The life and times of "Matilda" The 1956 Bondwood Fairway

[Richard]

Hey Reddo.
Great work with the sail track, and an excellent tip using the 3 core flex to stop the sail track from flattening while you are curving it.
I may just have to add this and another one of your tips to the Restoration Tips section of the forum.
Cheers.
Richard.

[reddo]

Hi All
The day before I set off for the October - Shellharbour get together I moved the van out into the yard to hose it off and pack it.
It rained that day and the next time I went into the van I had a wet edge along the bed.

Further investigation up on the roof found that the roof had sagged about 25mm on the left side rear corner of the hatch. I tonged the roof up from inside with a 4x2 from the floor to ceiling to level it back up . Then placed a 4x2 support packer from the top of the wardrobe to the ceiling.. removed the tong.
This done the trick to level the roof.... but did not address the leaking roof issue.
So.. I use my small LPG bottle with nozzle to dry off the offending area. scaped away and old repair of silastic.. applied a new bead of silastic and ran some woven tape across the split in the calico and timber and up the side of the hatch opening... then left it at that.
Hasn't leaked since... but I need to revisit the patch up job and do something a bit more "professional".... of course that will mean it will leak again when I am finished

The other repair on my to do list is...
Way back when a "previous owner" (before Bart and Jules bought the van) I.... ummmm... the previous owner... jackknifed the van while reversing it behind my... ummm... his HR ute and punched a ding in the sheet alloy on the front of matilda.
So I.... um he.. completely lost it and drove forward and reversed again.. only this time I... um.. he.. put a ding in the opposite side with the other corner of the HR ute.

I am.. eeerr.. he is blaming the ute for being too wide.. and its also Matildas fault for having such a short drawbar..... so ya see its everythings fault except the drivers...

Fast forward 6 years to 2014 and an overnight stay at Coledale on the way to Shellharbour. The guilty party new owner from "Event 1" ... This time reversing the van on site with EH panno, managed to do a repeat of his earlier efforts years ago and punched matilda in the left front with the panno left taillight...
Its all the towcar panelvans fault ya know !! ( again.. )..
So.. repair number 2 on Matilda will either be unpick the existing alloy sheet off the front of the van and install a new one .. or fit a ornate new "V" shaped alloy oversheet to cover the 3 dings in Matildas Complexion....

Just gotta find the time to do it all. Bloody replica TD is distracting me from spending time with Matilda.......
More later
Reddo

[reddo]

G'Day.. just last week I wrote..

"So.. repair number 2 on Matilda will either be unpick the existing alloy sheet off the front of the van and install a new one .. or fit a ornate new "V" shaped alloy oversheet to cover the 3 dings in Matildas Complexion.... "
End result....
I could have bought a big pair of size 20 thongs and cover the dings up... Hey.. it has been done before by the same dinger.. or is that dingbat ,

I did what most other people do when they ding the front of their vans reversing...

Some people call them "stone chip guards" ..
I call em.. " stufferer uppers repairs."


All done.. I'm happy .. and Matilda doesn't have to go under the knife for some plastic surgery...
SWEET .

Regards
Reddo

.

[Strugglebrook]

Old girl looks all freshened up.

[reddo]

Well it appears that any Matilda that has a surname like "Waltzing" would always be difficult to stop from "Waltzing " again...

Rebecca from Nowra Rd, Fitzroy Falls came and waltzed her away to the southern Highlands of NSW this arvo.
Rebecca has promised to spoil her rotten and keep her under cover of some sorts .

Sadly missed ( again) ... but I will play the patience game again andsomething will come along. The Old Purdon is still sitting in the shed no more than 10 k from here........Just have to wait until the family is ready to let go if it.... been waiting 6 years now ... another 6 wont hurt
Who knows.. Matilda might get her dancing shoes on again and end up back on our doorstep..

Meanwhile .. I know this bloke with a reeeeaaalllly cool road cruiser down the coast a bit....

Matilda ... Gone .. but not forgotten..





Reddo

[akeepsake]

Top little van Reddo Kinda glad it wasn't in Tassie or I might have been tempted to hit the bid button!
As they say " better to have loved and lost to never have loved at all"!
Will pm you later re an idea!
Cheers Andrew

[reddo]

Unbloodybelievable....!!!!
The whole time ( both times) I owned Matilda I was constantly on the scout for some new brass gauze to redo... that's redo... not Reddo the gauze in the flyscrren door.
Previous owner had gone apesh!t with the spray gun and painted a foggy white edge on the gauze while spray painting the flyscreen dorr frame.

Today trish and I went over to Stockton to do some more organizing with the managers at the van park for Christmas in July. We stopped in at an old servo that closed down years ago.. he had a bit of junk there and Trish wanted to have a look at a little 50cc quad bike he had advertised in the local paper.
He wasn't there.. we phoned him and he turned up, He had just been to a yard clearance and here on the back of his ute amongst the junk was a roll of brass gauze....
I told the bloke I had been searching everywhere for the brass gauze... He reached into the ute and threw it to me and said"Here... its yours"

Sad part about the whole scenario......
Matilda had left our yard the day before !!!!
We didn't buy the quad bike.. it was very sad.. covered in rust and not running...and way too much money for what it was.

Took the gauze and ran
Reddo