David Royle spent months repairing a 26-year-old car after he bought it for £40 - but it launched him into a new career and led to a successful business.

The 1930 Standard Avon Special he bought 50 years ago for £20 down and £1 a month launched a vehicle restoration company he still runs at Staindrop, near Barnard Castle.

"It was in such poor condition that it took a friend 18 hours to drive it 250 miles from London to Darlington, but once I got it into shape it gave me six years of reliable motoring," Mr Royle said yesterday as he celebrated his 50th anniversary.

At first, he was too young to drive the car, but soon gained his licence.

He restored and sold a series of other cars, including Lagondas and Singers, before buying an old school in Staindrop in 1973 and turning the hall and classrooms into specialist workshops.

Since then, he and his team have restored more than 800 vintage vehicles, putting them back into original showroom condition for clients from all over the world.

"I wanted that first car so I could tow a sailing boat to the Lake District, but I didn't realised it would start me on a career that is still keeping me busy 50 years later," he said. "It has been an interesting half-century."

The most expensive renovation, costing more than £400,000, was on a 1972 Rolls Royce Phantom Vl with some solid silver fittings which was later sold for £2.1m.

While restoring another Rolls Royce for a Saudi prince, he found a cache of drugs inside and handed it to the police. It had been hidden by drug smugglers when the car was shipped from Morocco to London.

A replica of a 1911 Armstrong Whitworth limousine was built for Beamish Museum and has been used to ferry visitors around the grounds for a decade.

Mr Royle said: "Some of the work is extremely expensive because we have to be so meticulous and many of the cars are large."