Noel and Trevor Shaw have achieved quiet fame as serious collectors of vintage cars, and are the envy of most of us who would like to accumulate a sizeable shed full of vehicles

At the recent Kumeu Classic Car show, I saw the Shaw’s original 1926 Chevrolet Tourer Superior K. Overcome with a sense of history I knew that I had to get closer to it, so using my Garmin GPS device I found my way into the fastnesses of the Shaw kingdom, where I found them converting a huge heap of timber into firewood by means of their vintage David Brown and vintage sawbench, and loading the resultant fuel onto their vintage Chev truck. For old-timers they sure can work.

I knew I was in the right place because of the machinery parked here and there. Clearly these lads don’t just collect vintage Fords and Chevs, if it’s got a wheel at each corner they’re very interested and will find a home — and a use — for it. Men after my own heart.

I went and had a chat to Trevor, who told me the four cylinder ohv motor was a typically Chevrolet cross-flow, and had exposed pushrods But this is a pretty advanced version of Chevrolet’s famous ohv motors — it wears a valve gear cover. The earlier ones had exposed everything, valve springs, rockers and camshaft as well as the exposed pushrods. No doubt allowing easy access for the thoughtful owner/driver to squirt oil everywhere at intervals.

Early History

The early history of this car is not known in any depth. It was bought and used by a Dargaville family — the second owners — in 1929. They must have kept squirting that oil, because they’re reputed to have used it steadily until the mid ’50s. We’re talking 20-something years, and that wasn’t unusual in those days when cars weren’t seen as an item of personal adornment, they were there to be useful and treated accordingly.

I remember that decade very well, it marked my transition from youth to adulthood. By the end of it I was living in Northland, and knew Dargaville, Kaikohe and Kaitaia very fondly. In the North, working cars weren’t spoilt with new coats of paint, a fancy retrim or even big fluffy dice. Radios (valve) and chrome rear vision door mirrors were okay though — not that our Chev has either.

At some stage in the next decade or two it was parked up for the last time, changed hands once and finally came to Trevor a bit over a year ago, and all he’s done is get it running. That was a bit of a task because it had been dead for a couple of decades, he thinks. A mate of the Shaw brothers, Peter McKenzie, had it at Iron Park — a sort of museum set up in Helensville — and they’d known that it was there for about 17 years.

Iron Park was auctioned and Trevor (the Chev collector) went to get this car. He comments that it was something he had to have, and would probably have paid whatever he had to. I think (the Shaw brothers don’t tell you what they don’t need to) that I know what he paid, and think it very reasonable. However he couldn’t drive it home, so there’s always that unknown fiscal gap bridging the space between delirious pleasure and deep despair. These two seem as happy as crickets, so it must have been a very sound old girl.

It was given a valve grind, and everything mechanical was checked for free movement. The petrol tank was full of some very murky stuff — rather tar-like, and the vacuum tank needed repairs. They also did the wheel bearings, rewired the loom and sorted the rather primitive rear wheel brakes and so on, and found that — probably thanks to simplicity of design — it was in a state of suspended animation rather than rigor mortis. You’ll notice from the photographs that simplicity is the keyword here, so freeing everything, firing her up and having your first drive was probably finished by smoko.

At 16kW (21.7hp) they don’t have as much power as Henry’s products — which is what brother Noel collects — but you didn’t buy either of them for GP performance, they were workhorses.

Amazing Patina

I asked Trevor, “What are you going to do to it?” suspecting that I already knew the answer, which came back to me firmly and promptly, “Nothing, it’ll never ever be restored!” Clearly he believes in immortality, but then so do I.
It would be a sin to restore this car, there wouldn’t be many totally original ’20s Chevrolets in the world — and they made lots and lots of them, definably and distinctly products of the United States of America. Everything appears to have been left as it left the factory, albeit with an amazing patina coming from 82 years of Chevrolet life and living.

The front guards and bonnet have large areas of patchy bareness revealing here and there what appears to be bare metal showing through the original undercoat/ primer and colour coat — which can be seen as green, mostly, but you have to see the whole car to pick that green. Probably it’s the doors, which being vertical have retained the colour best, and they save the day. The strange thing was that it didn’t seem to be heading for terminal rust — partly I presume because it’s been kept in sheds all its life to date. Although that said, the Kiwi shed is usually made of corrugated iron, and that offers lots of condensation. I guess maybe the steel is better and it’s taken all this time to get down to the bare metal, so how will they save it in the future?

However, the top and the seats are definitely only holding together by habit. Very tatty, so I’m not sure Trevor will be able to hold to his oath that she will never be restored. Since sooner or later material gives it away.
In the shed, next to this car, are a couple of other prized collectibles. A lovely Chev Roadster from the same era and an immaculate Ford T, in gleaming black and brass.

I too am firmly convinced that this car must be left in this (rather tatty) state.

On The Road

Trevor’s driven the car quite a bit in the 12 months since he got it, and comments that like all rear-wheel braked cars you need to drive with lots of anticipation. These rear brakes include an internal brake on the inside of the two rear drums running off the handbrake, and footbrakes functioning on the outside of the drums.

The three-speed gearbox is the classic crash ’box of the period, and young people who have not learned to double declutch on a crash ’box need the experience to enhance their qualifications — not to mention self esteem. However, I do think that the real skill lies in driving on these sorts of brakes in modern traffic, and that’s what sorts the men from the boys.

This model saw Chevs move to full elliptic springs with the axle mid-mounted — the earlier ones were half elliptic with one end attached to the chassis, and the other to the axle. The effect was to give them a strange gait so that they became known as ‘grasshoppers’, but whichever system was used these early vintage, leaf-springed cars didn’t compare well to later coil and damped suspensions. Consequently, there’s no doubt that driving the cars from yesteryear is a very different experience for the new generations of petrol-heads coming on — used to a great deal more sophistication than the cars of the ’20s and even the cars of the ’30s can provide.

Let’s be honest, some of them were pigs in almost every facet. Nevertheless, there are large crowds turning out every time there is a display of these old girls, and year after year people pay substantial money to own them — and usually even more money to restore them.

Original is good!

Louis Chevrolet

In 1911 WC Durant started making a car with the help of Louis Chevrolet, who had some fame as a racing driver. The first motor was a 4.9-litre side-valve six, then came a smaller version. However, 1916 saw them putting out the 2.7-litre overhead valve four, which was a big success, and this is the motor we’re talking about here — Chevrolet’s first ohv motor and very popular — 70,000 a year! It was the grandfather, of course, of Chevrolet’s justly famous ohv six — The Cast Iron Wonder. That drew GM’s attention, and it acquired Chevrolet in 1917. Interestingly, by 1931 Chevrolet was outselling Ford, and by and large stayed that way over the next couple of decades.

Words & Photos: Penn McKay