A rare Aston Martin that may have been used as an unmarked police car in the sixties has been found after half a century hidden in a garage. The DB24, built in 1955, was discovered at a property in Gloucestershire and is believed to be worth over $3000,000 when fully restored. The classic car, which became famous as the model driven by James Bond in Ian Fleming’s novels, was bought by a car enthusiast who intended to work on the engine when he retired. Instead it was covered by a sheet and forgotten by its owner, and was forgotten.
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00:07Worth a quarter of a million pounds, incredibly, this Aston Martin hasn't been seen for almost
00:12fifty years.
00:13006 005
00:14Discovered in a Gloucestershire barn, this is
00:16just one of the exciting projects currently being undertaken by Jonathan Wills and his
00:21company, Cotswold Classic Car Restorations,
00:23007 007
00:24008
00:24I mean, this is looking fantastic, f没事 。
00:26009 009
00:260010p We're really excited, and just it's a
00:28privilege to be involved with this.
00:30001 COMMS Jonathan started restoring classic cars while
00:33he was still at school in the 1990s and set up Cotswold Classic Car Restorations around
00:39four years ago with the aim of working on mainly British models such as Aston Martins
00:45and Jaguars. The company currently has a full workload and Jonathan shows us some of their
00:51current restoration projects.
00:54It's a three-litre, six-cylinder engine. Its stored conditions were perfect. It was
01:00in a dry, open, airy building that was heated during the winter. So the amount of corrosion
01:07that's occurred within the car is remarkable.
01:13What marks this car as absolutely unique is it's an Aston Martin DB2-4, which the build
01:19numbers are only in a few hundreds anyway. The few that are left are absolutely cherished,
01:26command considerable values, ever-rising, and for the Aston collector, you're not going
01:32to find this again. Potentially, that restoration typically takes about a year's worth of work.
01:38Here we have the Maserati Quattroporte 1970. This is one of only two in the world, and
01:45this particular car was a special commission by the Argo Con. The other one was a special
01:49commission by the King of Spain. It took three years to build this car, Maserati themselves.
01:55This car features one of the most opulent interiors you'll ever see. The super soft
01:59calf leather that the seats are trimmed in, the deep Wilton-style carpet interior you
02:04will not find on many, many cars at all. Lovely wooden dashboard with a very full complement
02:09of dials. This car would be, apparently, a discreet saloon. Discreet isn't a word I would
02:16use with it. And propelling this beautiful saloon car is a Quattroporte V8. Five litre
02:22in excess of 350 horsepower is a variation on Maserati's race engines. The design criteria
02:29from the Argo Con is a car that would do not the 60 in under six seconds, but 170 miles
02:34an hour. It's really ahead of its time. It's in absolutely beautiful and original condition,
02:40pretty much as it left the factory all those years ago. Restoration projects are very time
02:45consuming and incredibly detailed. We actually break the car down into all its component
02:51pieces. We mark out any repairs that are required as well. We can either build the car as completely
02:56original, or we may be able to modify it slightly to make the car actually more up to current
03:02speed of traffic. The chassis and body would be acid dipped. That's where the actual body
03:06and chassis are put into an acid tank and left there for 48 hours. And that removes
03:11all paint, it removes all the rust, all the sealers and corrosion. And when the body is
03:16removed it is then put into a neutralising tank. Then the car will come back to us and
03:20we'll inspect it for any cracks or perforation or where the panels have become thin through
03:26corrosion. Then we go through the various processes of the restoration which include
03:30body, paint, chassis rebuild and the re-trimming of the leather and the hide and even down
03:36to the glass. If the glass is marked or damaged we'll be looking at replacing the glass if
03:40the customer requires. The main challenges in a restoration of a vehicle is getting the
03:45originality correct and working closely with the customer to ensure that the re-finish
03:51article is exactly what he wants. Despite all the beautiful vehicles Jonathan has worked
03:57on, he still has a wish list. A car we're yet to restore that we would absolutely love
04:02to be commissioned to restore would be an ex-Formula One car owned by Jim Clark, Jackie
04:08Stewart, Graham Hill, James Hunt. The history with those cars, the battles that they were
04:14involved with is just second to none and it would be an absolute privilege if ever one
04:19of those projects comes our way one day. It would be a dream of mine to restore one of
04:23those cars and buy one of those fantastic drivers. And it seems Jonathan has no plans
04:29to stop working on these classic cars any time soon. Working on classic cars is an absolute
04:34joy. It's something that I see me doing to the day I die, being involved with them. When
04:39the cars are actually completed and leaving your workshop and you've seen them progress
04:42over one or two years, it's good to see them out there being used again and the customers
04:46enjoying them.