A quick recommendation to Nigel Cooper and his bodywork shop in north west London. He has been involved in restoring the bodywork of many exotic cars in the past including Facel Vega, 1960s Ferraris and (of course) a few Mercedes-Benz 300SLs and 1960s coupes. Nigel did some work on my Mercedes last year; their were some small areas of corrosion starting around the headlamps on the front wings. This just needed a small patch, some sandblasting and a partial repaint of both wings. He did the work and this was fine for a few weeks but over time there was a reaction between the old air dry two-pack paint and the new. It looked like the new paint had sunk and left a ridge between the old and the new. This was obvious and needed fixing.
It was refreshing to see Nigel's attitude to this and the way it was fixed was painless. After unsuccessfully trying a barrier coat they had to resort to striping the wings and repainting from scratch this all took a lot more time than anticipated. I'm glad to say this was all done free of charge and with no quibbles. One of the joys of owing an old car is using the specialists and meeting the people doing the work who are invariably enthusiasts too. Great service and craftsmanship is still out there, it's just a matter of finding it, and it beats going to the local modern dealer any day.
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