Brian Holmes's Grantura - 7B265
Last
updated - 3/11/2011
April 1961, MkII Grantura, 7/B/265. I've owned it since 1973 and there were
ELEVEN previous owners (all documented).
The rebuild of the car is still progressing very
slowly. With the chassis repaired, sand-blasted, zinc primed and powder-coated,
I put back all the various 'appendages', replacing parts where necessary. I
then spent well over a year working on the body, removing the flared wheel
arches (it had previously been raced) and replacing them with the correct
versions. I repaired all the star-cracks, re-shaped the door sills, and
generally ground away and re-fibre-glassed those
parts of the body that had been hastily repaired by previous owners. When,
the newly-sprayed body came back from the local spray-shop and I bonded it
back onto the new floor/chassis. This was probably the most satisfying job to
date and lead me into a whole new range of tasks, like fitting the petrol tank,
rear seat-belt anchorages, bolt-on 'A' posts, amending the door hinge’s
original ‘funnel’ action for any rainwater, etc, etc. Work on the doors took
ages because they just didn’t fit the body – big gaps everywhere. There were no
inner wheel arches when I bought the car so I thought I should make some with fibreglass – which meant making a mould from scratch.
Fitting brake lines and a servo relieved the boredom of working with fiberglass
but the bonnet is my current concern – it came with the car but is from a Mk I
(the ‘spider’ badge on it tells me that) but whilst it is the same shape as
that for a Mk II, it is not quite wide enough and the contours along the rear
edge do not match those on the body!!! Plus, of course, being an ex-racer,
there’s filler in large amounts everywhere... not the sort of work you
need to correct outside in the snow and cold of 2010!
I’d welcome any news from owners of similar
cars or anyone who wants to talk torsion-bar Grantura’s.
Brian Holmes, Devon, U.K. (01884 34111)
Current Owner:
Brian Holmes (UK)
To
contact the owner, please route inquiries through the registar.
Registar:
serel@zeelandnet.nl