Making a Morgan: 17 days of craftmanship: step-by-step from specification sheet to finished car

In Making a Morgan the reader accompanies a very traditional model, a Morgan Plus 4, through it's build from customer's specification sheet to finished car. A process that, in this instance, will take 17 days.

All Morgans can be bespoke, and the unique thing about 'our' car is that it will be built with a narrow frame front end that properly belongs to a 4/4 model. Invisible, except to Morgan cognoscenti, this non-standard front end means that the distance between the headlamps and the radiator grille is somewhat less than on the standard Plus 4 models. Most likely, this customer prefers understatement, but on the other hand didn't hold back when specifying the car's equipment: sports model without spare wheel, a 2-litre engine, polished wire-spoke wheels, door pockets, full leather interior in red, map light, hood, sidescreens, tonneau cover in black mohair, front and rear overriders on the bumpers, sun visors, and a radio with CD player.

Oh, yes, before we forget, this car will be painted in the very traditional, dark, Irish Green paint, code L4069. Why there should be so many green Morgans is a mystery to us; after all, customers can choose from a palette of around 40,000 colours!

Although the car will be delivered to a London Morgan dealership, what we have here is a model with left-hand drive steering. Most likely, the customer lives on the Continent. He, or she, doesn't know that a book is being written about their Morgan but, of course, the authors will see to it that the car's new owner gets an autographed copy of the book.

Andreas Hensing began his career as a Naval Officer, including a period studying social science and HR Management at the University of the Federal Armed Forces in Hamburg. He later found work as HR Manager at Axel Springer Publishing House, eventually spending 25 years as a consultant in media industries. Andreas took his first steps in media production in the mid-1990s, writing and producing corporate films for industry. In 2011, Andreas and his wife, Dagmar, founded their own small publishing house (Hanseatischer Buchverlag), producing self-written books about Morgan, plus several classic cars calendars. Since 2014, they have launched two blogs – www.classic-cars-news.de and www.morgan-news.de. They also write articles about classic cars for magazines. Andreas and Dagmar live in Hamburg, Germany.