Hello from Sunny Oxfordshire

Hello Everyone,

Just joined up, thought I'd introduce myself,

Been into cars for ever, started with a Fischer Price garage, then Hot Wheels/Matchbox cars, then Lego/Technical Lego, then 1/24 Revell/Monogram model cars, then 1/12 Tamiya F1 model cars

Skipped RC cars, straight to road cars, 1st car was a 875cc Hillman Imp coupe, loads of fun, learnt the art of driving slowly sideways in the snow

Then built my 1st and only car for myself, a Slyva Phoenix kit car with a 150BHP 2ltr Vauxhall twin cam, car weighed 530kgs, no windscreen, good for 135mph, built from 21 different cars ranging from a Mini to a McLaren F1, scared me everytime I drove it, when it tried to kill me, it had to go, so sold it and put the money towards my 1st house

Then somehow 25yrs passed filled owning many boring cars, while earning a living playing about on the desing/engineering of fast road/race cars before I bought my 2nd toy. My 1st Porsche, a 1989 Black 930 5 speed, proper old school car, not a car to muck about in. Great fun for Autobhan storming and mountain passes on family Euro trips between the UK and where we lived in Italy

Swiftly made up for lost toy ownership time by buying a 1991 Porsche 964 C2, stripped 200kgs of weight out, only a bare bones stock car, a very different driving experience to the 930, enjoyed it on Euro driving tours around both the far ends of the Alps and Pyrennes

Still own both Porsche's, sadly both are in storage while owning another 10yrs of boring cars and still earning a living playing about on the design/engineering of race cars

Now, I've come full circle, in the middle of building my own Fischer Price inspired garage with triple stack car lift, hopefully a turn table too. Aiming for a modern F1 factory internal vibe but hidden behind a period correct fascade of a drastically but sympathetically extended 275yr old stone house.

Looking forward, over the horizon to a retirement, filled hopefully with a few fast car projects for myself I've just started looking at cars I think I'd enjoy building and a Stratos is right near the top of my short list

Hope to make myself useful by contributing where I can while learning as much as possible from the excellent knowledge and impressive car builds on here while I count down the years before I can start building something interesting to enjoy on Alpine mountain roads