Plastic covers and even carpet cover modern engine bays; they’re a barely concealed no entry sign. You are not welcome. There’s a glorious technological openness about older cars, and especially vintage automobiles. You open a bonnet and might get spattered with oil, but you’ll see an engine in its rawest form. But the problem with [...]
Overwhelming. That was the first reaction on entering the second showroom at JD Classics in Essex, the UK’s – if not the world’s – premier historic car restoration firm. Surrounded by Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Porsches and so on, I had the impression that I was in an international automotive art museum of the highest calibre. Which [...]
A major part of JD Classics’ passion is invested in historic racing: not just supporting customer cars but fielding their own fleet of historic racers and even organising race series themselves. As with their road-going maintenance and restoration services that I took a look at in the previous story, the range of racing cars they [...]
The interior of the building gleams white with almost hospital levels of shine and crispness. Cars glitter under the lights, some looking like they’ve literally just rolled off the production line, others stripped back and in the process of being attended to by the large team of surgeon-mechanics. Everywhere chrome sparkles and immaculate paint reflects. [...]
