporting this from Basingstoke to Kent. Would I be able to get the item moved and would every thing fit in place.

The personal choice

1st July 2005.
The summer of 2005, brought with a lot of change in my family and a lot of change in my life.

I had met my partner Catherine in June 2004 at Gatwick after a long courtship on the phone. I had been courting her for a year at her home in bexhill for about a year when my my father became very ill, he had slowely lost wieght and become very introverted it had taken a push to get him to the doctors as he had always been the main staple of my family, times where changing and some serious choices had to be made. Some of them ones that I was not going to like as I could find no new garage for my buggy to reside in. I had six months before my family had to move out and I must confess my partner Catherine was the only one that kept faith even when I was despairing. 20 years had past and the dream that had started so long ago with my father was fading fast.

I took my beach buggy chassis and engine out of the garage and washed off the years that sitting in a garage had accumulated. The dust came off very easily with a hosepipe and my hard work with my paint work had paid off.
The reason for cleaning up the chassis was a sorrowful one. My parents where planning on retiring as my father was diagnosed with cancer and the family home was to be sold along with it my garage that housed my buggy chassis.

The reason for the pictures where that i was planning to sell the chassis on eBay and write the whole project off.

What would happen next would I find another solution? Would the chassis not sell?, or would it not even make it onto eBay?