Here the only other pic i have on the pc, in its drab blue


The desperatly needed a respray, looks ok in the "blue" pic but it was far from perfect.

Originally the idea was to just respray it he same, but after not being able to find a paint match i got suspicious. Phoned aston the their records show the car left the factory in red paint.

They really are amazing (aston) they had a list of everything, the name of the bloke who built the engine the name of the bloke who did the interior. these cars were built properly on a individual basis. tho you would expect that from a car which when new was worth than the avarage house!!.

There are about 4 different aston reds from this era, but they even had on their records the paint code, funilly enough the aston code is labled as "Fiesta Red" kind of takes the romance out of it a little, tho i guess the fiesta didnt exist in 1971?

Anyway during the striping the car and removing the windscreen (which was £1100 to replace) i found lots of the red paint around the frame which only backed up what the cars history folder said.

So there you have it, its back in its original red colour. The chrome work was all redone, but i think the chrome was a little lost on the blue anyway!

I have attacked the engine bay with nearly a whole can of WD40, in the hope that it may make some things a little easier tommrow.

The car was put on the rollers a while back when the carbs were set up and it read a miserable 186 bhp
This is the vantage model with the tripple webber 45's and It left the factory with 325bhp and 390ft/lb, some even recorded 350bhp as aston were always a little shy when they quoted power fiqures. Im guessing because owners of other similar cars of the time, were given falsely high factory bhp fiqures, which made the aston feel quick in comparison?

Anyway 325 down to 186 is a little sad. I plan to dyno the car when its back on the road, see how close it can get to the original bhp.