it started with one rivet, and ended up costing 1 million British pounds

A joke 40th birthday present led to Martin Phillips setting out to achieve his boyhood dream.

Martin had talked about restoring a Spitfire fighter aircraft for so many years that his friends finally clubbed together to buy him his first piece.

But it wasn't a propeller, wing or engine which set the £2.5m project rolling. It was a tiny "pop rivet" — suspended on a string in a huge cardboard box.

Now, some 13 years later, the 53-year-old businessman from Exeter has not only completed the mission of rebuilding the heroic Battle of Britain fighter plane but also realised his dream of seeing the Second World War aircraft take to the sky once more.

Mr Phillips spent years of his life meticulously restoring the iconic fighter plane to its former glory in his Langford warehouse, outside his home in Newton St Cyres, near Exeter.

He has travelled the world in a desperate search for spare parts, expert knowledge and inspiration – although one of its wings comes from a Spitfire which crashed near Exeter Airport and lay for decades in a hedge near a pub until it was salvaged. Mr. Phillips sourced the main fuselage from a scrapyard in South Africa,

http://www.exeterexpressandecho.co.uk/Martin-s-Spitfire-returns-sky/story-18013935-detail/story.html



photos from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2270031/Businessman-spent-1m-restoring-Spitfire-scrapyard-10-years-ago-sees-fly-again.html