Restoring a 1951 Quonset hut is a bit like restoring a car, only bigger, with more zeros attached when writing the checks. We are nearing the end of our massive facility restoration, and we will all be really happy when we are done. This past week, our lead technician “Russ the mechanic” was on vacation, so we took advantage of the down-time to move everything out of the way and refinish our concrete floors.
This was a monumental undertaking, facilitated by the diamond grinder shown here, and two courageous operators.
Everything had to be moved multiple times, so we could grind in sections. The concrete dust was intense. I must have been licking the floor in my sleep, because the taste of concrete is still with me.
Emerging today is our new light gray coated floor, soon to be completely impervious to the various classic car fluid leaks it will face in its future. You can see the new gray floor coating at the top of the picture above.
As with any good restoration, there have been multiple interesting and creative decisions to make. We have tried to leave the building “original” where possible, to honor the history and keep the vibe of the space in tact. To that end, we tried to use a clear coating for the floors, and so they were ground to smooth them out and remove some imperfections. Our intention was to let the deeper imperfections remain to acknowledge the history of our home.
Unfortunately, the clear coat was not to anyone’s liking-too many oil stains were still showing and the floor darkened dramatically, which made out Bugeye hut look more like a cave. So we made a last minute change to light gray, and now our space it brighter, and uniform, in a sea of other mottled surfaces.
That’s not a bad thing.
Friday at 6AM the team moved everything out of the center of the floor onto the first finished section, and then more gray goop was spread-on, so that by Monday morning, we’ll be off and running once again. We have a bunch of British cars we need to get back on the road! Below, you can see the guys moving everything from the center of the building onto the now dry section of floor, so the rest of the floor can be coated to dry over the weekend.
Thank you all for your interest and support! More updates to follow! Next up… epoxy-coating the basement floor of our parts warehouse!
