The Dark Wob

Taken shrinker/stretcher out of the box and ordered a small amount of sheet steel to try (as I don't have any washing machines to recycle).

Small victories - finally found my air impact wrench and was somewhat amazed when it freed off three of the troublesome set screws I'd been battling with for ages - one in the door striker and the others in the lower hinge of the rear door.

Continuing the theme of small victories - I managed to snap off the remaining set screws so have removed the left rear door tonight. I've also removed the striker plate. Not sure how the plate behind that the screws thread into is supposed to work - I expected it to drop out but it seems to be captive behind a pressing - maybe only being held in place by the remains of the screw threads now. If I get one those dog leg repair panels I can just cut it all out anyway.

Thanks entirely to Mercrocker of this parish I am now proud owner of a photo of the old bus from 1976.

It was listed on eBay.

Very nice find! That '59 Impala in the background belonged to a friend of mine and was also an original RHD import car. It was pretty nice then and even appeared in a Sunday Times supplement in 1970. He visited me on one occasion when I had my RHD '59 so there were two parked together in a side road on a South East London council estate. Sadly no photos exist of that moment in time and I only have one photo of my Impala. I shall have to take a photo of that photo and share it if you like.

That is a seriously cool photo

I just received (partly thanks to Mr Mercrocker) a copy of "The Over Here Collection - Chevrolet"
I am guessing anyone with even a passing interest in Yank Iron is aware of the late Steve Miles "Over Here" books - and I thought I had them all, but it turns out I didn't.

Sadly no longer with us -
https://www.classic-american.com/obituary-steve-miles/

In the chevy book he says (in 2015) it was his intention to make his (10000+) pictures freely avaialble - when he has time - sadly I guess he never did get the time. I wonder what happened to all his pics?

I shall have to lookout for that book, I have Volumes 1-5 of the general photos but not a Chevy one. Such a shame that he passed away. There were a fair few cars around although they were very expensive to buy new. That said they were of course a status symbol for many buyers. As they got older though they were cheap and were often sent to the breakers yard for want of a couple of ball joints or tyres or a bit of engine work. When I started work in 1972/3 my boss told me that circa 1967/8 he and some mates bought a black RHD '58 Belair and that a couple of them would hide in the boot and when in traffic would open it and with toy machine guns pretend to shoot at the other cars. Not something you'd want to do these days! After a while the starter motor played up so they used to bump start it but eventually they got bored with it and just left it in a council car park.

I need to get hold of some of those books!