Local Oval
When Paul Renney heard about a totally original and unmolested 1957 Volkswagen Beetle for sale locally, he thought it all sounded a bit too good to be true. Yet when he went to see it, the time warp survivor that stood in front of him turned out to be even better than he imagined, and caused him to re-think his ideas for what he wanted to do with it.
His original idea of a hot motor, a colour change and a few tasty modifications was soon ditched in favour of a sympathetic restoration.
48-year-old Paul first became involved in the air-cooled VW scene at 16, a passion many of his school friends conveniently shared, too.
“I was already attending VW shows with my father, and I managed to buy my first Bug, a ’71 1200 Deluxe, just before my 17th birthday in 1990,” he remembers. “I restored that car with a Cal Look style, and showed it over the next 10 years.” Its final outing under Paul’s ownership would be to The VolksWorld Show in 2000, where the ’71 found a new buyer and was subsequently exported to Guernsey.
“Once I’d sold that car, I set my heart on finding an Oval Window Beetle to replace it,” Paul recalls. “It had to be
