Poor Fiona

Fiona is the 1986 XJ6 Jaguar we bought when Adam got his new job. $2500. She was a fabulous deal, since Adam realized immediately that the car was really worth about $4000, just as we bought her. This allayed our fears, as we handed over the cash.

Now that Adam doesn't have work again, we need to sell Fiona, which is a sad thing for my husband. He's wanted a car like this since his teens, and now he's had her -- for a few weeks. Ah well. Such is life.

In preparation for selling Fiona, Adam is doing as much reconstructive work on her as possible, to increase her value. The previous owner had already done some nice stuff -- upholstery, head-liner, tires. But the dashboard was in rough shape. In fact, all the wood work was old, dry, cracked and peeling. Adam replaced the strips of wood on the trunk, and on the doors. They looked gorgeous. Then he redid the glove box, also lovely. Now, he's doing the entire dashboard. If you'd rather hear him tell about it, here's his post.

He ripped out the top and front of the dash. Eek! I find this all rather terrifying, and don't want to watch. He has all the schematics and manuals though, and is keeping meticulous care of each little screw and bolt, taped to paper and labeled. But doesn't it look horrid?

Some of the gauges, sitting out -- um, like the speedometer.

See what I mean about labeled? That ugly orange thing is the top of the dash, turned upside down.

Here it is, just before he took the wooden dash out. You can tell how the glove box has already been redone, but the rest of the wood work hasn't. The photo is too fuzzy to tell, but some chunks of wood have varnish that's peeling off and ugly.

More dashboard stuff removed:

There ARE moments when my husband shows his organizational gifts!

So, he chipped off the old varnish. Then he replaced it with polyurethane, about 8 or 9 layers, combined with lots of gentle sanding, to make it silky smooth.

It's shiny and new now.

I'm very proud of his work. Because he doesn't have income right now, the improvements he makes on Fiona are basically adding money in our pockets (hopefully), when she sells. Next step? Putting her all back together.  I'll photograph and post, if I dare.