Marque Restorations

Members enjoying the tour. In the back R/H corner is Malcolm Adamson’s SS Airline

A particularly interesting meeting was held on 18th August at Marque Restorations at Kilkenny for the E, F & GT Register meeting. Register secretary - Suzanne Jarvis welcomed members including the Patron, President, Vice President and Editor. General business included details of the upcoming run to Mintaro on 28th and 29th of September with many choosing to stay overnight after a “long lunch” at Reillys Wines restaurant. The next meeting on 20th October will be held at Alan Baker’s shed at his Somerton home to inspect his D-Type project which is nearing completion. Suzanne reminded members of the National Rally to be held in April next year with Phil Prior as the organiser. Organisation is progressing for a dinner in July next year to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the inaugural meeting of the club. A show of hands supported the willingness of members to attend midweek rather than a Saturday night. The reasons are that the first meeting of the Club was held was on a Tuesday (25th July 1963) and it will enable the Club to secure a desirable venue without the necessity of a minimum number of bookings as required for a weekend event.

Tour of Marque Restorations

After a reminder that the monthly general meetings are now held at Adelaide Bowling Club on Dequetteville Terrance at Kent Town, Suzanne handed over to Marque Restorations proprietor – Gerard Miller.

Gerard gradually toured members through the various areas of his premises. Many extremely desirable and exotic cars were in various stages of restoration with the incredible amount of work each requires clearly evident. Each project includes sourcing parts, mechanical overhaul, extensive body work including making panels, plating of parts, modifications, electrical, paint, trim and so on. These are the obvious areas of restoration but there are also the management issues of client negotiation, scheduling and of course, compliance. As an example of the challenges, one project required modifications to seating location and controls to enable the particularly tall owner to be able to sit in and control his vehicle.

To top the evening off, Gerard and his employee - Tirana (T), demonstrated their skills by making a door skin for an E-Type. It was enthralling to watch the process and once again, clearly established the depth of experience, skill and know-how of so many different and talented people required to give these treasured vehicles a new life for all of us to enjoy. The evening concluded with supper and a heartfelt thanks to Gerard and T for their generosity of time, demonstrations and making the premises available for the club.

END (More photos pages 42-45)

Magnificent TR4A in final stages of work. Photographs carefully attached to the cars show the progressive stages of restoration.

A ‘James Bond’ DB5 and Mercedes 230SL in stages of restoration. Both have undertaken extensive work.

Marque Restorations will be fabricating a complete car built on a section of Jaguar Mark IX chassis with the design as shown in the photos. Two timber bucks have been made, a miniature to see what the final car will look like and the other being full size for the final fabrication.

Gerard and “T” kindly provided a demonstration on how to fabricate an E-Type door skin from a sheet of aluminium. Amazing!