Saturday 26 April 2008

Dolly hunting

Travelled all across Belgium today with René, to Zealand Flanders to be precise, to inspect a 1977 Dolomite 1850. Due to too many problems the car had to go after 30 odd years with its owner.

The advert was rather promising in stating that it was a very solid car. But an unrestored 30 year old Dolomite, which has spent all it’s working life near the sea shore will predictably have a few rust spots. This car was no exception. But the good thing was, all the structural parts were in good condition. It also looked rather unmolested and reasonably well cared for. The bad news was that the boot floor was pretty bad. Also two doors will need new skins, the odd wheel arch needs replacing, a few rust spots on the wind screen pillar, and of course rust in the nose panel above the headlamps.

Judging by the state of the interior and the fact that the odometer read a bit over 74000 km, we presumed that the car probably covered 174.000 km. This was more or less confirmed by a rather lowish oil pressure of just over 2 bar when cold. There were no knocking noises from the crank shaft or any discernible play on the crank. So nothing to worry too much about.

To sum it up, the car was not worth the asking price, but we got an agreement over the price so another Dolly has joined René’s fleet ...



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