A selection of photos taken between 2000 and 2007. I had been restoring the car for about eight years by 2000 - first in Germany and then in England before shipping it to the States, with a couple of years stored with Pickfords in Peterborough in between. A much-traveled car.
Our daughter Amanda, helping Dad out before heading out to her High School Prom. This was taken shortly after the car arrived by container from England as a rolling chassis. The first task was to build the ash frame, using the original timbers as patterns, plus the ply patterns I had made when previously restoring JN 570 in the eighties. Note the bandsaw in the garage.
The ash frame painted and nearly ready for paneling and fabric, showing off its sweet lines.
First firing up. The car retains its original factory engine that was vandalized in a machine shop in Bexhill, while we were living in Germany. There were two years of delays and excuses. They had found a crack in the block and had to send it to a company in Birmingham for welding - or so they said. The truth, which was discovered by my brother-in-law who lived in nearby Hastings, was that furious creditors broke in to the engine works one night and smashed every engine with sledgehammers. The block was subsequently described as a 'jig-saw puzzle', but some superb craftsmen in Birmingham stitched it back together and the repair is now invisible externally. Luckily it was limited to the side opposite the oil gallery. if that had been smashed, the block would have been scrap. As the Bexhill company quickly went bust, there was no come-back - an expensive exercise, but it did save the original block.
During the fabric work (I chose hot weather so the material stretched over the tail more easily), Register member Peter Caldwell visited from Wisconsin to learn how it is done before tackling his 1931 Minor fabric saloon.
The difficult part - the 3/8" pin beading. Getting this wrong would have let down the whole car. The most difficult part is ensuring the narrow pin beading covers ALL of the fabric attach pins underneath. Note also how the beading comes to a perfectly symmetrical point. I am NEVER going to do another one!
Getting close. In the background is my old 1929 Minor tourer. Now resident with Ray McCrary in Tennessee.
The big day. First drive up our hill and back.
An early test run to the historic Ada covered bridge.
Our Summer Rally at Milton Abbey in 2007, after this historic car had been repatriated. Note the shipping stickers on the windscreen. The green one reads 'TOWED ON'. I didn't want it driven by the dockers! When the car arrived in Southhampton, I was there to collect it and drive it to Dorset. The car was undamaged, but I did find the gear knob missing. I found it on the floor. Weeks of a ship's' engine vibration tends to unscrew anything not tightly secured. The only other problem was that it would not start. The distributor points had become glazed with salt air. A quick cleaning with emery paper and we were off into the Southampton rush-hour!
The two Hambro sisters, Jean Woodroffe (left) and Mary Seymour (right). Their father, Captain Angus Valdimar Hambro, DL JP, owned Milton Abbey in Dorset between the wars and purchased the Semi-sports new for his chauffeur to teach his six children to drive. Jean and four other siblings all learned to drive in this car, uyt Mary was too young at the time, but remembered the car fondly. The children rather irreverently christened the car 'The Bed-Pan' due the shape of the body! It was an honour to take the sisters for a drive around the Abbey grounds and through nearby Milton Abbas, bringing back many happy memories for them.
The sisters are interesting. Jean Woodroffe (Nee Jean Francis Hambro) was appointed Lady-in-Waiting to HRH Princess Elizabeth in 1945, then Extra Woman of the Bedchamber to HM The Queen in 1953. Mary Seymour (nee Rachel Mary Hambro) married Major Sir Bryan Cosmo Bonsor 3rd Baronet, 7/3/42, thereby becoming Lady Bonsor. Both sisters were with the incognito Princess Elizabeth outside the gates of Buckingham Palace among the ecstatic throngs on VE Day. Sadly, both sisters are now deceased, so the reunion was timely.
Taking Jean Woodroffe for a trip down Memory Lane.
Jim Legg, MBE and Honorary Member of the Register. The above-mentioned chauffeur was his father and he remembers the car vividly from his youth. The Semi-sports was given to Jim's father as a retirement gift because he loved the car so much. A few years later, Jim became the third owner. Jim is still going strong and sends me a Christmas card every year.
As you can probably imagine, I cannot wait to own this car later this year and drive it to the pub once again.