Hi all. New member and owner of this neat tiger project. Actually just got permission to post here last night.
I've been out of the car restoration world for ~30 years, but my 12 year old son pulled me back in. He loves the old stuff and actually bought an Alpine with his own money last month. I suggest an old car project for anyone wanting to keep their kids off video games........
Well, while researching Sunbeams and waiting on the Alpine to ship from TN, we saw this tiger and grabbed it. Now the Alpine will wait as the tiger take priority.
The tiger was completely disassembled and on a rotisserie for body work. The PO was hand scraping paint and undercoat. The paint was terrible and after a weekend of putting the boy through the Karate Kid routine, it was time for some help. We are going to do the whole car ourselves, but some things need to be done by the pro's. Luckily, I've got some really good Ford connections locally in NW FL, so the tiger was off to
www.stripmastersinc.com for media blasting and epoxy primer. They cater to the six figure restoration crowd, so this is were their help ends.
Just got the tiger back and it looks great. Well, now we know the truth, and can get going. The main issue is previous rust repair. Maybe 1/3 of the repair work is good and the rest we'll redo. I've got brazed patches, lap welds and a few riveted section that all must go. Butt welded sections on the sheet metal and all the tiger structural upgrade are in order. The plan it to teach the boy, and me, the right way to restore a car. He wants to design cars some day, so this will be a good foundation. This kind of work can help get him through college too, it sure did for me.
This site seems to be the most active and informative for tigers, so we'll be bugging you guys as we go. Slowly but surely.
David
