Removed all the glass from all the windows..cleaned up the good ones and had new toughened replacements made for the rear doors and one front windscreen at the local glaziers. In all quite cheap, costing about £40 for the three.
Removed the sliding door gear both sides, cleaned them up, primed, painted and greased up. Also decided to add some missing ball bearings. Got some new 5/16 ones and managed to easily add them in by bending the holder open, popping in a bearing and bending the holder back with a pair of pincer pliers.
Also removed all the glass runners from the front doors and again cleaned, primed, painted and fitted new felt.
Took quite a while but I have now repaired all the doors and front grill. Had to knocked out and/or fill the many dents. All doors are just waiting to be primed once I have my spray gun up and running.
Managed to buy a new rear door handle of the same pattern as the one fitted...not sure if that was an original though. Had to modify the fixing for the handle as the mounting holes were slightly wider apart. The old fixing holes were no good anyway as the wood had rotted away in the region of the screws. I used two 6 mm Riv-Nuts and washers to make new fixings. See pics below. The raised head of the Riv-nuts sit nicely inside the handle escutcheon.
Finally I got quotes for chrome plating a couple of door handles and the front grill badge. Wow! At anywhere between £100 and £200 for the badge alone I decided to try another method.
I applied some fairly bright 50 mm wide aluminium adhesive backed tape all over the badge front surface. I carefully worked this into the nooks and crannies using the round end of an artists brush. Used one piece for the letters and background and then several pieces for the edges, top and sides, being careful to only join pieces where there is a bend or corner. Don't try this with plastic based shiny tape as it will not deform into the tight corners on the badge. This looked pretty good so I polished with some metal polish and got a decent shine.
Next I added about three coats of signal red enamel to the background, by hand, and finished off with a couple of coats of clear enamel spray paint.
Here are the photos at various stages. As I don't see George being out in the rain too much I think it will do until I find a much cheaper source of chrome plating!
Old paint cleaned off
Aluminium tape applied and polished
Finished
