It’s fine! Safely tucked away at the secret secure base overnight until Ceri delivers it tomorrow while I’m off for my booster jab.
It looks a bit a bit rougher than it is on the surface but a cursory peek underneath reveals a solid base. Rear quarters are in need of attention as does the N/S lower front wing, the pillar seems to have cracked the rather thick paint/primer filler from when it was restored in the past.
The seller had another, rougher Midget that he was going to concentrate on - that one was a local car with an Ashley front and fastback hardtop. Oh and the most impressive collection of vintage road bikes I’d seen in quite the while!
Have some recent pics.
At least repair panels are plentiful and cheap. This is available to pickup same day from Moss in Bristol. Probably can get the same/better even cheaper elsewhere.
Even this relatively complex inner a-pillar hinge panel isn't that expensive. It's a heritage part so from the original (knackered) factory body press tooling.
Wings on MGs are bolt on (unlike Triumph ) and as the factory tooling is available for brand new, unused nearly new panels aren't ridiculous prices either
More than I'd want to pay given I should be able to repair what's on there already.
I mean the thing is with heritage panels is they're hardly any worse than late factory pressings anyway.
Sit a 1970 Triumph 1500 next to a 1980 Dolly and you can see the difference in the pressing quality. Later cars are very "soft" in their body lines compared to early cars. Those fucking NOS repair panels just don't fit, especially after decades of sitting around in storage, mine had to be cut in half to get it to line up properly.
The fact nothing is bolt on is just salt in the wound considering their love to rust out their wings...
1976 Triumph Dolomite 1850HL - Field based greenhouse. 1977 Triumph Dolomite 1300 - Lean green oil dripping machine. 1983 Triumph Acclaim L - Japanglish daily runner. 1989 Volvo 740GLE Estate - Mobile storage unit.
Those panels are cheap and plentiful enough that I'd feel less guilty about not fully butt welding and leaving some overlap for speed + jiggle room. Especially on stuff like the replaceable front wing.
) and as the factory tooling is available for brand new, unused nearly new panels aren't ridiculous prices either