Early June has seen a busy couple of sessions in the workshop. After delivery of the afore mentioned traditional lino we set too recovering the centre isle and area from the driver’s seat to just beyond the front offside wheel arch. This was another of those theoretically quick and simple tasks but as ever, turned out to be a real ball ache! The old centre isle covering had been removed sometime ago along with the adhesive but it was only trimmed back as far as the floor seat rail. As there was no chance that we would be able to get the seat rail up without snapping numerous screws we had no option but to laboriously ‘hook’ out the remaining lino which sat under the floor rail. By doing this we would be able to tuck the new lino under the rail and hide the edge. Whilst I got on with this Stephen built up the new floor traps, reusing the majority of the components from the old ones. The finished result is very pleasing.

Once the centre isle was complete our attention tuned to the area from the driver’s foot well to just beyond the front offside wheel arch. This area of grey lino had been removed when we replaced the area of rotten floor around the emergency exit and the piece of corroded stress panel. As lino is quite expensive it was imperative that an accurate template was made of each of the areas before waving the Stanley knife around! You only have to make one wrong cut and that is £100 worth of lino ruined. However, patience and accuracy prevailed and all 3 pieces finally glued into position as if they had been factory cut. All the aluminium beadings were then drilled and screwed into place covering the joins between the two colours and the floor now looks rather splendid after being just exposed wood for the last few years.

Saturday the 13th saw Peter once again give up some of his valuable time to assist us in reinstating the front running gear. All the new components (and those which Stephen had very skilfully refurbished) were laid out and Stephen & Peter had a very productive couple of hours jacking, bolting & bashing - stopping only for the prerequisite buckets of tea! It was great watching them do what they do best and to see the parts going back into place.

Meanwhile I just had to look on from the sidelines as it all looked a bit too much for a simple desk jockey! We owe Peter a great deal of gratitude for lending us a helping hand in this area of CDK’s restoration.

At the end of the session the new springs were hung, the axle beam bolted up, the stub axles & brake assemblies attached and the shock absorbers fitted. One more session should see the track rod and brake chambers on, all the hub components fitted and the new radiator and fan cowl back into its correct position. And all this achieved without the aid of a pit! Well done chaps.

Ebay has produced a dashboard switch panel to replace the damaged original one which Mr Sharpe will in due course wire up for us and we have managed to source some brand new seat fabric for when we get to the re-upholstering stage.

Disappointing news this month though, is that one of the other surviving ex Yelloway AEC’s has been scrapped (HVU247N) and with it our only hope of an original drivers partition screen. Shame.