It's been a while since I have done some updates, so quick update.
So slowly been working on the guard moulds and reproductions, and unfortunately this has taken a lot longer than expected due to work commitments consuming a lot of out of hours time, trying to get Pearl back on the road and generally, the moulds and reproductions taking a lot of time to fix up and get as best as possible.
So I have built the moulds and started on the fibreglass versions, when I get a text on 9-July from my mum, saying to contact someone at the panel shop.
Apparently they have been trying to contact me for a while about the car (though I left a message on the shop managers phone a month back..) as the business is closing up. Called up the owner and she said the shop was closing on the 10th July and I had to get my car and parts out by 4pm. To hear the news was rather unexpected, but I kicked into overdrive and started sorting out storage space with friends so I could store the car in a safe and dry place.
I kept up the calls with the shop owner and manager and we finally settled on the cost of the paint job as the work wasn't finished and arranged the use of their trailer so I could get the car back to Nick's place where the RC was stored. Luckily Nick and I had cleaned his garage the previous weekend so it was just a matter of driving the car out and storing it under a cover before moving the Elephant into the vacant space. In the morning I popped around to Nicks and finished up making room and prepping the garage for the influx of parts to come.
Next day I worked from home/took day off, and went over to the panel shop. They were in full swing removing offices and clearing out the cars and parts stored in the shop. The paint booths had already gone and my car was still sitting where it had been since I last saw it in January. Over the course of the day, I moved various parts back to Nick's and finally we got my car on to the trailer and back to Nick's safely. There was a can of nuts/bolts/badges/grommets and I was lucky to find the boot lid bolts as the lid wouldn't fit in my station wagon so we fitted the boot lid to the car. Found a spare boot opening surround as well, so there was no metal on metal contact. It was raining heavily, so the car did get a fair amount of water in the cabin, but at least I got back safely.
The panel shop decided to paint the bonnet and bumpers as part of the deal. Was a bit hard for them as they could only use some heat lamps to flash off the paint and I picked them up at the end of the day with the paint still soft. But I was expecting to only take back the primered parts, so to have them painted was a nice little bonus. They even bought a little more paint to finish up the job.
Car was covered in a layer of primer dust for sitting so long. This combined with the rain left the shell with a decent mess to clean up. Water also pooled in the cabin during the ride over, so I spent the afternoon/evening cleaning up the mess inside and out with paper towels. This also allowed me to inspect the shell up close and identify any issues.
Long story short, I have my car back after a year of waiting. The paint job is pretty reasonable with some junk in the paint but nothing that can't be cut back with a wet sand. They didn't clear coat it as I had expected, so I'll figure out if I want to do that or just buff the 2k. The didn't roll the guards as it would breach the paint job. As there are a number of parts not painted, I'll make a decision on the guard rolling as soon as possible before arranging another panel beater to do the fibreglass guards and other non finished parts. There are also parts missing so I'm going to have to chase the original panel beater to get some stuff back which is going to be a big hassle.
Here are some pics of the car as I got it back
