Fiat 600 restoration

A PICTORIAL HISTORY OF THE RESTORATION OF MY 1957 FIAT 600
	In 1998 Piet Lourens gave me the 600. Due to severe health problems he could not carry on with the restoration. This was the day I went to collect the 600.
	Piet making sure the 600 is nice and secure on the trailer.
	Ready to go!
	The 600 is home.
	The owner of Pietersburg Auto Bumper, Neels, offered his help in the restoration. It was decided to strip the 600 of all old paint and redo everything Piet has done up to that stage.
	Working on Friday afternoons and on days I had off from work I started the job under the watchfull eye of Neels.
	This is Neels removing dents from the roof. It was clear that the car must have been the victim of a hailstorm in it's past.
	Neels is a master tradesman. He did the spray job on the car, perfect first time round I should add!
	Neels is busy applying the final coat to the "hanging on's".
I was very fortunate that the engine of the 600 seem to be in good condition. It was run outside the frame to check for excessive smoke. No smoke or oil leaks was spotted and we decided to fit it as is.
	Piet having a final cigarette before the job of refitting the engine is tackled. He takes everything in his stride.
	In less than an hour I was able to start the engine. I do not think it was to bad, although I must admit that prior experience with the 500's did help a lot. The righthand taillight lens I also got from Lauri. When one ask for spares on a car like this locally you are treated like an alien. Thank you Lauri.
	Once the engine was in the frame connection of all the necessities had to be done. The most difficult was the parking brake which works on the gearbox. As I did not have the original cable I had to have one made up from scratch. Here Lauri Viljanen came to my rescue with a drawing he made and e-mailed me. Being able to get the car on ramps wthout to much effort helped a lot!
	Another item which proved very problematic was those little "expansion blocks" found in the parking brake. Piet had one sample and I had another made from that. When I started on the parking brake these blocks were nowhere to be found! Again the good Lauri came to my rescue! He e-mailed me the picture on the left and I made my own expansion blocks. It cost me nothing, I used the metal parts from old diskpads to make it from.
Electrical problems was never one of my strong points, in fact it has never even been a point with me! Piet and I struggled for weeks to get things working. Eventually a friend said he had a friend who would gladly see to our problem in exchange for two bottles of whiskey and a steak. This is how I met Willie Naude. The deal was that Willie would be "paid" on delivery. Willie had the problem sorted out in no time. Willie died in October 2003 after he was involved in a very serious accident.
	One of my biggest problems was to find a wiring diagram which one could read. Here is one in PDF format. Click here to view the file.(179kb) Please print it if need be.
	When Piet painted the car first time round he unfortunately did not cover the wires properly. We had to clean all the wires one by one to get to the correct colour coding. It was a job my daughter Mari-let took on herself.
	*The Fiat's electrical system is also known as @&(#@?!! here in South Africa, well - that was what Piet called it!**