Who says Britain doesn’t make things any more? Bridge-builder-cum-engineer Brian Hale has made things all his life. He might be retired these days but that’s no reason to stop dabbling.
Motorcycles, bicycles, cars and boats - Brian builds the lot. Strips them down, puts them back together.
His garage at his home near Little Wenlock is a bounty of bits and bobs: lathes, funny-looking spanners and mechanical thingymajigs.
Fortunately Brian, now 73, knows what they’re called, what they’re for and how they all fit together.
His latest project is the re-construction of a legendary 1920s Bugatti racing car - or, to give it its proper name, a Teal Replica Type 35 Bugatti, one of only 30 ever made and one of only five of this ilk - a so-called two-plus-two with “the rear end of a stagecoach”.
It might not be the real thing - if it was he’d be a double millionaire - but that’s not the point. This 14ft replica is more than just a hobby: it’s part of his drive to build things.
And anyway, a similar replica recently sold for £110,000.
As Brian’s wife Pam says at their home - which he built himself, of course - “It’s been an interesting life living with Brian.”
In the life of Brian, the rescue of his beloved Bugatti is certainly one of the key scenes.
He says: “I’d been searching for one of these cars for 11 years. I didn’t want one in perfect condition, I wanted to restore one and put my own mark on it.”
Brian got his wish. At the time he bought it from a fellow enthusiast nearly 12 months ago the Bugatti was a wreck. The gearbox was in the front garden, the rest of the engine in the back
The bonnet was in the chap’s bedroom. Electrics in the unhappy chassis were all over the place. Brian takes out a photograph and it looks like an explosion in a telephone exchange.
“It really was a tub on wheels,” says Brian who, of course, promptly bought it.
But he would have to wait three months to get started on the project, because first he had to finish building his boat.
In recent months, however, the car has come back to life. It’s now all in one piece and is just days from its first outing on the open road.
Down the years Brian has had hundreds of cars - TR3s, E-Type Jaguars, a fleet of other Jags, Alfa Romeos, Bentleys, MGs by the dozen and eight or nine Rolls Royces - but the Bugatti is his favourite.
“I am fascinated with the building, it’s very rewarding but I’ve never had a thing about the ostentation of cars,” he says. “I was the MD of a company using a Citroen Dyane because I liked its quirkiness.
“I’ve had some gorgeous Rollers but I don’t care what other people think - as long as the bonnet was clean the rest could be covered in cow dung for me.”
Brian knows his stuff when it comes to engineering and developed some interesting ways of knowing when things weren’t quite tickety-boo - when raindrops began to vibrate on the bonnet of his Rolls Royce sitting at a set of traffic lights he’s been known to turn round, go home and change the carburettors.
The luxury of driving a Rolls Royce, says Brian, is a bit like sitting in the comfort of your living room and having someone move the scenery around for you.
It won’t be like that when he stretches the legs of the old Bugatti, of course. He’s ready for potential soreness.
Still, there is one concession to comfort which he’s in the process of building.
He explains: “I want to make a hard top that’s in keeping with the car, with a drop-on, four-bolt fixing - because my wife does not like open cars. That’s the concession.”
Brian is a driven man who has travelled the globe building and designing feats of engineering. And there’s never a bridge too far.
“I’ve driven my wife miles to see a bridge,” he says.
Today when pottering around, it’s usually in a modern car. He has a pair of Fiats on the drive but says that on the whole new cars just don’t cut the mustard.
“They’re okay for driving but they leave me cold, there’s no atmosphere. The old smell, it’s how we used to have it.”
If former RAF man Brian has any regrets it’s that his magnificence was not in the field of flying machines. He’s piloted aircraft and says that if he had his way he wouldn’t be down here on terra firma, he’d be “up there” in the sky.
“My mother always said I would build an aeroplane but I never did,” says Brian.
Still, now that the Bugatti project is nearing completion, he’s got his eye on the next best thing.
“I’m going to build a flight simulator for aircraft flying off a carrier deck. We’ve got a 30ft room upstairs big enough for an eight-foot screen.”
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