I've done a very similar amount of panel replacement on my brother's car although it didn't have the element of surprise for unforeseen work like this one will have. That will come courtesy of not already owning the car and the accident damage. But I did most of the big work on that in about 6 weekends (what I call phase 1 restoration). There's still lots of little jobs to do on it which will be spread out over the next 12 months (phase 2) but the car looks respectable now and is very useable again .
Summer activities with the family will get in the way of a straight run with this one but as I've got the experience of doing most of the jobs once now I'll be disappointed if I can't do phase 1 in similar timescales. That will clearly all change if I find something horrible, particularly once the front end is dismantled.
Today I've secured virtually all of the parts I currently think I need for phase 1 up to the MOT. I'll be picking them up next Wednesday and making a start shortly after that. So end of July maybe for having it back on the road.
Like many people we name our cars after the 3 letters in the registration. This one is Y683 TRD. My daughter suggested Trudy but it has to be Terdy. I lost a best friend to alcohol abuse 3 years ago now and because of his scrapes when he was boozed up Richard (his real name) became Richard the Third > Turd > Terd (had to sanitise it a bit after I got complaints from his family when I first knew him as 21 year olds
A lovely guy, we were like brothers but the name was apt sometimes! So will be thinking of you I'm working on the car Richard, particularly when I'm getting cheesed off with it and need a motivational shove
Those who like The Two Ronnies will know where that particular rhyming slang comes from! If you don't then I feel duty bound to share it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RwyPDPlFA8 (3 mins in if you don't want to watch all of it)
I'll start a journal thread with photos of the rebuild as I've taken lots from this forum and feel that will help put something back as a record of the jobs involved. I'll also probably be looking for advice at various points!