Classic car mechanic’s weekly motoring – When it rains… spec a Roller

‘In the corner of the workshop, Olli Ragbin ponders the motoring world’

The clocks have leapt forward and Mother Nature has stolen an hour of sleep from us all. What have we got in return? Rain. Lots of rain. Doesn’t seem a fair deal to me.

We are now well and truly at the beginning of another (wet?) classics season and across the UK, loved and cared for cars & bikes are venturing beaks out of nests. CCM towers is starting to get busy again with the re-commissioning of old friends and preparing them for the year ahead.

To mark the start of the year proper, the boys & gals at the workshop are having an open day tomorrow (Saturday 6th April) from 12pm onward. Why not pop down with your classic? Take a browse around the facilities, chat to the Techs and embrace all the love and care that the community has to offer.

2 of our current projects will be there - the Roller I talked Eric into buying and the Series III Jag Eric and I ‘won’ at auction. The Jag is now being put back together following a fairly extensive restoration and the Silver Shadow has been fully recommissioned for the road and is just in a ‘pending’ position as Eric & I contemplate navels before setting fire to more tenners.

Yesterday I booked in the old 911 that the gaffer & I have both owned at one point or other. This time for a ‘fresh from storage’ oil change and check over. Lewis did the business with the oily stuff and then Roy renewed the MOT. I’d forgotten what driving a car with firm suspension is like on British pot-holed roads. If you see me tomorrow, I’ll be the one sitting down chewing an ibuprofen.

As we are on the theme of weather, I can confirm that we have a forecast of ‘dry and bright’ for the morning (that’ll jinx it), so it would be great to see some lovely cars in the bright light of a warm April day.

Last night the CCM WhatsApp group was inundated with photos of Keithy Baby’s son-in-law’s company car…. Well, company car for the day at any rate. He works at Rolls Royce and rocked round to see Keith in a brand new Phantom. Good Lord now that is a motor. After having browsed the pics careful I then wasted an embarrassingly large proportion of my evening on the RR configurator site. Just so you know, I have exquisite taste and a two-tone grey Phantom with Lotus white interior (with cyan piping) and contrasting red leather proves it…(I think).

Anyway, I’ve got ahead of myself somewhat and need to refocus on the job in hand… and that is, deciding what to do with our Shadow whilst also trying not to bankrupt us in the process. Tricky problems to solve and anyone who’s faced a restoration knows only too well how easy it is to get overexcited by the whole process. Keith has pushed his son-in-law front and centre and is suggesting that having an RR expert tackle some of the paint stuff may be an option for us (fingers crossed on that one).

So projects are lined up and ready to commence, the sun has been booked for the morning, refreshments will be available, and classic chat will be on tap across an exceptionally broad range of makes, models and vintages.

Come on down, the water’s lovely!

Olli

....and so to this week's photos

This is an exceptionally beautiful early E-type, being fettled by our one and only (and also exceptionally beautiful) Jim

Simon has been practicing his magic show all morning. Any second now, he'll present you with (from thin air) a bunch of flowers.

Kaspars is gunning hard for the 'smile of the week' award. It's a bit like 'goal of the month' on Match of the Day.... different subject, but similar kudos

I think this may be our 100th blog with a Mini picture. They insist on it you know...

This reminds me of a scene from 'All Creatures Great and Small'. James Herriot (Justin) is attending to Daisy the yellow Cow, whilst Tristan (Lewis) calms her with a gentle pat

I think Keith stayed the night in that seat....

This is a Triumph Tourer. Can also we used (in an emergency) for Lighthouse duties

Eric has managed to source a complete parts catalogue for Project 'Series III Jag'..... yep, we'll be needing all of those bits..... yeah, of course they'll all be available from stock

Winter is over.... we just need Spring to start.... any ideas where that's gone?

Fist of my 3 fav customer cars this week..... this Jeep 4.0 looks sensational in the flesh. This one the Americans got right. Love the tyre/wheel size and the significant jack-up. It just looks right!

2nd....A very tidy 560SEC. Beloved of 80's football managers and high-flyers the world over. Cars were smaller in the 80's & 90's.....except for this one

3rd.... I had a poster of one of these on my bedroom wall when I was a kid.... it was a white series I. They are starting to age very well and are still under appreciated in my view