Following the triumphant return of my brother, sister, her boyfriend and I from the 40th anniversary Renault 4 event in Arnhem in September 2001, my sister, Tonia, decided to prepare her new R4 for repainting. A bit of history about this car:
It was 'purchased' back in June 2001 in Surrey, England, from somebody who had sent an advert to this website. My sister was having problems at the time with her camper van, and was in need of some other transport. Given that she had owned a green Renault 4 before (as can be seen at the very start of this My Pics section), I notified her of the car being for sale, although in fact it was being given away free because the previous owner had too many vehicles getting in the way. Nonetheless, it was in brilliant condition mechanically and chassis-wise, had low mileage and had been looked after. The bodywork looked a mess because it had been painted with red Hammerite using a brush, and whoever did it had seemingly splashed it on in five minutes, but the state of the actual body was remarkable, and better than my own car.
Tonia had to pay only 120 pounds at the MOT the following month, which was cheaper than any MOT that my own R4s had been through, and it sailed to Arnhem and back without a hitch (aside from a flat tyre on the way home), unlike my R4 which acquired a broken driveshaft. Not at all bad for a free car (a standard right-hand drive 1986 GTL). It was adorned with funny little stickers and had unusual boot door locks on either side, as can be seen below.
The photo above shows my sister on the left, my brother on the right and me looking a bit weird in the middle with the wind blowing my hair into some kind of toupée style. The car was to be first resprayed yellow after being rubbed down, although Tonia had considerable problems with the shop that supplied (or failed to supply) the paint, so it spent months being driven around looking tatty with bits of masking paper hanging off everywhere, whilst it awaited the final coat. More pictures of the finished article follow in later entries to this section. The previous owner referred to the car as 'Visible Pantie Line', based on the initials VPL on the number plate. So it seems I'm not the only disturbed person to do this sort of thing.
Here's my car at that same suburban Hove location once more. Now, I wonder who that could be in the above picture? I'm afraid I once again had to turn my face into a mosaic on this one, in part to preserve my mystery status on this site, and partly because I just didn't like my mug shot on this picture very much. Tansie the dog once again gets more than her fair share of fifteen minutes' fame. For all I know, however, she might be thinking 'Oi! What about my mosaic?', and be unhappy I've displayed her face here.
I took the dog out for a ride whilst I went to the shops in Brighton, and what should I spot but that same car again, the multi-coloured R4 that's now been featured a few times elsewhere on the site. I parked in front of it here at Preston Park (below). The dog was guiding me back into the space. If I heard her woof I knew I'd gone too close; if I heard her woof followed by an unhealthy silence I knew I'd gone very close!
