who we are at red castle classics
Redcastle Classics has two members of staff – Brian Gunney and Simon Gunney.
Brian Gunney (Simon’s father) set up the business many years ago, focusing on Mercedes primarily. Brian’s car background goes back to being involved in the preparation of both Lotus Cortinas and Escort Twin Cams for rallying back in the 60’s. The day job saw him working at probably Cardiff’s main specialist car dealer of the time, where Lotus, Alfas, Astons to name but a few were an everyday occurrence. A spell running a mainstream garage saw him run a string of interesting cars, including a 1960 356B Super 90 Porsche as daily drivers! A number of classic cars were rebuilt during the evenings as a hobby, including an early Marcos, Sunbeam Talbot and a very early Escort Twin Cam. Then in 1989, Brian bought two Mercedes 190SLs that were in a dire state having arrived from Ghana of all places. Over the coming years, both were rebuilt into complete cars and it was at this point that people started asking for him to rebuild and maintain other classic Mercedes – and the hobby became the day job! Since 1989, Brian has worked on a significant number of 190SL’s in the UK, completing full restorations on upwards of 20 of them!
Despite working on old cars all day, Brian still finds time to have a couple of classics at home including a replica of the works lightweight 190SL.
Brian specialises in the mechanical and structural bodyshell repairs.
Simon Gunney was pretty much destined to have an interest in cars! After successfully completing an apprenticeship with Cardiff University Mechanical Engineering department, he undertook a small number of non automotive engineering posts. Evenings were spent restoring two Mercedes Fintail saloons (one of which he still has, nearly 15 years later!). His automotive tastes then took on a Latin flavour, with Simon purchasing a very rusty UK right hand drive Guilia spider. The car, which had spent ten years outside with the roof off, was, as I’m sure you can guess, very rusty, but after twelve months of hard work, the shell was finished even if the majority of it had to be fabricated from scratch! The finished car was a regular prize winner at Alfa Romeo events and was eventually joined by a hot rod Guilia Spider with a 2.0 engine installed! These were both recently sold and funded the purchase of a ’96 355 Ferrari.....
Simon specialises in the bodywork refinishing.