Coachbuilding and Panel Fabrication Christchurch.

Coachbuilding is a dying trade in New Zealand. Autobody & Glass Repairs in Belfast is one of the few Canterbury workshops still doing it properly. Custom panel fabrication, hand-formed metalwork, aluminium and fibreglass body work, all done in-house. Darryl Froom trained as a coachbuilder through New Zealand Railways in the 1970s and has spent 40+ years on the craft. From vintage car restorations to bus body rebuilds, classic motorhome conversions and one-off custom panels, every coachbuilt job that comes through this workshop gets the trade's full attention. When others tell you it's a write-off, this is the workshop you bring it to.

Most modern panel shops have one approach for damage. Replace the part. Order a panel from a catalogue, bolt it on, paint over the gaps. That works for late-model vehicles where the parts exist. It fails on anything older than ten years, on classics, on coachbuilt motorhomes, on buses, on horse floats, on anything bespoke.

Catalogue parts don't exist for a 1960s Holden quarter panel. Or a coachbuilt 1980s motorhome side wall. Or the curved rear corner of a vintage bus. When the part doesn't exist, the modern panel shop tells the owner "it's a write-off" or sources a poor-fitting imitation and bills the job out anyway. The result is a vehicle that doesn't look right, doesn't sit right, and loses value as soon as the new panel goes on.

Autobody & Glass Repairs has served Canterbury since 1999. Family run from one workshop in Belfast with an 18-metre heated spray booth and a four-metre fabrication bench. Darryl Froom holds a coachbuilding trade qualification through New Zealand Railways, where he started at sixteen and learnt the craft over years. The same hand-formed metalwork, aluminium body work and timber-frame techniques he learnt then still go into every coachbuilt job today.

Custom panels fabricated to fit, not bolted on from a catalogue. Factory colour-match paint mixed on site. Every job in-house with no subcontracting out. Every coachbuilt job comes with a free quote, honest turnaround timeline, and no surprises on the invoice. Custom work takes time, but you'll know what time before we start. Servicing Belfast, Christchurch, Kaiapoi, Rangiora, Rolleston, Lincoln, Lyttelton, Halswell, Hornby, Riccarton, Papanui, North Canterbury and Mid Canterbury, plus coachbuilding work from across New Zealand for vehicles other shops can't source parts for.