05x20 - Tape-Recording Machine

[bunniefuu]

Welcome to The Repair Shop, where
precious-but-faded treasures...

It's in a bit of a sorry state.

..are restored to their
former glory.

I'm going to teach you how to do it
the old-fashioned way.

Furniture restorer Jay Blades...

Now the fun begins. I know.

So nice that we can be part
of that history to just keep going.

..and a dream team of expert
craftspeople...

Looks absolutely amazing.

Wicked.

You really start to see the thought
that went into making it.

..come together to work their magic.

Teamwork. Absolutely.

Yes! Beautiful.

Employing heritage craft skills
passed down the generations...

It's my duty to make sure that this
all goes back in working order.

..preserving irreplaceable
heirlooms...

It's absolutely amazing.
It really is.

It's like keeping a bit
of our family history alive.

..the team will restore the items...

SHE GASPS
..the memories...

Yes! Yes!

..and unlock the stories
that they hold.

It's touched my heart.

It's amazing.

In The Repair Shop today,

in his quest to use the right tool
for the job,

Steve's going bespoke.

I'm just sculpting brass
to make this spanner,

so they can take the wheels
off of the car.

While a costume once donned
by a glamorous 1950s strongwoman

tests the skills and patience
of expert Sara Dennis.

It's safe to say I don't really want
to see any more green sequins again

for a long time.

I actually went to bed and dreamt
of green sequins.

But, first, a conduit to the past
in need of a tune-up.

John Mears is hoping radio
and electronics expert Mark Stuckey

can bring a precious
family heirloom back to life.

Hello, there. Hello, I'm Mark.

Nice to meet you. Hi, I'm Dom.

Nice to see you.
What have you brought along?

It's a reel-to-reel tape recorder,
which used to belong to my dad.

He would sit this in the corner
recording parties.

We had this grand piano
and all the family,

they'd take turns in playing it.

Oh, brilliant.

It was 14 or so brothers
and sisters of my dad's.

14?! Wow! Yeah.

So they were big parties
and it wasn't a big house!

Oh, no!

But it didn't matter.
They were good times.

Yeah. You know?

Dad used to play guitar and piano
and...

This would just be recording
in the corner the whole time?

In the corner, yeah.

So do you have a lot of tapes
from your father, then?

There's about four or five
different tapes.

So are you on the tapes, then?

Yeah. You are?
I'm on the tapes, yeah.

I'm singing away. As a kid, I guess.
Yeah.

I would have been about three,
four years old. Oh, wow.

Singing, playing guitar.
That's all right.

Sounds like you've got some
good memories of those. Yeah.

Good childhood. Yes, absolutely.
Yeah.

Do you want to see inside?
Yeah, please. Go on, can we?

Let's have a look
and see what we've got.

We have...an Elizabethan.

It's a little bit worse
for wear. Yeah.

But so am I! Me too!

But the Elizabethan Popular,

this actually is from 1962.

Is it?! Yeah.

I didn't know that.

So this is the probability of
when the party started.

I've always known him to have it.
Right.

There we go. Yes.

I presume this is like an
auxiliary lead.

For the MP3 player? Yeah.

The latter day one.

THEY LAUGH

And there's the join... Oh, look,
a bell wire mains cable.

Yes. Bell wire?

That's what we called...
For the mains. Yeah.

I did plug it in, but I stepped
back quick. Yeah, I would.

Wow. Crikey.

So what are you hoping
we can do to it?

There's a fault with it.

When you played it back,
it would wipe the tape out

and there'd be like
a whistling sound over it.

And I'm afraid if I put it on,
I'd lose everything.

OK. You know?

So you sort of plugged it
in very tentatively

at one point? Recently. Yeah.

And why was that?
Why did you sort of even attempt

with something which hasn't been
used for so long?

I can't hear my dad's voice
any more.

He passed away
when I was quite young

and I just wanted to hear
his voice again.

If I lost a minute... Yeah.
..just to hear his voice again,

it would be worth it.

Aw. So, worth the sacrifice.

Yeah. Yes.

If I'm able to actually sort
of bring this back to life

and get it fully working...?

It'd mean the world.

I'll be able to get my children
round, and my grandchildren...

Mm-hm.

..and we'd sit around it
and have a listen... Yes.

..to all the family. And not worry
about if you're causing damage

would be nice. Yeah. That's right.
Exactly.

When you hear their voice
after so long,

you just think they're still here.

They haven't gone.

Just close your eyes and... Yeah.

And-and dream yourself that
you're back to those times.

The good times. Yes. Yeah.

Well, leave it with us.

I think that's about all I can say.
Mark's going to do his best.

Really lovely to meet you.
Thank you very much.

Thank you for coming in.
Thanks, John.

See you later. Thank you.

I'm really pleased that someone's
going to take care

of the reel-to-reel and hopefully
give it me back

in perfect working order.

To be able to hear Dad's voice
once again,

and the family's voice once again
would be fantastic.

Wow. Cor, dear.

Yeah. Isn't it amazing?

It is, and that...
Precious little box, there.

Precious as gold. Yeah.

Where are you going to start
with this? OK.

Well, in fact, what you would
actually do

is take the chassis out of the case.
Fine. I'm with you.

Right, so far, easy.

Yeah!

Then what I will need to do
is just start taking

all the components which normally
are known to be aged... Right.

Their capacitors, things like
that. Replace those. Yeah.

Mechanically clean it.

There's obviously a drive belt
in there which will need replacing.

Sounds like there's some parts
in there that you're kind of knowing

that they're going to be worn
and broken. Exactly.

Hoping, fingers crossed,
that there's nothing else...

No, no. ..broken in there.

When we've done that... We?
When I have done.

Yeah, I was going to say...

Keep me well away from it!

When I've done that, then I can
attempt to put a tape on it.

Not that one. No. One of my own.

OK. Yes.

And we can then go from there
to see how it's behaving

and then any little bits of
adjustments, etc, needs to be done.

So you really have to put a tape
on and play it. Oh, you have to.

To troubleshoot. It's the only way
you know how it works. Right.

I hope you can get it working.

This is some precious cargo there,
so... I'll look after it.

Right. Best of luck with it.
I look forward to hearing it.

So will I. Thanks, Dom.
All right, bye-bye.

Here we go.

Let's have a look.

Here we go.

Now it should pull out.

Right, OK. See what we've got.

OK. So, first of all, we can see
we've got just a couple of valves.

And, underneath, we have capacitors.

Now, all these are probably,
due to age, are leaky.

So when John was putting it on play,

probably part of the array circuit
was being energised,

and that's why he was getting
the whistle.

First call, test that.

And to do that, I use a multimeter
on an ohms range - tests resistance.

And I connect on one side,

and I expect to see this meter
rapidly rise

and then slowly fall
as it discharges.

Let's have a look.

So we've got a rise.
It's discharging,

but it's now staying static.

Well, if I do that on a brand-new
electricity capacitor here

and do the same thing,
you'll see there's a rapid rise

and a rapid discharge.

Tin solder.

Anything like this, there's a lot of
work you have to do in advance.

Only then do you actually all
connect it to the mains.

And then you'll have an idea of
what else you may have to do.

You're doing that until
you're ready to go.

The next visitor racing towards
the workshop is Julian Ma.

He's brought something in desperate
need of an MOT,

courtesy of mechanical guru
Steve Fletcher.

Hello. Hello. How are you doing?

I'm Julian. I'm Jay.
Nice to meet you.

I'm Steve. Nice to meet you, too.
You, too.

So what have we got in the box?

So, this is a toy car that my dad
gave me when I was about ten.

Now that's a toy car!
LAUGHTER

That's what I thought when I got it.

Tell us about your dad.

How come he bought you this, then?

So, my dad was
a university academic.

He was a lecturer
in mechanical engineering.

So, in fact, he did his PhD studying
the internal combustion engine,

which is where he got
a love of cars.

Eventually, he actually started
working on the rocket flames.

I suppose was also related to
exhausts and internal rockets.

Rockets for...? Well, I mean,
he actually used to speak to Nasa

at one stage. What he was really
interested in

was the turbulence inside
the flames, which gives, I guess,

rockets instability
as they take off.

See, Steve would understand
all that stuff.

LAUGHTER
I don't know.

Actually, that's beyond me!
Beyond you?! Yeah, yeah.

There's not much stuff
that's beyond Steve.

It sounds like that your dad was
a really smart man, then.

Yeah, he was.

And, in his research, he had a lot
of collaborations in Europe,

especially in Germany. Right.
He used to travel to Germany quite

a lot and, every time he came back,
he used to bring us something.

One year, this was the toy
he brought for me. Right.

I was fascinated by this car
because, of course, when I was nine

or ten, I mean, that looked
pretty amazing to me.

Very cutting edge.
Very sophisticated, you know.

I was excited.

My favourite toy for a long time.

How did it actually get damaged?

Sadly, one of my relatives
managed to step on it.

As you can see, he sort of damaged
the back of it. OK.

I was gutted, because I used
to play with it all time.

What would it do? What would
the car do? Would it just drive?

So you wind it up.

There was a key which fit
in there.

You'd wind it up

and then you put it down
and off it goes. Whoosh.

So what does this car symbolise
to you?

Obviously, it's a very important
memory for me, from my childhood.

It takes me back. But I think
probably the most important thing

now is that it triggers all
those memories about my dad.

My dad's 94 now and not
quite as sharp as he was,

but it does remind me of that time
when, you know,

he was a real hero, of course.

But, you know, it's also
about his love of trains

and cars and engineering.

So I think this car is that -

that sort of trigger
for all those memories, actually.

Now that's really special.

Steve.

It's over to you now.

Well, I've never done a car
like this before.

So I'll have to work out a few bits
and pieces, but, um...

I'll-I'll give it my best shot.

Thank you very much.
I'd be very grateful.

Julian, thank you for bringing
it here. Thank you.

Thank you very much.
Nice to meet you both.

Likewise. You take care now.

Bye-bye.

I'm very excited now,
because chatting to the guys

about the history of the car has
made me realise

that it's going to be quite exciting
to take it back and show my dad

when it's repaired.

So you've got this wheel to attach?

Yeah. What else is wrong with it?
The wheels are all out of alignment.

Yeah. There's the linkages missing.

There's the bit that holds the wheel
to the car is all missing.

So there is a whole host
of things that need doing to it. OK.

Can't wait to get it going
and having a little play with it.

You're not the only one there, mate!

The more I look at this car,
the more I see that when Julian's

cousin stood on it, it caused
quite a lot of damage.

There's a lot of distortion
or misalignment.

The paintwork here has all
been rubbed off or scraped off.

There's a few damaged bits
on the front here as well.

And I'm sure Kirsten will make
a beautiful job of that.

I've found a clock key
that actually fits the square

and will actually wind it slightly,

but it's not doing anything
at the moment.

It's fairly solid.

But I'm just going to pop
the bottom off

just to have a look
at the mechanism.

And, hopefully, I can see how
I can straighten things out

and repair things.

Nothing's pinged out so far!

So I'm just checking at the moment

to see if there's any broken teeth
on any of the gears.

Can't see any at all,
which is really, really good news.

There we go.

Just going to pop that over.

I can now give these pieces to
Kirsten.

Hiya. Hello, you.

I wonder whether you can help me
with this little job.

I know you're not accustomed
to car body spraying...

I was going to say!

But I wonder whether you could
just touch up this... Yeah.

Kirsten's auto paints.

Yeah, absolutely. Excellent.
Good, good.

Thank you.

As Kirsten gets to work
on retouching the paintwork,

electronics expert Mark
has discovered another faulty

component on the tape recorder.

So this resistor here is 220k ohm

and a resistor, if you'd like
an analogy of water,

you have a large water flow
coming in,

the resistor reduces that amount
of water flow

so only a small level comes
out the other side.

This should be 220,000 ohms,

and it's reading 279,000 ohms.

So we'll change that
for a more modern counterpart.

We take the old one out.

And solder in a new component.

So that one's replaced.

The next stage is to do
the drive belt.

But the drive belt is encapsulated
within this mechanism,

and though I'm not familiar directly
with this machine,

I've got to start taking things
apart so I can do it.

When you disassemble something
you're not familiar with,

it's like in effect going
into an unexploded b*mb.

You're having to very tentatively
move screws,

see if it will start to shift,

and you know you're going
in the right direction,

because if you don't, BOOM!

Everything goes off,
springs fly everywhere,

and you've got mud on your face.

It looks like it wants to lift.

Now, look at that!

Nurse!

Next thing to do is to remove
the old belt, which is that.

Now, what I've got to try to do,

because, unfortunately, this model
is, say, 1962,

I haven't been able
to locate spares,

but I have got a quantity
of different size belts.

With the correct size belt
identified and installed,

Mark can begin the painstaking
process of cleaning

the delicate components
of the tape deck.

The overall condition's actually
pretty good.

There's no deterioration
of the rubbers.

But this is filthy.

But it's going to be.

It's had, what, 60 years?

So it's entitled to be a bit dirty.

The cleaner this is,
the better the take-up,

the smoother the action, less wear.

In fact, this metal polish,
you'd normally use

to sort of polish up chrome,

but it'll do tape paths and heads
absolutely superbly.

Nice and shiny again.

I'm now just going to do a dry test,
a dry run,

on a spare tape -
obviously not John's tape -

just to prove that the tape paths
are working correctly.

We'll just fast forward it
just to see if it is doing that,

and everything seems to be
working satisfactorily.

And rewind.

So it's doing everything
it says on the tin.

Taking it all apart,
cleaning all the parts, etc

has actually done the job
perfectly well.

A little way still to go,
but it'll be really nice

to sort of see how John sees it for
the first time, fully working,

and with that important
tape playing.

It's taken hours of tinkering to get
the tape recorder up and running

again, and the next item
through the doors is also in need

of patient attention.

Triona Palmer is calling
upon the needlework skills

of Sara Dennis to help put
the sparkle back into an item

with a glamorous past.

Hello. Hello. All right?

Here we go. I'll pop that there...
OK.

..and just these here for a minute.
OK.

I'm Jay. Hi, Jay, nice to meet you.
Triona.

Sara. Hi, Sara, nice to meet you.
Hi. OK.

So what have we got here, then?

Well, I've got for you
a stage costume

that belonged to the
strongest woman in the world.

Now that is nice! Something else.

She was a lady called Joan Rhodes.
OK.

She would bend bars.

There we go.

She would actually bend
this for real.

OK. Go on. Have a go.

This would be straight
and she'd bend it like that? Yeah.

Can you straighten it up for me?

Tsa-a-ah.

No, I can't do that!

She could pick you up easily.
Really?! Yeah.

She once picked up an elephant.
A baby elephant.

A baby elephant. Yeah.

But she was built like a tall
Marilyn Monroe,

as you will see from this costume.
Hold on a minute.

You're saying to me, there's a lady
this size... Mm-hm.

..could bend this?

Yeah. Really.

OK. You've got to tell me about this
lady, because that's...

JAY STRAINS
That's impossible!

OK. Yeah. Tell us about Joanie,
is it?

Joan Rhodes.

She was very famous in the '50s
and '60s. OK.

She started on the streets
of London at 14.

She ran away from home.

And then she learnt her trade
from street performers,

and she went on from there and ended
up performing for people

like the Queen and Prince Philip at
Windsor Castle. My goodness.

And she performed
all around the world.

She was once offered the job
of being Tarzania...

Oh, great. ..to Johnny Weissmuller's
Tarzan, back in the '50s.

It was a Hollywood contract.

And she loved London so much,
she couldn't leave! Couldn't do it!

She didn't do it.
She wanted to stay here. Wow.

Yeah. You'd have loved her.

She was a great woman.

So how did you get to know Joan,
then?

I was writing a book about
real women.

So I wrote to her and we met.
We just kind of fell in love.

Right. It was great.
And she was like a mother to me.

She was inspirational.

And I became ill with lupus...
Right.

OK. And I was retraining
to be an artist

and I started at Chelsea College
of Fine Art

to do a degree in fine art.

I did it part time, but even
then it was very, very tough

and, many times, I thought
about giving it up,

but Joan would be there.

"Come on, get on with it. Do that."

She was an inspiration always
for me. She kept me going.

So what would you like Sara
to do to this, then?

I think that there are obvious
bits of particular wear.

Yes, there's obviously bald patches,
aren't there? Yeah.

Obviously that needs repairing.

That needs repairing, yeah.
At the bottom.

And it would just be wonderful
to try and preserve this

because I don't know how much longer
it's got just to stay as it is.

And then I'll pass it on to my
daughters, who knew her, too,

who loved her. Brilliant.

So thank you for bringing this in.

Good luck!

Going to need it!
Thank you very much.

I'm going to give you back these

because I don't think I'll be able
to straighten them out.

Oh, what a cop out!
I know! Sorry about that.

All right? Thanks.

You take care now. Bye!
Bye-bye.

I want the costume to look

a little bit as it might have done
in its heyday.

You know, to give some
of the sparkle back that it's lost.

But to feel like I could
imagine my lovely Joan in it.

I was almost beyond hope
that that could happen,

so crossing my fingers that this
could actually be the answer.

Now that is a beautiful story.

It was. It was lovely. What a lady.

That bar! I mean... Yeah, I know.

I see you didn't have a go!

No, I thought you would
do it for me.

THEY LAUGH

What have you got to do on here?

Structurally, it's not too bad,

but obviously there's a rip here
that needs repairing.

Mostly it's the bald patches
from the sequins.

OK. There's a bit of tidying up
to do at the back.

I don't really want to do a lot
to the structure of it.

Because of the story, the more
original we can leave it,

the better, I think. All right.

So if there's anything you need
sequin-wise,

I think I've got some sequins
somewhere. I bet you have.

Probably have, actually!
I'm sure I can get you some.

It's a deal. Let's get this over,
yeah.

Let's get it over.

It's obviously been a stage piece,
so it's been well used,

and I think Joan used to come on
in this beautiful skirt

and then whip it off and reveal
herself in her leotard.

But I think this was sort of thrown
on the floor and then thrown

into a case when she moved on
to the next engagement.

So it's had a hard life.

It's a bit battered and bruised.

But it's all part of its history.

So, I'm going to start by taking
apart some of the home repairs,

this clasp and these black stitches.

Very carefully using
curved scissors.

Come away.

I'm hoping there's no horrible tear
or anything lurking under there.

I very rarely work with sequins,
but it's really fun.

It's really interesting.

And these are interesting -
they're old metal sequins

and you can't get them any more.

But I think we're safe down here,
which is good.

There we are.

There is nothing under there.

It's just hiding yet another
bald bit.

These are the clasps
which she's made, designed...

I think they're old earrings.

Yeah, I can see underneath here,
they're old clip-on earrings,

which is really brilliant.

I'm literally just taking off
the old bits of string that...

..have been knotted on.

And then the clasp should work
on its own,

which would be super.

So there we go.

The earrings are in place,
the clip's where it should be.

One repair done.

It's sequin sewing now.

It's mechanics in miniature
over on Steve's bench,

as he is busy calculating how to get
the 1960s toy car roadworthy again.

I've just got to make up
the wheel bearing.

Which shouldn't be too
difficult to make.

I'm just going to use bushing wire,
and this is used for clock bearings.

So I'm going to put it into my
watchmakers' lathe

and turn it up so that it will
all fit in place.

Almost there.

That's one piece.

Just make sure it
fits onto the wheel.

Good.

I've just got to make the other unit
now, just to hold the linkage,

and then we'll see if it all works.

Meanwhile, Steve's asked Kirsten
to use her colour-matching prowess

on the scratched bodywork.

Although this looks like it's
a sort of metallic grey,

I think it's probably got a little
bit of blue in it as well.

I remember using these paints
many, many years ago.

I used to make up those sort of
model aeroplane kits

and, actually,
I was never interested
in the planes or the boats.

What I actually really loved
was just the painting at the end!

Right. Let's see what
this looks like.

I've turned up the other part
of the linkage, or the drive shaft,

and also made up this bent wire,
which is also part of the linkage,

or drive shaft, as well.

So I need to just pop that on.

It's a bit fiddly.

So the drive shaft, once I've got it
all in place,

will drive the wheels
from the clockwork mechanism.

I'm just going to pop that
in place, there.

Push that in tight.

So if I pop the wheel on...

Just do up the nuts.

Now, that should...

..drive the wheels.

Which it does.

Fantastic.

Always nice when you get something
working when it's been broken

for years and years.

With Kirsten's now-gleaming
paintwork

and Steve's newly-working mechanism,

it's time to rebuild
the Pocket Racer.

Hopefully, it's all just going
to fit together...

..nicely.

Hopefully.

Screw this up.

Just going to put the final
wheel on.

I don't think I'd get a job
on a Formula 1 pit crew.

HE CHUCKLES

Let's see if it works.

Now the fun begins!

I know. I've just finished it.

I'm just going to test it.

Ready? Yeah.

Now that is smooth.
Smooth as an F2 car.

Nice. I think Julian's going to be
made up.

He will be.

Well done, you, man.
Yeah. It was good fun, actually.

Yeah. I'll tell you what. I've done
some research of these cars.

Yeah. Basically, when they came,
they came with a key like that.

Yeah, yeah. And a spanner.

A spanner? Look at that.

Oh, right. That's for changing
the wheels.

That makes it easier. That's right.

So, what I was thinking,

is it possible to make one of those
for him?

Yeah. That'd be good fun.

I'll send you the picture
so you've got a reference.

Brilliant, thank you.
No problem. OK.

As Steve sets about making the final
bespoke accessory for the toy car,

Mark is also in the closing stages
of his repair,

rebuilding the reel-to-reel
tape recorder,

which recorded countless
family get-togethers.

OK. What I'm going to do now is put
the cover, the main top cover,

onto the chassis and just screw
these pieces back together.

Next thing to do, of course, is put
this over the heads like that.

Get the delicate tape.

And there we go.

It's now ready to go to John.

John Mears brought the tape recorder
to The Repair Shop,

desperate to hear his late father's
voice again,

immortalised on
the family recordings.

How are we doing, John? Hiya.

You all right? Hiya, Jay.

Hello, John, nice to see you.
Nice to see you.

How are you feeling?

I'm excited. Yeah? And I've got
a lot of faith.

You've got a lot of faith.
That's good. Yeah.

You haven't even seen it yet!
Let's let him see it.

Ready?

There we go.

Did you say that you used
to accompany your father

on this particular tape
at one point, singing?

There was some of me singing
and playing my guitar

and some of me just singing
without anything at all. OK.

The button's ready for you to
pull forward.

Here we go.

TAPE PLAYS A CHILD'S VOICE
A-ha!

# My old man's a dustman... #

GUITAR PLAYS

CHILD AND ADULT SING

# He wears cor-blimey trousers

# And he lives in a council flat

# He looks a proper 'nana
in his great big hobnail boots

# He's such a job to pull them up,
he calls them daisy roots

# Whoa, my old man's a dustman... #

That's amazing! Yeah?

Absolutely amazing.

So long since I've heard that.

SINGING AND MUSIC CONTINUE

And that's my grandad.

I can remember
that like it was yesterday.

I'm so happy because
I've got nothing of Dad.

You know, just what's here.

I've got no video recordings of him.

You know, nothing. Yeah.

But at least we can all hear
his voice and everything now.

You've got 30 minutes,
probably, of memories there.

Really amazing. Absolutely amazing.

I can't thank you enough.

No. It's been a pleasure.

Thanks so much for bringing back
all the memories for me.

I've enjoyed it immensely.

All the best.
Take care. Bye-bye.

It was great to hear Dad's voice
once again.

Amazing.

And my grandad, I'm really lucky
to have it.

Any time I feel a bit fed up
or missing Mum and Dad,

all I've got to do is put
the tape on

and I can hear them once again

and it'll be
almost like I can touch them.

DUCK QUACKS

The nimble fingers of seamstress
Sara Dennis are restoring

a theatrical costume

worn during the glittering career
of 1950s strong woman Joan Rhodes.

I'm doing the main bulk of the skirt
at the moment, and, as you can see,

there's lots of gaps where
the sequins need to be sewn on.

And, as you can see, they're all
different blues and greens

running into silver.

So I can use those where I'm going
to fade into the silver.

But, up until then, it's just a case
of sewing in patches

of these teal ones for now.

The shiny sequin takes its name

from an old Arabic word for coin.

Sequin dresses first became
fashionable in the 1920s

as the ultimate celebration
of wealth and glamour.

I'm quite lucky because these
sequins have been put on by hand,

so they're not strictly regimented.

So it's much easier for me
to sew them on.

And I'm using a silk thread,
which I've actually knotted

onto a very small needle
so that my thread doesn't show

at all in any of the repairs.

So it's literally a case of putting
a sequin onto your needle,

and put down to the end
and sewing it on.

Quite time-consuming

and a little bit repetitive,

but we'll get there.

It's one of those jobs
where you could just keep going

and going and going,

because, every time you look at it,
there's another little hole.

And Triona said she didn't want
it to look new.

So I've told myself to stop.

Right.

So, obviously, the crotch pieces.

So I've stabilised it with pins now

and I'm just going to use ordinary
sewing thread

and I'm going to sew this
back together.

So I'm doing a ladder stitch,
which should be invisible.

So I'm going to go in and along.

And then go slightly backwards

from where I was before
on the other seam.

And, then, hopefully, you won't see
any of my stitches at all.

I actually have been looking
at the dress and I researched Joan.

She was quite a woman and she did,

she genuinely did look like
Marilyn Monroe.

And there's pictures of her on
the internet picking up men

and ripping up telephone books.

And she was quite a woman.

And I showed it to my daughter
and my daughter said,

"That's the type of woman
I want to be."

So she was obviously quite
an impressive woman.

I think it's an absolutely
incredible story.

I love it. I absolutely love it.

She's so inspiring.

I'd have loved to have met her.

I think she would have been
great fun.

Well, it's safe to say
I don't really

want to see any more green sequins
again for a long time.

I actually went to bed
and dreamt of green sequins.

The chequered flag is in sight
for Steve

on the final stages of his repair

of a 1960s miniature racing car,

crafting a replacement spanner

that originally
accompanied the toy.

I'm just sculpting brass to make
this spanner

so they can take
the wheels off of the car,

or, if they come loose,
they can tighten them up as well.

I think they'll look quite nice.
Better start cutting it out.

Putting the final finish.

Good.

That's all ready for the buffer now.

Beautiful, absolutely lovely.

I love making things like that.

Owner Julian was given the car
when he was ten years old

by his rocket-scientist father.

Now he's back, hoping Steve
has managed to achieve

his very own miracle of engineering.

The racing car's really important
to me,

because, obviously,
it was a favourite childhood toy.

But it's more than that.

It's about, mainly about my dad,
actually.

He was the one who gave it to me,
brings back those memories

of his trips to Europe
and his interest in engineering.

It's all about those memories,
I think.

Hello. Hello, Julian.

Nice to see you again.

Nice to see you. Nice to see you.

I've been looking forward
to this day tremendously.

Happily wondering
what it's going to look like.

Yeah, I'm very looking forward
to this. OK. Go for it, Steve.

Oh, fantastic.

Wow, you've taken me back 50 years,
just like that, actually.

Can I? Yes. Of course you can.

Fabulous!

Steve, you're a genius.

He is, isn't he? Thank you!

Does it work? Oh!

THEY LAUGH

And you found a key?

I found a key.
Can I wind it up for you?

Yes, of course, yeah.

Fantastic!

That is lovely.

Thank you ever so much.

I don't know whether you remember,

but through the research
that Jay did, um,

there used to be a spanner with
it for tightening the wheels.

Oh!

Now you mention it,
yeah, I do remember that.

You do?

Well, I made another one for you.

That's lovely. Thank you.

Wow, a bespoke spanner.

Yes.

Well, that will help this one
not to come off again, won't it?

It will, yes.

Oh, I just can't thank you enough,
actually.

And...

It's just wonderful.

Yeah.

What would your dad think
about you doing all this

and getting it repaired?

He was fairly astounded
that I still had it

and wanted to get it repaired
and he said, "That'll be great."

I can't wait to show him, actually.
Oh, that's going to be so nice.

His memories are, you know, the most
precious thing at the moment.

And I think that will bring back
a lot of his memories as well,

not just, you know, of young family,

but, also, it'll remind him of,
you know, his work,

and, you know, him having to go
abroad and on trips.

And so I think
we're going to have

an enjoyable afternoon
chatting about this.

Fantastic. Brilliant.
I'm really happy.

So, on his behalf, as well,
thank you.

Very, very welcome. Well done, mate.
You've made us both happy.

Thank you for bringing it in.
Bye-bye now. Bye-bye.

Brilliant. Well done, you, man.
Well done. Nice.

Wow, that was really great.

I think what's lovely is that

it's not been renovated back
to brand spanking new

and it feels like we've
kind of aged together.

It looks like a toy of,
you know, of my era,

and, yeah, just feels great,
actually.

Expert seamstress Sara
has been doggedly hand-sewing

hundreds of replacement sequins
onto the strong woman's dress.

In the '50s,

there wouldn't have been that many
shiny Lurexy-type fabrics,

so sequins would been the way
to catch the light,

to draw attention to it.

So that's that repaired.

We're done.

Yes, we're done.

Hopefully, Triona will be really,
really happy with Joan's outfit.

When I brought the dress here,
it was in a terrible condition.

Lots of the sequins had been worn
away or fallen off.

It needed to be given that new life.

And I wanted to have that feel
of her presence in it,

because that's what I cherish
so much.

Hello.

How are you doing?

I'm good, thank you.
Hiya, Triona. Hello, Sara.

Are you excited?
Yeah, I'm really excited.

I didn't think I would be
so excited, but I am.

Yeah. Excited.

OK.

Let's see it.

Wow!
SHE LAUGHS

Oh, look at that.

Oh, I love it. You've...
Oh, wow!

It's a shame.

Do you know the one sadness
I have is

she's not here to see this.

She would have loved it.
Oh, I'm pleased.

Yeah, but...

But, yeah, she would've loved it.

Good. Yeah.

She lives on through all
of us who will remember her

and cherish her memory.

And this is perfect,
absolutely perfect.

Oh, I'm delighted. It's wonderful!

Absolutely...

It's just all sparkles, isn't it?
And she was like that.

She sparkled everywhere, you know?

She lit up a room, so here we go.

She'll light up a room again
when I get this home.

I hope so. Oh, that's wonderful.

Let's let you get this home, then.

There you go.

Thank you very much, guys. Thank you
for bringing it. Absolutely.

Means a lot. Take care now.

Seeing the dress actually
being brought back to life

like that brought back Joan to
life for me,

I felt that she was there.

Just looking at it,
it's so beautiful.

I think Joan would love that.

I think she'd love the fact
that she's still very much here.

Join us again for more
stopped clocks...

So I'm just going to take
the mechanism apart.

..and more unstable tables...

First things first, I need to get
these legs off.

..in The Repair Shop.