Thoughts on smaller scale restoration!

[Roy of the Rovers]

A few years ago I picked up an old 'Thistle' Pedal car Jeep. Thistle I understand being the Canadian division of Triang.

Its a nice little thing, in pretty good condition I believe from 1953 with a bit of rust here and there. It has the original numbers and American star painted on and its original olive green paint.

Id love to restore it but only if I can do it identically to the original. The body and spraying is easy but the decals are something else! I've found I can get decals for it but of course these are just stickers effectively and it will no longer be original...

So there we have it, Dilemma.. Do I strip and fully repaint it and apply decals or leave as is..needing TLC ??
I wonder if a signwriter might be able to paint it all back on?

Its very similar to this picture I found on the net...

[johnwp5bcoupe]

Give it a good wax polish and keep it as is

[David]

I agree with John on this. Easy to repaint something, impossible to get the patina of age.

[Mr Pelham]

No harm in an army jeep looking like its seen "active service" patina wins for me on this one!!! Good job its mot exempt!

[Deleted]

I'd just leave it like it is. Its 60 years old and that's the beauty of it.

[Steve P5b]

Nice looking jeep Roy, as most suggest, best to keep as original as possible, though do try too make sure it all works. I have two fully restored Triang pedal cars one of which we took along to the "antiques roadshow" kids event at Hendon air museum, their comments were that patina and originality mean more than shiny paint and no dents etc. Both of mine were repaired over twenty years ago when my kids finished playing with them, both came from a boot sale at 50 pence each, now I see on ebay prices are in the hundreds.
Shame there's no rover Rover model pedal car.

[Dean Hovland]

Give it a few coats of clear for the oily rag look .

[Roy of the Rovers]

Thanks for the opinions. Maybe what I'll do is an invisible restoration of the moving parts, strip, clean and grease all the moving surfaces?

Apart from my Rover my other interest is militaria and so this pedal car is kind of a half way between the two hobbies! Maybe a generous coating of oil on the paintwork then......

[David]

Good decision. Photos and perhaps a write up of its 'Restoration' would make interesting reading for Take Five, please

[Roy of the Rovers]

Sure although greasing a jeep pedal car is not as exciting as customising your P5

I also came across a Bren gun magazine pouch made by no other than Rover during the war years. I'll pop some details of that through too...
cheers
Roy