Having stripped the car to nothing more than a tubular chassis the need for attention was evident as car be seen from the photo above. I have been aware that my own 1994 chassis has a lot of the powder coating having failed and allowed rust to degrade the tubes, but seeing this 7 in its naked form brought home the extent of the problem below the skin. 

So off to Arch with the chassis along with all the other powder coated components including suspension arms, de-dion tube and wing supports. Once there Bruce and Phil Robinson conversed with Andy Rogerson in New Zealand via the great interweb and the spec was agreed. In what seemed like a remarkably short timescale the chassis was ready to collect, and beautiful it looked too! The quality of some of the aluminium skin work is exquisite.

On the way home I dropped into a local restoration specialist to get a quote for paint - he too was very impressed with the quality of the work - but clearly therefore believed that it must have cost a packet and that he could therefore also make a killing - he quoted £5k for a paint job - plus VAT! Needless to say he did not get a call to book the car in and following a bit of further investigation it became clear that the best place to take it was TSK Autocentre as used by the Caterham factory. Hugely knowledgeable and helpful and a very reasonable price.

None the less before it went for paint there were a number of holes to drill including:

• Aero fuel filler screws;
• Exhaust exit;
• Rear wing fixings;
• Windscreen stantions;
• Heated windscreen wires; and
• Battery Master Switch.

Chassis was then delivered to TSK along with the fibreglass panels as they strongly recommend painting these as well to ensure a good paint match. Now have about 3 weeks to prepare the garage and spare parts before the rebuild begins in earnest!