2000: After 20 years of sitting the brakes were frozen and so was the engine. That didn't really surprise me but what I was not ready for was the amount of Bondo that held the whole car together.
The first step was to get the car up on jack stands, remove the bonnet and wheels. All this was the easy part.
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I did a lot of cleanup in the engine area and on the front end. Much of the initial work I did was not really necessary because over time I ended up doing it again and again. A good example are the wire wheels. Over the years I've cleaned them three or four times before the car was actually driven anywhere.
The engine area needed a lot of cleanup but it would have been a lot easier if I had waited until the engine was out of the car. I do believe that all the extra time spend doing unnecessary things is part of the learning experience and does payoff later in the rebuild process because I was more familiar with the internal layout.
I pulled the rugs out of the cockpit and it exposed the fiberglass work I did twenty years before. You will see a lot of this throughout the car. Especially in the boot area.
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I do not know the full history of this car but as I tore things down I could see that the car was painted Jaguar Carmen Red at the factory. Probably early on the car was in an accident because there is a repair to the frame and the car was painted Hot Pink. You can use your imagination to figure out who drove it then.
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Probably a few years later the car needed major repairs to the body panels because body rot was showing everywhere. The quarter panels were rusted out and repaired with sheet metal brazed over top of the rusted panels. I figure the car was about 5 years old when it was repaired and repainted. The car was painted a brown/bronze color (probably a used car dealer needed a better color in order to sell it).
A third set of repairs probably happened around 1971 because now more rust was showing up and the quarter panels had rusted through again so the repair was more sheet metal on top of the last repair and more paint and body putty. All other rust throughs were covered with aluminum tape and body putty. The car was repainted with a similar color bronze color.
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Bondo was everywhere and in some places it was applied over aluminum tape just to cover up gaping rust holes in the sheet metal. The side mirrors on the doors were screwed into the body putty that was covering a piece of tape.
The real work started with the rear end because I knew the back brakes were frozen. In order to get to the brakes the exhaust system has to be removed and the whole rear end unit has to be dropped and disassembled. Some of the bolts were frozen in place and had to be cut off. I ended up spending a lot of time just getting the rear unit out of the car. Also I've done 99% of the work by myself so I had to figure out ways to get things done without assistance.
A lot of work went into cleaning up the rear unit. Everything was removed and cleaned up. New brake cylinders were bought to replace the old ones because the original ones were beyond repair. The brake disks were turned at the machine shop.
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New bushings were pressed into the trailing arms and any rubber pieces that needed attention were replaced.
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Everything was painted and reinstalled.
The rear end assembly cleaned up very nicely. I almost hated to put it back in the car where it would not be seen.
