Swedish adventures

Recently the Thompson family have relocated to Northern Sweden to help manage an Australian companies interests in Sweden and Finland - we saw it as a chance to further the kids education and let them experience true seasonal variation, learn to ski, fish etc.

We are based in Mala, Vasterbotten - or West Bothnia as it was known in the UK historically. It is very close to the arctic circle, sees the Aurora Borealis in winter and the midnight sun through summer. It is remote - 800kms from Stockholm - which itself is level with the Orkney Islands. We are as far north as central Iceland.

We left our nice Perth house and garage of Triumphs in the care of Ken Bryant and the closest I expected to get to a Triumph was when I pop over to the UK to do events with Doug. What I was not expecting when driving through the neighbouring village was this.....

Seemingly abandoned outside a workhop in Norsjo - a 1964 Conifer mk1 looking very sorry for itself.

Trying to remain objective I had to have a closer look as although neglected it seemed amazingly solid

Looking underneath I expected the worst - but amazingly it seemed virtually unscathed - mild surface rust and oil or wax leaking from key areas of the sills

Most of the underside seemed covered in thin bitumen flaking off to reveal shiney factory paint

Early body number confirmed

I traced its owner, Morgan, to a nearby house where it became apparent he was a car saver with his own collection of barn finds

Morgan drives truck at the Kiruna Iron Ore deposit which is where he found the Triumph - virtually abandoned for the last 40 odd years. I crazily agreed to buy what I had sworn to Del I was going to avoid whilst on secondment - another project!

Over the next few weeks we got the Triumph back on four wheels and did a temporary fix on the rear subframe rubber that had failed - common 64 problem

And then 2 weeks ago - delivery - all part of the service!

In my shed and ready for revival