Now gleaming and safely tucked away at Sports and Classic Cars it was time to start the really exciting bit namely reassembling all the nice clean, refurbished parts back to the body. I started by cleaning out the interior which was grubby with the remains of the bodywork preparation. Having got it clean I gave the underside of the roof several coats of Smoothrite and the floor and bulkheads several coats of black stone chip.

I then glued three insulation panels to the underside of the roof. Contrary to popular belief these are not intended to keep the inside of the car warm but rather to prevent condensation and subsequent rust. I attempted to minimise future rust problems by covering the roof underside and box section with closed cell rubber foam. I then used leatherette cloth for covering the A and B posts and area under the tailgate.

With this done it was soon time to fit the new headlining which when unfolded is absolutely enormous.. I spent a couple of hours one evening carefully ironing the creases out of it. I had hoped to persuade Jock to help me fit it as this job looked like the sort of nightmare that would benefit from his infinite patience. To my dismay he declared the job to be too difficult and suggested that we get Ray Banks (colloquially known in Sports and Classics circles as ‘Ray the Roof’) to do it. Ray hails from just down the road in Alcester but travels all over Europe in his mobile workshop doing car trimming and carpets. He has a voluminous photo album containing everything from the Sultan of Omans’s Rolls Royce to Adolf Hitlers Mercedes Convertible, all loving retrimed by Ray.

This was all very impressive however I was anxious to impress upon him that this job was for a near bankrupt bloke’s GT6 and whilst the Sultan could doubtless afford to line his pockets with gold, I was looking for something closer to the ten-bob mark. In the end we negotiated something closer to the latter and by 5pm I had a beautifully fitted lining.

The original windscreen was very scratched. I suspect that a previous young and impoverished owner could not afford the luxury of windscreen wiper blades. I got a new one surprisingly easily from the lads at British Sports Car Spares and Simon offered to fit it for me while I was at work. I returned on the Saturday morning expecting to see the windscreen in place but to my dismay I was met with no windscreen and a very serious looking Simon. ‘You’ve broken it’ I surmised. ‘No, its worse than that’, he replied. I couldn’t think of anything that could be worse but was soon to find out that during the roof box section rebuild the windscreen surround had been pulled out of shape at the top. When the windscreen was offered up it fitted the flange perfectly at the bottom and sides but stood clear of the flange at the top by about half an inch at its worst point. Deep gloom.

There was only one solution. Cut the box section and roof front above the windscreen, pull it back into shape and weld it up. But it was all painted! and that beautiful headlining! I couldn’t face the prospect and went away to make a pot of tea and break open a fresh packet of biscuits. By now Jock had arrived and seeing the deathly pallor of my face said to Simon, ‘So you’ve told him then’.

We held a crisis meeting over said tea and biscuits and worked out a logical approach to the job. During this meeting I reminded Simon that it was he who had welded the roof in the first place and that this seemed like an appropriate moment to re-negotiate the guarantee period of the vacuum cleaners. He was full of contrition and readily agreed to waive the guarantee altogether, which made me feel a little better.

The first job was to carefully unpick the front edge of the headlining and peel it back. Everything would need masking to keep grinding and welding sparks off the paint. We would need to make up a new top windscreen flange, weld it into place and then fill as required to ensure a proper fit of the windscreen seal. Once the initial trauma of taking a cutter to the new paint was over everything went remarkably smoothly. Jock was as usual, an absolutely brick, measuring, checking and re-checking everything as we went. Eventually after several fittings and removals the flange profile was deemed correct. I re-masked the surrounding area primed and painted finishing with a light coat of thinner to blend the new paint into the original. After carefully re-gluing the the front edge of the headlining back into place (fortunately I’d watched Ray do the original job!) we refitted a new seal. The result was as good as new.

With the trauma of the windscreen over I was able to continue the rebuild more or less as planned.. The heater, windscreen washers and wiper gear went in. A new wiring loom was acquired and run in and rear light clusters fitted. I reassembled the engine backplate, flywheel, clutch, bell-housing, gearbox and overdrive on the workshop floor and then fitted the whole assembly into the car in about 10 minutes courtesy of Simon’s hydraulic lift.

The engine ancillaries followed in short order, including electronic ignition, spin on oil filter conversion along with a custom alarm system. I’ve never been much of a fan of dashboard eyeball vents that blow cold air into your eyes. The old Escort had then and I threw the drivers side one out and replaced it with a aircraft altimeter obtained for a few quid at a car boot sale; a fascinating and unusual accessory. Not only are the GT6 vents useless being so small but they are unnecessary because the car has quarter-lights. Wonderful things quarter-lights such a pity they went out of vogue. I therefore refitted only the under dash vents and filled the subsequent holes in the  dashboard to fit a voltmeter and oil pressure gauge… I did draw the line at an altimeter though!

I had the inlet and exhaust manifolds bead blasted and then painted the exhaust manifold with Eastwoods Stainless Steel paint. This has to be baked in an oven after application so I chose a day when Angela was out shopping . This gave the cooker time to cool down and the smell time to vacate the house by the time she returned. The exhaust system itself came from Bell silencers. Its made to OE standard but from stainless steel and emits a rather pleasant 6 cylinder tone.

With the engine ancillaries in place it was nearing the time when I could fire up the engine, a significant milestone in any rebuild project. I fished out the fuel tank from under a set of drawers in the shed only to find that in the preceding six years of storage the tank had rusted clean through. Once more British Sports Car Spares came to the rescue with a used item and once cleaned up, painted and refitted  all there was to do was connect up the fuel pipe, prime the pump and give it a whirl. A little choke, a pump of the throttle and a few anxious moments later… vrooooom! Off she goes. The only issue a small leak from the heater pipe union soon rectified.

With the engine warm we set the carbs using the special long allen key tool and an airflow meter and within a few minutes she was running like a sewing machine. I couldn’t resist the temptation to drive it, so without doors or seats I set off up the road which at least proved that the clutch, gearbox, overdrive and brakes worked! In jubilation on my return I also tested the airhorns and they worked too!

Spurred on by the car being mobile again I made rapid progress with the rear windows, tailgate, new rear luggage shelves, headlamps, and carpet set fitted by Jock with his usually attention to detail. I anguished long and hard over in-car entertainment. An original GT6 long/medium wave radio would be not only hard to find but also restrict me to a diet of Radio Four and Five, not exactly my cup of tea. Eventually I lashed out a whole five pounds on a digital radio cassette player from Chesterfield flea market. It needed some technical fiddling to make it go but now I have Radio 2 and the ability to play my Ray Conniff cassettes; well worth compromising originality for!

With carpets and seats in place there were just the doors left to reassemble and fit. I’d made copious notes when I disamantled these but still getting them to close with an appropriate clunk required considerable time and adjustment. So there she was ready to roll at last.

I duly collected all the paperwork together and on November 1st 1996 I headed to Evesham post office to get the car taxed. The young lady behind the counter noted that it had been untaxed for seven and half years and enquired if it had been kept on the public road during that time. I explained that this was the last day of the rebuild and she handed over the requisite paperwork with a smile and an exclamation of ‘have fun!’

I did 120 miles that day and Bluey ran a treat except for the time when she suffered the common problem of fuel vaporisation after stopping for a few minutes. A good excuse to keep driving. I’ve subsequently fitted a pair of heat shields and re-routed the fuel pipe away from the engine block this has completely cured the problem. I now look forward to a summer of driving once the weather has improved.

Finally before I close I should thank the real heroes of my rebuild: Simon Andrews and Jack Parffrey of Sports and Classic Cars. Without their help, advice and encouragement I doubt Bluey would ever have seen the road again, but more than that Simon and Jock oiffered me the immensely satisfying opportunity of working for many months in the company of like minded enthusiasts, sharing their interests, their knowledge, tea and biscuits. They continue to be and I hope will remain, good and valued friends even though Bluey is now finally, rebuilt.

Bluey with the S&C Team. From left to right: Mark Duffy, Tony Carr, Simon Andrews and Jock Parffrey.