Hello from essex.

Hey there, thought I would introduce myself. Hi I am Chris and I have just bought my 1st ever X1/9 and I shall be restoring this car (over a number of years) and while my son is 4 I am hoping to finish this for him when he is old enough to drive lol. Although I am new to this club I have the feeling this car is not, as I have seen club stickers in the window. If you did own this then please get in touch as would be nice to build so history on my project. I am sure along the build I will have many questions, as this will be my 1st build aswell. I look forward to speaking with you all, here is a quick photo I took this evening just after I got it home.

Hi Chris, welcome to the club. For me the black X19s always look the best

Thanks but sadly the paint is in a very very poor condition & was painted out of cans. So I am going to take it back to bare metal and start all over again. If my son has his way I will be painting it yellow as its his fav colour lol. I am going to have to try to save up and get a body kit so I can get rid of them bumpers 1st

Once you take them off you will be amazed at how good they look. It is relatively easy to do a de-bumper conversion. The original design (pre US spec bumpers) is pure and beautiful. They do look good in yellow too!

So do I take it you can buy just the bumper conversion then?

Hello and welcome Chris! Good to see a fellow Essex member on here, I own two 1300s myself...
Jim.

Thanks Jim. Will have too meet up over a cuppa sometime... I'm burnham-on-crouch area what about you?

Hi Chris - with regards to the bumper options, there are three main choices if you are keeping the look of the wings etc standard.

The 1300 bumper conversion (early cars had them):



The Eurosport bolt on kit - comes with side skirts and will need a lot of filling/jiggery pokery to look right:






You could just take the bumpers off, replace the indicators (Spaces are still there underneath for the earlier 1300 sidelight/indicator units), fit a lower spoiler and make a grill (or fit a 1300 grill if you can find one):




If you want it to look clean a lot of filling/sanding will need to be done:





And if you really want a nice look, stick a stainless grill in there:




In the past, I have done all of these conversions. The cheapest and easiest by far is to take them off, make a grill, add a lower spoiler, use your existing lights (they will look a bit naf), find 1300 lights, or use something similar out of a breakers. I keep looking at early jap 4x4 light units and thinking they would do nicely.

Cheers