Restoration Ripoff ...... what happened?

I'm pretty sure the Mini got restored because the phone vote was only open to the British, and we're terribly fond of our Mini's. Anybody who calls it boring has clearly never driven one.
 
SantaHul said:
Anybody who calls it boring has clearly never driven one.

You've got it spot on! You hear people saying you should drive a supercar before you die. Well, the same applies to such a simple car as the Mini!
 
Can't be those Minis in the studio coz one is the Olympics one and the other has a massive dent in the roof which obviously wouldnt be there if it had been restored
 
The mini is being restored right at this minute!! The problem was financial wrangling, and because the BBC isn't the owner of the car, it was a very tricky job to sort finance. Originally, they weren't allowed to use the money from the phone in due to the car not being property of the BBC.
They hope to have it in the studio before the end of this series, if not, then next series definately.
 
Jezzabelle said:
The mini is being restored right at this minute!! The problem was financial wrangling, and because the BBC isn't the owner of the car, it was a very tricky job to sort finance. Originally, they weren't allowed to use the money from the phone in due to the car not being property of the BBC.
They hope to have it in the studio before the end of this series, if not, then next series definately.

For a moment, I thought it was the car they used to fix rockets in the winter specials, which of course is cut up and crashed
 
I'm going to let you in on a little secret.

It's been restored. It will probably be shown in the next series.
OMFG! :shock:

Mind if I post this in the news or is it semi-secret for us forum users only? ;)
 
OMFG! :shock:

Mind if I post this in the news or is it semi-secret for us forum users only? ;)

I'm sure it's fine to post it. I've seen pictures of the restoration, and the car looks fantastic, obviouly I can't share those, but I am aware that everyone here has been keen to know what's happening.

I think it's also important for us to show that we don't say we'll do something and then not bother, everyone always wanted to get the car sorted, but there were lots of problems and setbacks. It took longer than anticipated!
 
I wouldn't say pimip my ride restore cars, they just do cosmetic things to it. I wonder if they actually fix vital things, like repairing mechanical glitches, I'm inclined to say no. :thumbsdown:

thats why overhaulin is much better

they bead blast the mofo's and remove all the rust, buff out/fill in the dents and cracks and patch up missing metal work

it takes them about a week, but they have hoardes of workers working 24/7 on one car, chip and some times his dad included.
 
Oh sure, spoil the surprises.. ;)
 
This is great, bbc.co.uk/topgear. :)

Thank you very much for the heads up.
 
*waves nervously* - Long time lurker, but first time poster.

I'm so pleased to hear this. Got a bit of a family history with this car, and I'd been wondering what happened to it.

Although apparently, the term 'Paddy Hopkirk's Mini' is a bit misleading... from what I can gather, there wasn't one specific mini for Paddy - (although I'm hazy on the anoraky details, I can find out specifically next time I go home) The cars would be stripped down after each race and parts re-used on whichever team car happened to need them at the time. So, from what I've been told, it's a bit of a bitsa.

That said, still a huge bit of history and I'm v.delighted that this has finally come about. Can't wait to see the finished project in the next series.

Hell, what am I saying - I can't wait for the next series full stop. Having to resort to Fifth Gear to get my fix over the past few months has been somewhat sucky ;)
 
After the start of this year, I thought that was it - that we'd never see or hear anything about it. But IT LIVES!
 
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