Hi Rob- Just read your most recent on-line column. Did Phil Sansossion Sr. actually call it quits and close up his shop after all these years? One of my great memories is bringing my '90 E30 M3 to him that I found neglected in RI with only 70K miles. It had lots of nicks, dings, scratches typical of a city car. I brought it to Phil and he brought the car back to showroom condition...allowing me to spend a week working in his shop doing the wet sanding and trim assembly after he had finished repairing & painting it. He was a great teacher and had lots of good stories. As is often the case, the car was so pristine after restoration that it became a garage queen..and I decided to part with it. Unfortunately, the E30 M3's were not commanding the hefty price tags then that I now see in the Roundel. By the way, I still have the '72 2002Tii (Ceylon) that you looked at a few years ago. I'm hoping to make it my retirement project in a few years. Phil's 02 guy actually swapped the "guts" from the old doors into the new shells and "jam" painted them before I hung them Jonathan
Jonathan! Sorry for the delay; I was in the field. Sad that your M3's gone, but glad that you still have the tii. Have you read my book? I actually refer to meeting you and your car: "Even folks who get off on removing, zinc plating, and reinstalling every nut and bolt are subject to burnout. People have different strategies: visualizing the end product; working on the car for 30 minutes every night; leaving the car alone for a month and coming back to it. And they still get in over their head. I recently saw, and passed on, a ’72 2002tii project where a guy wanted to build himself a show-quality car from the ground up and had cut out the rust and acquired a full assortment of new and used body panels awaiting installation. Now, everything was piled on top of the car in the garage, threatening to crush anyone who disturbed it, and he had to admit that he was never going to get this done and wanted out. In the old-buddies-showing-up-at-your-door analogy, this qualifies as your ex-roommate getting shit-faced, throwing up everywhere, passing out in the spare bedroom, then staying around your house, hung over, for twenty years." So, all that being said, by picking the right car and doing nothing, it's appreciated, so now you can claim that it was your plan all along. Well played, sir! Phil Sansossio and his son are still there but basically got out of the restoration business. It's now only the two of them, no employees, and they have only half the upper part of the building; another bodyshop has the other upper half, and a third shop has the entire lower half.
