You may have seen this car before - it was featured as Star Car #9 in the Gallery, and further pictures can also be found at number PP37 in this section. It belongs to Peter Pigmans from Rotterdam, and this photo shows work progressing on repainting the trim. He states:

'I did some decorating too this summer, you can see the result; bumpers blue and the sides yellow. It isn't finished yet, also the front grille and door handles need to be done (yes, I copied that from your car ). After that I send you the result to become Star Car of the month again!? Some major refitting (welding) has to be done soon this month at the bottom, fighting against corrosion...'

Well, that's a common problem, especially in Holland which is just as wet as Britain. Peter says he discovered a very good shop for car paints in Rotterdam, where he was recommended a 'plastic-suture-primer coat' at first for the side trim, which is transparent. That's followed by a standard yellow coat and a further transparent top coat, with use of light sandpaper between the layers. After over 4 months there's no signs of paint flaking off, which is often a problem R4 owners have discovered when painting these plastic panels. He goes on to say:

'The blue on the bumpers came after a anti-corrosion coat and a beige primer, finished with transparent coat again. It's a new color blue of FIAT (why FIAT? don't know, just liked this color blue). For just some small surfaces, it was quite a lot of money on paint. I decided to choose yellow on the sides, to get all the colors of the Brazilian flag, this work was done during the world cup in Korea and Japan. As Holland was not competing I thought it would be fun to ride after Brazil won the final....'

It's a good job he didn't do that in England, he'd have got his head kicked in after they were knocked out by Brazil in the quarter final! I was worried enough with my blue and yellow car when it came to the Sweden game, and the rest of the country had their cars and houses daubed in white and red crosses. Peter's car looks like a kind of hybrid between my own R4 and my sister's repainted R4, which as you'll see later on is now in a bizarre multicoloured design that outdoes my own. You can also spot the above green dream machine for a few seconds during the Arnhem video in the Events section, when we met up for a chat in a street in Doesburg.