I may have told this before. In the 70s a bloke that lived near me had a Lotus Cortina that he idolized and was forever polishing it but hardly ever drove it.
One day someone nicked it and crashed it in a hedgerow, it was an easy repair (front wing and NS door) however the owner was heartbroken and stuck it in a lockup for about a year up the back of the council estate where I lived at the time.
I forgot about it until he approached me asking if I wanted it, I had loads of Escorts/Cortina's kicking about and wasn't realy interested but said ok and gave him less than £100 for it as he wanted it out of the way.
It sat down the side of the garage for ages and one day George Polley phoned me up and said had I got a running twincam for sale as he wanted to fit it in an Escort for stage rallies, so I flogged him the engine and as the car was now a non runner and taking up room I scrapped it !!!!
Hindsight