So what's the plan

With the imminent arrival of my MG Midget, I would like to capture my thoughts about my plan for this lovely classic car. For it will either be a complete failure, which will result in selling the parts as spares due to a totally rusted out chassis, or go according to plan with some ups and downs along the way. If there is a god, please now let them hear my prayers!

I can't help sound foolishly naive but the plan is basically to strip her down all the way back to the bare chassis and rebuild. I found this photo which goes to some way in explaining what I am hoping to get to over the next few months.

And now and spiritual quote for all car restorers out there...

"Refitting - Reverse the removal procedure"

Now I have owned a couple of Haynes manuals over the years to save some money from the annual service and I know only too well that those words are more often than not a complete joke.

I am fully aware that for someone as inexperienced as myself to get to this point requires a lot of dedication, patience and skill, but the way I look at it, the most important part is recording and documenting the disassembly of this vehicle.

Noting what each piece is and how it was attached to the chassis and what else was connected to it will help me understand how I am going to put it all back together. Every part will be assessed and graded as 'OK', 'restore' or 'replace'. (not counting on too many OK's) I will of course be very reliant on friends and the online community on how to restore the parts that can be, as well as understand how to replace the parts from their recently scrapped predecessors.

I will have to learn new skills, especially I am sure in MIG welding. But one of the skills that I am sure I will be subcontracting out is the finishing. You cannot beat a professional paint job even though it will cost probably way more than I originally paid for the car, but I know it will be worth it.

I did note that the speedo read around 44,500 miles. I will need to find out if this is genuine or not, hopefully to log book will revival all. If the car is that low mileage after 47 odds years I do still want to tackle the engine. What is the point of not taking it apart to make sure that something isn't going to fail because I didn't do a proper job. There is also the massive satisfaction that I did in my life rebuild an engine. Of course help will be needed...I think timing is kind of important??

That sums up my whole approach to this project. If you're going to do it, do it properly in the first place, once and once only!  I cannot bare the thought of driving down the road knowing that I cut a few corners.

I'll upload some photos on Monday evening when we will hopefully have her in the workshop.