Maltese bus (karozza tal-linja)

[Vanvlak]

Hi all,
remember the bus I'd bought a few weeks back? Well, someone's blown it up!



All right, I'll come clean. I dismantled it as the start of a conversion process.Two small Philips screws are removed from the bottom of the bus, and hey presto, job is done.
Although the bus scale appears to be close to 28mm, the seats inside are titchy! the detail on the dash is extremely poor; so a sort of makeover is in order. The bus will be (well, I hope) semi-armoured by the time I'm done with it, but some seats will be visible. I'm not going to bother with a massive makeover of the interior which will only barely be seen, but I'm going to paint the seats and the floorboard and steps at the bus entrance at least. The 'Malta bus' script has to go, but I'm keeping 'Emergency door', 'Diesel' and 'Pay as you enter', even though they are larger than what you would expect on a real bus. The route number (80, which goes to Rabat) is gone, as it was a cheapish sticker. The windscreen might not be visible in the future anyway, so I might eliminate that altogether; on the other hand, a bus number 666 has its attraction...
Meanwhile, I also have to do something about the headlamps (no detail at all) and the number plates (too modern). I was thinking of mounting a hatch and an MG on a ring mount on the roof, but I think I'd prefer not to break up the classic shape of this too much.

The bus is a 1940s model, so I'm afraid it can't go with the 1937 boat - unless this survives for another decade, that is!

[Le matou rouge]

The bus is a 1940s model, so I'm afraid it can't go with the 1937 boat - unless this survives for another decade, that is!

But what's we want to know is the vintage of the wine !

"A la tienne !'
Meow,
Matt

[Vanvlak]

But what's we want to know is the vintage of the wine !

"A la tienne !'
Meow,
Matt

I just KNEW this would happen... ah well: a youngster, I'm afraid - a 2006 Cabernet-Carmener, El Emperador from Chile.
It's like this, see: I enjoy a good glass of wine in the evening. I am also partial to the books of Luis Sepulveda, who is from Chile. In 'Patagonia Express' (good name for a back of beyond game, by the way) he mentions the excellence of the wines of his homeland (Sepulveda lived in exile, in Hamburg for some time, I believe, for a long time because of his writings). Quite an adventurous life, incidentally. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Sep%C3%BAlveda.

Anyway - I was curious, and one New Year my wife and I ate out at a small Vinotheque-cum restaurant, and I tried an Errazurriz. http://www.errazuriz.com/errazuriz/english/default.asp
It was the best of the Chilean wines I have tried yet, but funnily enough I cannot find a single one I do not like. I am no wine expert, I just enjoy a single glass of wine late in the evening. But if it's Chilean, it seems to go down better, and I think of Sepulveda, the author, who I admire, and his exile.

[Vanvlak]

Progress: I added some detail to the interior. I didn't go over the top with this as it will only be partly visible through the transparent panels. In particular, I didn't bother with the rather poor dashboard - the driver's compartment will be armoured, so I left is as it was apart from painting it in a dark colour. I couldn't resist replacing the route number I'd removed from the front (a sticker) with a more realistic number plate stuck on the inside. So, route 72 it is.

The innards:


Number 72 before re-assembly:


And after:


And a side view showing a transfer at the steps and some colour instead of the nasty pale yellow plastic of the original: