Belonging to a local businessman who drove it up to the Lake District when he moved here in the '50s, it was left in a wooden garage which eventually collapsed on it, badly damaging the hoodframe. After a few more years it was decided to call in Garner Restoration to work some sort of miracle. When it was seen in what remained of it's garage it was difficut to tell if this was a viable project. The leaves and detritus of years came up as high as the wheelcentres, the engine was a solid block of rust , the interior was distinctly secondhand and the chromework was past polishing.
We pulled it from it's resting place with a fourwheel drive and skidded it onto a trailer for tranport to our Ambleside workshop. After some preliminary dismantling and powerwashing an initial estimate was prepared. The owner gave the go-ahead for the restoration to begin, and the work began. In a restoration there are many surprises to be found, usually nasty ones. This little Morris had mainly nice ones for us. The back axle, gearbox , springs, shackles and steering gear were all found to be serviceable after stripping and cleaning them. The engine replacement was sourced from Morrispares of Wales as an ex-army reconditioned unit originally meant for a Cheiftain tank! No, not the main engine but the auxiliary . Electrical parts were obtained from the Green Sparkplug Company to rebuild dynamo, starter and distributor, with a new wiring loom in cotton braided plastic coated wire being supplied by Autosparks. These looms look identical to the originals, but have the high longevity of plastic covered wire.
The interior on a Morris Eight is spartan by anybody's standards, making it a relatively easy job to refurnish it. Again it was a pleasant surprise to find the instruments and dashboard reusable. However, the body panels were as we expected them to be, perforated as a colander. The first job is to remove all the panels and have them sandblasted. When they are back to bare metal they are refitted and aligned correctly before rebuilding. New running boards were obtained and the old wings were remade, with badly perforated sections being cut out and replaced.
In the meantime, the chromework had been replated by Cumbria Plating Services at Carlisle. Brake parts were obtained and fitted, new wooden floors made and installed and the panelwork was painted in I.C.I. 2K , baked and machine polished to reproduce that flat, 'well polished' look.
New tyres were fitted all round and everything was reassembled. After an M.O.T. test, the car was roadtested. The whole job was completed within three months, and the owner is delighted that a car he drove in his youth is back on the road again.