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Craig Ranson

Managing Director – Bridge Classic Cars

Autoshack – July 2021

July 23, 2021

Good friend to Bridge Classic Cars, Lee from Autoshack has shared our latest competition car, our 1983 Volkswagen Golf GTi Mk1. Lee and Autoshack have

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Just launched!

July 22, 2021

Our competition has just launched to win our track ready road car, a dark grey 1983 Volkswagen Gold GTI Mk1! Enter today for your chance

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Container Makeover

July 20, 2021

Our 40 foot container has had a quick makeover with a fresh coat of paint, ready for this weekend’s Classic and Sports Car and Bike

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Lotus Cars – July 2021

July 18, 2021

Special thank you to Lotus Cars for sharing our beautiful Elise Sport 240 Final Edition competition to their equally impression 800,000+ audience. Norwich City Football

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1979 MG Midget – Sold out in 21 hours!

July 23, 2021

The description for our 1979 MG Midget didn’t last very long as we sold out in record time! 21 hours from launch we sold our final ticket and can bring the draw forward.

Here’s what we said about the car…

We’re proud to present the latest MG competition car; our stunning Blaze Orange MG Midget 1500.

One of the very best usable summer classics, tickets on this practical British sportscar are only £5.

Our lovely example boasts a striking Blaze Orange exterior, which is paired delightfully with an incredible condition black leather interior. This honest classic is a very tidy, well presented classic, ready for some summer fun. With only 47,115 miles on the clock and stacks of paperwork and history dating back to 1980, this fun little classic is ready for a new owner!

The fourth and final generation MG midget was given a gearbox with synchromesh on all four gears and a larger 1500cc engine found in the triumph spitfire. The increased displacement and twin SU HS4 carbs made the final iteration of the midget the most spritely to drive.

Throw the roof down and enjoy a summer’s drive in your fabulous MG Midget. Enter the draw now for your chance of winning.”

Autoshack – July 2021

July 23, 2021

Good friend to Bridge Classic Cars, Lee from Autoshack has shared our latest competition car, our 1983 Volkswagen Golf GTi Mk1. Lee and Autoshack have been a huge part of the recent times of our Golf GTI. The car has been regularly maintained in the Autoshack workshops.

Thanks for sharing our competition Lee…

MG B formalities done, she’s Cypriot now!

July 23, 2021

Although we say goodbye to a lot of cars here at Bridge Classic Cars we always love to hear of their latest adventures and see images of them out and about. Here is our 1971 MB G Roadster, now with it’s official Cypriot paperwork!

Peter says “The weather is beautiful but heading towards high 30’s, need to go out early morning or late evening” – sounds perfect as we gear ourselves for a weekend of thunderstorms and torrential rain!

Porsche 911 Carrera 2 Tyre Change

July 22, 2021

Good friend to Bridge Classic Cars Mark called upon our black book of contacts as he was in need of some new tyres fitted to his beautiful Porsche 911 Carrera 2.

Graeme from Tyre Assist, formerly We Fit Any Tyres Anywhere is the man to ask! Pirelli P-Zero N-rated 245/35/R20 91Y on the front and 295/30/R20 101Y on the rear.

About the Porsche: The seventh generation of Porsche’s iconic rear-engined 911 sports car; the 991 was manufactured between 2011 and 2019. Originally unveiled at the 2011 Frankfurt Motor Show, the 991 was introduced to replace the outgoing 997 designation.

The model was a reinvention of the classic 911 recipe and only the third all-new 911 platform since its first release in 1963.

This example is a first-generation 991 (991.1) built before 2016. It was succeeded in late 2016 by the 991.2 model following a change in EU emissions legislation. As a result, the first-generation 991’s are now expected to represent the last naturally- aspirated 911 Carrera Porsche will ever manufacture and therefore cementing their place as a true modern classic in the making.

The car is based on a 2-wheel drive/ rear-engine configuration, utilising a 3.4 litre, 6-cyclinder version of Porsche’s legendary boxer engine which produces 350ps at 7,400rpm, with 288 lb-ft of torque. It is coupled to a 7-speed dual-clutch ‘PDK’ automatic gearbox, and achieves 0- 62mph in 4.4 seconds, with a top speed of 178mph.
Finished in classic Indischrot or ‘Guards Red’, one of the most recognisable Porsche colours (making its first appearance in the mid-70’s), the car boasts factory-fitted design cues from the Carrera S model including; 6-piston front calipers, dual-piped sports exhaust (PSE), and 20” SportDesign alloy wheels. In addition, the car is fitted with the optional Porsche Sports Chrono Package, Porsche’s Active Suspension (PASM), and Porsche’s Torque Vectoring Plus system for greatly improved handling.

Thanks, as always to Graeme for doing a great job!

Just launched!

July 22, 2021

Our competition has just launched to win our track ready road car, a dark grey 1983 Volkswagen Gold GTI Mk1!

Enter today for your chance of winning.

  • Apx 20 valve turbo with 3 stage boost
  • Emerald ECU
  • 6 speed 02S gearbox
  • Peloquin Limited Slip Diff
  • 800kg corner weight
  • 384nm torque
  • Bhp/tonne 356
  • AVO GTX performance suspension kit
  • Motorsport spec triangulated rear beam
  • Pro race 1.2’s with R88
  • Wilwood four pots on 280mm discs
  • Electric power steering
  • Brake comp brake bias/pedal box
  • Techedge 2j9 wideband lambda
  • Porsche grey black 7A1
  • Yoko ad08R

For your chance to enter, please click here

Prime time for the Jaguar E-Type!

July 22, 2021

Chris and Matt have given the series 3 1973 Jaguar E-Type a coat of primer this week! We’re looking forward to seeing it in all it’s colourful glory!

Aston Martin goes greyer!

July 22, 2021

Brian has been continuing his work on the Aston Martin DB2/4 interior.

He’s finished re-covering the pockets for the doors, the top parts for the dashboard and the cover for the rear hatch hinge. The door cards have been re-covered in new foam, then the new dark red leather, with a line of dark grey piping down one side. The pockets fix onto the doors first, and then the door cards go over the tops of these, so you just see the dark grey leather through a rectangle-shaped cut-out.

Brian has also been busy covering the rear door cappings, front window surrounds, rear side window surrounds and front side windows in the new dark grey leather.

Repairs on our 1968 green Jaguar E-Type

July 22, 2021

Scott has been continuing his work on the green 1968 Jaguar E-Type Series 1.5 4.2.

He’s repaired the air filter bracket, fitted new brake reservoir bottles and replaced various bits of wiring. The heater box and controls were seized, so that was sorted out. Scott also rebuilt the rear breaks and put the rear axle back together.

New Parts for the Ford Escort!

July 22, 2021

John has been working on the Ford Escort recently. Here’s a list of the work carried out!

He’s modified and fitted the choke cable, the headlight relay was fitted, headlight surrounds were adjusted, the interior was put in, wiper blades were installed, a new double width kit was put in to adjust the wheel arch placement, there’s a new old stock steering wheel centre in the car, and the odometer clip was missing so a new clip was manufactured!

Rear wheel arch work on the Honda!

July 22, 2021

Pricey has been continuing his work on the rear wheel arches of the Honda Integra.

He started by tacking the wheel arch in position, before welding the arch fully. The welds then got ground down. The outer return lip was fabricated and welded. Pricey had to take it down to bare metal on the nearside quarter panel and drill it off, because of poor quality previous repairs. Deep filler was then applied. The middle sill was corroded, so was removed, and the inner sill was cleaned up. He fabricated the front lower inner arch and treated the corrosion on the inner sill.

Small interior changes happening for the Aston!

July 22, 2021

Brian has been covering the top parts of the dashboard and the cover for the rear hatch hinge in the chosen new dark grey leather, for the Aston Martin DB2/4. He took the original leather off each of the pieces and cleaned off any old glue, before applying the new leather.

Pockets for the Bentley!

July 22, 2021

Brian has been making the pockets for our Continental Bentley. These sit inside the door panels and are made up of two parts. He took the original foam and leather off the “fronts” of the pockets and took the original leather off the “backs”. He then cleaned up the metal for each piece, before gluing new foam and leather onto them.

Brian has also been working on the frames that sit underneath the front base seats in the car. He took the original leather off each one and replaced with the new leather. Straps were also made that attach underneath these frames.

More fabricating more to the front end

July 22, 2021

Clinton is continuing to work on the front end of our 1955 Aston martin DB2/4. More areas of corrosion have now been cut out and new metalwork has been replaced.

Fabricating new TR6 bracketry

July 22, 2021

In order to fit the new ignition barrell, Paul has had to fabricate new brackets for the Triumph TR6 steering brace.

Leak detection on HMC

July 22, 2021

Her we have Ady carrying out a combustion leak test on our HMC, trying to find the cause of an apparent over heating issue. A long road test brought back no results to go by.

A new thermostat and leak detection test should hopefully show the issues, if any.

Stick to original with our Aston DB2/4

July 22, 2021

More stripping, gluing and re-covering on the agenda for Brian and Lydia in our trim-shop this week and the cappings, front and side windows, window panels and woodwork have all been finished in new leatherwork.

Stripping the Jaguar MkII engine bay

July 22, 2021

Work continues on our 1963 Jaguar MkII. Paul has stripped the engine bay of key components, clean up in preparation for refit. The refit will commence once the engine bay is prepared and painted by our paint shop.

Bonnet prep for the Honda!

July 20, 2021

Lydia has been getting the Honda Integra bonnet ready for re-painting.

She started off by sanding down the paint, to the original metal, on the front/face of it, where any dents were showing. Skims of filler were then applied over the tops of where it had been sanded. The filler then also got sanded down once dry, to create a smooth finish for painting.

The underneath of the bonnet was gone over with panel wipe and a red scotch pad to remove the shine of the paint and to clean off any dirt. Corrosion spots were sanded down to bare metal with a DA and painted with treatment to stop any more spreading of the corrosion.

Collection of the Austin Mini!

July 20, 2021

Winner of our 1989 Austin Mini ‘Pocket Rocket’ Keith Aldous visited our hangar this week to personally collected the car. Ordinarily we delivery direct to your local but we wlecome any of our winners down to have a look around and meet the team!

Here are a few photos from that day!

If you’d like to be like Keith and win the next competition car, our red 1959 Jaguar MK 1, or any of our future classic car competitions, check out the collection here click here

Sand Blasting for the Aston Martin!

July 20, 2021

Lydia has been sand blasting the internal bonnet and hinge assemblies for the Aston Martin DB2/4 in order to get rid of any substances such as old paint that have been left behind.

Bonnet work for the Aston Martin!

July 20, 2021

Clinton has been busy fabricating for the bonnet of the Aston Martin DB 2 / 4.

He’s fabricated new hinge supports for the front, repaired various cracks with welding, fabricated a new part onto the wheel arch, straightened out the front because it was all bent in, and pulled a dent out of one of the wings!

Chevron B20 – a new adventure

July 20, 2021

The day has come where we wave goodbye to our incredible Chevron B20-72-2.

The car is now on it’s way to it’s new owner who has already made the necessary plans to have her restored and prepared for the track.

The new owner is very well known in the motoring scene and this will be added to a collection of race cars that he already owns.

We hope to see the progress and results in due course. For now, it’s been fun…

Our Piaggio Ape TM P50 Arrives

July 19, 2021

Bridge Classic Cars technician Mauro, originally from Portugal told us that his grandfather owned a Piaggio Ape and had used it as his everyday car for many years. He recently decided that the car needed to be sold.

We don’t know for what reason but we thought it would be a great idea to own the little Ape, possibly to make into an advertising and promotional tool for the company or to sell on to somebody as they are used for many different applications…pizza, coffee shop etc. She has now arrived safely from Lisbon and we look forward to registering her in the next few weeks and to have some fun.

Volkswagen Golf GTI 285bhp Mk1 Madness!

July 19, 2021

Arriving in with us this morning is our monstrous Mk1 Golf GTI. A very special car with an impressive restoration history too.

In simple terms, here’s the story:

  • Apx 20 valve turbo with 3 stage boost
  • Emerald ECU
  • 6 speed 02S gearbox
  • Peloquin Limited Slip Diff
  • 800kg corner weight
  • 384nm torque
  • Bhp/tonne 356
  • AVO GTX performance suspension kit
  • Motorsport spec triangulated rear beam
  • Pro race 1.2’s with R88
  • Wilwood four pots on 280mm discs
  • Electric power steering
  • Brake comp brake bias/pedal box
  • Techedge 2j9 wideband lambda
  • Porsche grey black 7A1
  • Yoko ad08R

Featured in Performance VW, the world’s best-selling VW tuning magazine. November 2016.

Article written and photographed by Jimbo Wallace.

285bhp in a Mk1 that weighs about the same as an empty packet of Quavers is anything but cheesy…

Engine: APX 20v, custom stainless downpipe and exhaust system, Emerald ECU (mapped by Emerald) and custom wiring loom with three map settings: 200bhp, 265bhp, 285bhp (various torque settings). Custome engine ounts, hydraulic (with braided hoses), twin paddle Helix clutch, lightened/balanced flywheel, new fuel system including pump and stainless basket to hold filter/pump etc, braided fuel lines with custom swirl pots setup, Mocal oil cooler with stainless hoses and alloy fittings run inside front wing with cover plate over hoses, Forge intercooler, Mk2 Golf diesel radiator with twin 10″ fans, SFS hoses, custom induction filter, baffled alloy sump, Mocal oil catch tank, Audi 02S six-speed gearbox, Peloquin limited-slip diff, cable shifter on custom raised allow tower inside car, new 100mm driveshafts, Mk2 wiper motor, washer bottle and oil catch tank moved further back for better weight distributions.

Chassis: 15″ Team Dynamics wheels with Toyo 888 205/15 tyres, Wilwood four-pot calipers and 280mm front brake kit, brand new copper lines and braided hoses throughout, lines to rear brakes run through the inside of the car, rear disc conversion with Mk4 calipers, larger Mk2 16v brake servo/master cylinder, adjustable Tilton bias valve, AVO GTX adjustable coilover suspension valved and built to custom spec with higher lb spring rates (front and rear), fully polybushed, seam welded wishbones with ball joint extenders, lower strut brace, rear motorsport derived traingulated axle inc, adjustable rose joints to reduce beam flex under load and CDS tube roll bar fixed in place of original anti-roll bar to increase oversteer and reduce understeer, 15mm wider track on the front, 10mm wider track on rear, stud and alloy wheel nut kit, Ground Control fully adjustable front top mounts with new bearings, adjustable rose-jointed track rod ends, Quaife quick steering rack in original Mk1 housing, currently running new rack with original ratios, strengthened steering rack mounting points.

Exterior: Bare metal respray including underside, new front panel, rear panel, front wings and parts of sill, lower rear panel cut to allow air flow as existing design acts as an air scoop, new grille and spoiler, full weld in roll cage to front suspension turrets, part seam welded shell, lightened shell throughout (inc. removal of spare wheel well), original seat belt points, excess metal in rear quarters and doors, rain tray in engine bay, carbon bonnet, fibreglass tailgate, polycarb windows, lightened metal doors, tubed rare arches, pulled arches all-round, new windscreen, lower swage line deleted, tinted genuine Helix rear lights, cold air ports in front panel.

Interior: Carbon door cards, flocked dash with Stack gauges (mph/rev counter 0-60 timer, lap timer), electric power steering with adjustable resistance control, Cobra Suzuka Pro bucket seats with Luke four-point harnesses, fibreglass wheel well cover, carbon trim in dash, OMP steering wheel, fire extinguisher, custom ECU port and fuse board inside glovebox, raised shifter tower, battery relocated to boot.

Lotus Cars – July 2021

July 18, 2021

Special thank you to Lotus Cars for sharing our beautiful Elise Sport 240 Final Edition competition to their equally impression 800,000+ audience.

Norwich City Football Club’s Principal Partner, Lotus Cars, has generously donated a Lotus Elise Sport 240 Final Edition for a competition to support the Community Sports Foundation.

Production of the iconic Lotus Elise is ending after 25 years and the competition prize is the first car to be built from the Final Edition range.

It comes with a customised Certificate of Provenance pack from Lotus and will be provided with a new bespoke Lotus Elise car cover.

The competition winner will also have an exclusive handover day at Lotus HQ in Hethel, which includes a private factory tour and test track experience.

#DrivingInclusion for people with disabilities

All proceeds from the competition will help the Foundation to continue our work to provide inclusive environments for people with disabilities in Norfolk.

Jake Humphrey, TV presenter and trustee of the Foundation, was on hand to unveil the car and further explain the significance of the competition.

“This is an incredible prize; all of the Elise Final Edition cars have been snapped up, so this is the only way to get your hands on one.

“As a trustee of the charity, I have seen first-hand the importance of its work and the impact it has on people in Norfolk.

“Without vital fundraising this work would stop, and many across Norfolk would be deprived of our support.

“We want to thank Lotus Cars for this incredible opportunity to boost our fundraising this year.”

Matt Windle, Managing Director, Lotus Cars, said:

“At Lotus, we are great supporters of the power of sport, not only for mental and physical wellbeing, but also how it can help inclusiveness amongst the community. Providing this unique version of the Lotus Elise, a sports car that is so admired around the world, will enable even more people in the region from around the county to benefit from the wonderful work of the Community Sports Foundation.

Shaping up the Jaguar E-Type

July 16, 2021

Chris and Matt are continuing the work on shaping up the body of the Jaguar E-Type roadster in the paint shop.

Once the shell was back from the sand blasting, it was re-assembled, making sure all the panels lined up. From that, Chris and Matt were able to assess what condition the shell was in. It was then given a coat of epoxy primer to protect the metal and a thin layer of body filler to perfect the shape of the car and allow them to give each panel an equal gap around all the edges.

Bridge Classic Cars are award winning Classic Car Restoration and Maintenance specialists. Your pride and joy is in safe hands with our expert Classic Car Technicians. Take a look at our awards here.

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© Bridge Classic Cars Holdings Ltd, T/ as Bridge Classic Cars. Registered in England and Wales with company number 5047706.