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P1800 restoration - early Jensen car

matt b

Active member
Joined
Apr 12, 2007
Location
Tucson
I don't do catchy titles, great social media posts or regular updates so bear with me.

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Volvo P1800, VIN 1311, type 18394 VA, making it a pre-March 1962 Jensen built car. Gearbox would be an unusual M40 and not an M41 with overdrive. (source: http://volvo1800pictures.com/from_year_to_year/1961_1962.php

Bought this car out of LA in October 2018. On the surface, the seller seemed knowledgeable and legitimate. Reality bit hard when I had to bicker with me until late May to finally get the car to HiPerformance Auto in Torrance, CA.

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Things got ever grimmer when Eric explained that the car came in with no hood, no grill surround, and with over 20 lbs of rat feces spread out over the interior and engine compartment.

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I was traveling and couldn't communicate with the seller beyond the odd text message every 3-4 days. I felt awful that Eric and Ian had this health hazard on their hands.

Fast foward to late June and I made arrangements to have the car brought to me in Tucson.

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Here it sits next to 6501, the 1964 I picked up last summer. 6501 needs extensive rust repair and is currently on a rotisserie. Buddy and I are welding panels as time allows.

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Eric thought that only media blasting would truly rid the car of any rat feces and associated issues, and it's exactly what we did. Local company hauled it off, blasted it and gave me a clean, poop free shell:

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Media blasting reveals surprises, 1311 was no exception...

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1311 is a red 70 car, according to its VIN plate. I couldn't find a suitable panel on the car but 6501 had this splash panel painted in the correct color:

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I'm assuming that when Volvo took production over from Jensen, some panels had been pre-painted and were used as-is. (6501 is a white car)

I started collecting parts, cleaning up others and made a little progress:

wheels:
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The wheel color is based on a few factory pictures from 1961 and 1962 showing what the wheels looked like underneath the early Jensen hubcaps.

Worked on the rear end, cleaning up grime and other issues and re-flaring brake lines to accept the 1965-1968 wheel cylinders.

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Engine cradle/front cross member/front end:

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Pretty sure the color should be black on that part but it's already powdercoated and I don't have it in me to have it re-done.

Rhys from Island Automotion did the carbs, confirmed as early 60's carbs (based on their tags)

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According to literature, the early Jensen cars had tons of production issues and panel fitment was amateur-ish. So Jensen used lead to hide flaws and 1311 is a prime example of that:

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I will take a picture of 6501 in the same area, there's barely any lead at the seam.

That's it for now. I'll grab pictures of the dash soon, as well as the body repairs. I'm waiting for the temps to drop a little bit before welding in my garage. It's hard to have a hood on when it's 105-110F in my garage...
 
Good progress on this one so far. I saw it in person at HiPerf - Ian and Eric told me about some of the grief you'd experienced and I saw that mountain of poop for myself. Didn't realize the car came from the seller who has had a handful of 1800s and 544s listed for ages on LA craigslist. I recognize that first pic! Up north of Santa Clarita, right? Did he seriously remove the hood and grille surround before shipping the car to you?
 
Good progress on this one so far. I saw it in person at HiPerf - Ian and Eric told me about some of the grief you'd experienced and I saw that mountain of poop for myself. Didn't realize the car came from the seller who has had a handful of 1800s and 544s listed for ages on LA craigslist. I recognize that first pic! Up north of Santa Clarita, right? Did he seriously remove the hood and grille surround before shipping the car to you?

That's the guy, good ole crooked Charles. He has had his ad flagged so many times, and he keeps trying to put it back up. Owns a pet store in Beverly Hills but keeps his cars in Santa Clarita.

I don't know the specifics on the hood, but I know it was supposed to be there (and he acknowledged it). The back window is also missing, but was there when it was loaded so I'm assuming it flew off at some point. The grill surround, he says wasn't supposed to ever be there.

Eric and Ian were amazing, and continue to be very involved with the car. The M40 slated to go in the car was rebuilt by them, and the car will go back to Torrance once it's put back together.
 
Man, that sucks to hear you were jerked around. I've never talked to that guy myself but figured something was fishy based on the sheer volume of ads and the ambiguity around which cars he is actually offering for sale. It's obvious he's got a big stash of iron... so represent each car accurately and sell to the highest bidders - WTF is wrong with people?

Looking forward to seeing more shiny parts in your thread. The wife and I had a '66 1800S a few years ago that really needed a complete restoration, but we were on a budget and just trying to enjoy it as-is. Ian & Eric helped me get that thing running & driving so sweetly before we sold it. Major body issues but it was fun to drive. You are working with the right guys!
 
Thanks, definitely stoked on this car. I'm trying to get the details right without losing sight of the larger project and the time needed to complete it.

A shop had done rust repair on the last Amazon I owned, and they may be involved in getting some of the panels repaired/replaced on this one. Rear floors and the bottom of the rear quarters need help. The driver's fender had no splash guard so it rotted from the inside out. Thankfully, everything is fairly simple to replace.
 
Did you buy Matt's house?
I did not. Person who owns it was someone out of Phoenix, I haven't talked to Matt's widow or Roy's widow (Matt's partner at the yard, and owner of the red 122S I did) in over a year so I am not sure where those parts went.

I am currently working out of my garage and looking for a shop in Tucson. Preferably north of Speedway, and east of Country Club. I may have something lined up, things are getting way too crammed at the house and I don't like having helpers come up to my house. I'd love to buy the old Revolvstore building but I can't swing that much coin.
 
Congratulations on now owning both a Jenson and the 1964. It appears you are going to restore the Jenson to factory original condition? How is it rust wise?
 
Congratulations on now owning both a Jenson and the 1964. It appears you are going to restore the Jenson to factory original condition? How is it rust wise?

The Jensen is rust free, especially when compared to the 64. The 64 sat in a field in MN between 1972 and 2016, so you can imagine what that did to the undercarriage.

The only spots of rust that will be removed next week are:

-the rear floors. Doing full replacements on these.

-the trunk floor panel has some rust in two small spots but not enough to warrant replacing the entire thing. So we will cut out and weld what's needed.

-the driver's fender at the bottom has some rust. This was probably from the lack of splash guard. There is a dent in it that will be cut out when the rusty portion is replaced, I'm assuming it's why the splash guard wasn't re-installed. It probably didn't fit anymore since they Bondo'ed over the dent instead of beating it out.

All in all, the car is amazing straight and rust free.
 
Little bit of progress made. I am doing some of the welding with the help of a friend who is more experienced than I am.

Some of it is easy (floors need love)

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Some of it will be turned over to a local shop, given the angles and multiple panels coming together:

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I just ordered both panels from VP, along with the glass this car and my other one needed.

Engine is coming along and should be ready sometime next week.

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Gas tank will need to be replaced, I pulled approximately 8 gallons of this stuff:

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It's basically oily water at this point. I didn't try to ignite it or test it, but it wasn't great news. Lots of rust.
 
Some of body work being done here involves pulling dents out and making sure that panels are straight. I have a simple dent puller from HF and it works well.

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Then fill the holes with a quick weld and sand down.

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Paint has been more problematic than expected. The panel I scanned couldn't give us a good read. It's old laquer paint and it is a giant spider web and full of blisters. We tried matching it, I shot a quick section:

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Close but not quite there.

Got a little annoyed with the temperatures in the garage this week (we hit 109 on multiple days so the garage can easily see 120 F) and decided to finish up the rear axle work

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Replacing old lines with fresh ones, aiming for clean bends. I love the Eastwood brake line flaring tool. Worth the purchase.

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The front calipers were a mess. Lots of rust, a bleed nippled that needed to be drilled out, etc...

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Here is the other side after soaking in Evaporust and receiving fresh seals and pistons.

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I wanted to keep the original front calipers. Pre-64's are hard to find but since I have the correct pads, this will help me keep the car accurate.
 
I?ll post the formula used on my 70 later tonight. I?m assuming yours is 46 cherry red as well and that the color stayed more or less consistent over years. We used unpainted original from under trunk lid and got a very close match.
 
hope this can be of some help:

script>


I don't have any photos of this but the original chassis number plate (whatever the hell the plate is called that is mounted next to the data plate) still has the original paint on it. When it was cleaned up and put back on the car it shows that the match to the original 1970 code 46 paint is nearly dead on.
 
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Thanks. 70 Red is earlier than the 46 color code and slightly darker. I had some 46 mixed and it's a brighter red (I did an Amazon in 46 red, I love the color).

I'm going to try to match a chip again tomorrow.
 
Careful with the brake calipers. I practiced rebuilding a caliper by separating the halves and then reassembled them. Not sure where I went wrong buy the leaked from the 4 bolts. :-(
 
Careful with the brake calipers. I practiced rebuilding a caliper by separating the halves and then reassembled them. Not sure where I went wrong buy the leaked from the 4 bolts. :-(

That sucks. :-(

These are easier:

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The two halves are only sharing fluid through a hard line that runs from the top of one half to the top of the other half. As long as the seals are good (and they're new), I should be OK. Post 1963 calipers have the two halves linked through a couple of small holes that require a rubber gasket to seal properly.

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