Crosville`s AEC Matador 59 A:

Crosville`s AEC Matador 59 A

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Brief History Of 59A

The Story So Far 1

The Story So Far 2

The Story So Far 3

The Story So Far 4

Guest Book

Links and Contact

We had to start thinking how to go about the restoration programme.

A number of ideas had been suggested but realistically we needed a watertight workshop as a base.

So we cleaned out and salvaged any gems of memorabilia that had been left in the truck,

and thankfully loads of bits were found.

In Aug 06 The group set about removing the old T&G board roof.

Sadly the old boards had shrunk over the years and some of the boards had suffered from water ingress.

With the help of a local sawmill new one-inch boards were manufactured and Fitted.

Time was spent cleaning down the roof sticks, also making four new sticks for under the fibreglass front section Yes!

In 1957 Crosville was well advanced in manufacturing fibreglass panels, 59a front and side curved roof panels were moulded in fibreglass.

We were able to locate a local firm who were able to apply a new type of rubber sheet covering at a very good price.

This was completed before Christmas.

It was also a week before Christmas that we received the logbook, complete with age related number, after many months of work with the DVLA.

The problem had been 59a was given a Q plate in 1986 and some of the details given by Crosville did not match the Matador. Thankfully all was resolved. It was so handy to have the Build sheet and help from the Historic Vehicle Society and the Leyland Commercial Museum to prove 59a was originally built in 1945 for the Navy.

January 2007 and cold weather did not give us any enthusiasm to get stuck in on our visits.

But we did and work progressed slowly.

With only one day returning home It was definitely too cold with icicles hanging from the roof, inside!!.

We had been able to remove the only two steel panels from the front to work on them.

Using our beg and borrow method.,We came across a sheet of 3mm aluminium and as you can see they have worked out very well, along with our newly manufactured light units.

Into the month of March and cleaning and painting has started looking good.

Our next photo shows us on our last visit with the panels fitted and some new paint work just to give us some idea how things will look and to brighten the old girl up.

Work was started on the crane we now have the hooks working again, and also removed the ballast box.

This has given us access to the chassis rear end for cleaning and painting.

We removed the front towing beam/spring.

This gives us more headroom to crawl underneath, to start cleaning and painting the chassis.

In the summer months we hoped to have the engine running again, but sadly we have had major water leak so at the beginning of March we removed the radiator and found we have a leak in one of the cooling tubes.

This was a job for a local radiator repair shop.

We left the Matador radiator with them and are keeping our fingers crossed that a repair can be done, Hope to have good news soon.

When we have the chassis cleaned and radiator refitted we hope to be able to have the engine running again and start removing the wheels and checking and repairing the brakes.

We have found someone in North Wales who has some Matador spares so we hope we can call on them if we need any parts. Now we are into April and work has gone well.

We have had support from many friends in the area with pictures and information and we have also met up with some really helpful companies, in particular our nuts and bolts supplier Leyton Fasteners Ltd. Who have a genuine interest in vehicle restoration, they will mail order small quantities of those hard to get items.

It is worth a visit to their web page (see link on our links page)

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