Perched high up before the hills behind Richmond, Nelson, is a workshop with stunning views over Tasman Bay, the Waimea Plains and beyond to the Arthur Range. Difficult to get to but well worth the effort, it’s the home of Heyward Rods and Restorations.

Lloyd Heyward started an apprenticeship in 1962 as a ‘bodybuilder in wood’, mostly building caravans and truck decks. After a year he was told he was now a panel-beater, rather than a bodybuilder in wood, which was fine with him. This was back when the panel-beating trade could still involve working with wooden framing, and accident damage was repaired because replacement parts were difficult or impossible to come by.

An Australian hot rodder who joined the company gave Lloyd a stack of Hot Rod magazines in the original small format. Lloyd devoured their contents and was soon modifying the engines and bodies of his cars. He joined the Kustoms Club based in Christchurch, and several members suggested he should start a club in Nelson, so he formed the Nelson City Rod & Custom Club in about 1972.

Lloyd was also modifying cars for other people, and the business slowly evolved from a one-man panel shop into a multi-skilled restoration and modification enterprise. It now comprises Lloyd and his son, Graham, plus a full time painter of 30 years experience, Alastar Donaldson, and a part-time panel-beater, Ken Laws. Ken is also an artist, who produces top-quality stainless steel sculptures.

These days Lloyd handles most of the minor assembly and detailing. As the elder statesman of the business he has earned the right to leave the heavier work to others, although he still does welding and panel work when he feels like it. Graham runs the business, answers the telephone, talks to customers, orders parts and arranges outwork. He also gets involved in panel work and whatever else needs doing, and did most of the painting before they employed Alastar.

Wood ’n’ Carr

On leaving school, Graham trained as a cabinet-maker before heading off for several stints overseas. He drove combine harvesters and trucks in America among other jobs, and worked for Wood ’n’ Carrs for a while. This US company specialises in producing automotive woodwork, and Graham gained experience that was to prove valuable later. Permanently back home in Richmond in 2002, he went into business with Lloyd, who has passed his knowledge on to his son. Graham has been exceptionally quick at picking up the old ways, and it’s comforting to know that Lloyd’s exceptional skills have been passed to such safe and steady hands for the benefit of the old car hobby.

The Heywards turn out what must be some of the best engineered and finished vehicles around, from hot rods to modified street cars to rare and valuable classics. The proof is evident, not just in the vehicles they have completed for customers, but also in Lloyd’s personal car, a tastefully modified 1959 Plymouth Sport Fury. They were responsible for the stunning restoration and mechanical upgrade of the 1949 Ford Woody wagon that NZCC featured a couple of years back, and they have excelled themselves with the latest project for the same customer, John Graham.

John and his wife, Sandy, are Americans by birth and have been part-time Kiwis by preference for some years. John has business interests in the States, so they spend part of each year in Montana (during our winter, understandably). John bought an accident-damaged 1948 Chrysler Town and Country convertible from an insurance company in 2002 during one of their Stateside sojourns.

Although it was a mess, he knew it was rare – one of 380 survivors, or 195 depending on the source – and worthy of restoration. He shipped it to their New Zealand home and started the search for a donor car.

Sacrificial Saratoga

He contacted a vintage car yard in Montana, which rang two weeks later to say it had seen a 1948 Saratoga for sale at a Ford dealer in Missoula, for $1500. John immediately drove 250km to Missoula and bought the car, beating another buyer by minutes. He knew it was a shame to cut up a perfectly good Saratoga but, as he said, “It was going to a higher purpose and the proper words were said over the car prior to its demise.”

When John asked Lloyd whether they could repair the Chrysler, Lloyd blithely said that anything could be repaired, but his heart sank when the container arrived and they dragged the car out.

It had been hit by a Toyota driven by two teenagers speeding through a Florida stop sign at 100kph. The body was bent like a banana, the transmission was destroyed, the driveshaft had been shorn off the differential and the back axle assembly was bent. Lloyd thought the driver must have died, but not so, although he was supposedly left with an imprint of the horn button in his chest. He kept the button as a souvenir when the car was sold.

The chassis and floor pan were pretty much bent beyond repair. John supplied the Saratoga with apologies – it was in such good condition that the Heywards believe they could have had it in driveable condition within a day. However, the customer is always right so they pressed on. As well as its chassis and floor pan, the Saratoga gave up its bonnet and front mudguards, most of its running gear and innumerable small parts such as nuts and bolts, dash knobs and so on.

Despite Graham’s experience with automotive wood, they farmed out the woodwork to Neville Rhodes of Marton because they couldn’t justify the expense of a finger jointer to replicate the joins in the Chrysler’s woodwork. Having agreed to take on the job, Neville found it almost impossible to shape timber to fit a car several hundred kilometres away, so the Chrysler was shipped to him.

Neville supplied the wooden parts in a rough machine finish. It was then up to Graham to do the final trimming and fitting, which proved to be more involved than it sounds. Several telephone calls to the United States were needed to check some of the measurements. Then the timber had to be sanded before 10 coats of varnish were applied.

Vinyl Mahogany

The pale timber is American white ash. The dark ‘mahogany’ panels are not timber at all. They are made of steel and coated with a stick-on vinyl material. As Graham commented, they are covered with Duraseal, like school books. On Town and Country models to 1946 the dark panels were real timber, but the cost of making such complex shapes must have been prohibitive. It’s easy to understand why Chrysler ‘cheated’, and it must have been in the early days of such self-adhesive plastic materials. Even so, Town and Country Chryslers were very expensive. At US$3395 they were dearer than most Cadillacs, twice the price of a Plymouth convertible and three times as dear as a Ford sedan.

While Neville was busy with the timber, Lloyd and Graham carried on with the rest of the car. They struck a few problems, including the fact that the Saratoga’s chassis outriggers for the body mounts were different to the convertible. This meant the outriggers had to be swapped or re-made as required, but at least the holes in the floor pan lined up.

The original worn-out engine was fully reconditioned. It had to be retained so that the car’s numbers matched. The Saratoga’s bellhousing, gearbox, driveshaft and back axle were stripped and refurbished as required. A mixture of Saratoga and Town and Country brakes was also rebuilt and installed. The two cars being built in the same year simplified things – the Town and Country was part of the New Yorker series, which used many of the same parts as the Saratoga. Major parts such as the gearbox were not stamped with numbers, so the use of Saratoga items created no authenticity issues.

The die-cast parts, such as the grille and taillight housings, were sent to Gisborne Electroplaters to be re-chromed, while the bumpers and other parts were done by Geoff Andrews of Shiny Bits in Geraldine. Max Wildermoth of Christchurch repaired the stainless steel trim pieces and other small shiny parts, while Tony Mackle and Rob Jackson handled the upholstery. Rob reckoned the electric hood was no more difficult to re-cover than a Volkswagen Golf hood. A replica fabric-wrapped wiring loom was sourced from America.

There’s a lot of wood in the Chrysler. Stripped to its basics, the floor pan and firewall are steel, as are the mudguards and bonnet. The rest of the structure is wooden with steel infill panels. It was a labour-intensive car to build originally and of course it took a lot of labour to restore.

Town and Country Range

The first Town and Country was a station wagon, introduced in 1941. By 1946 it was a three-car range of six and eight cylinder sedans and a convertible, but no wagon. Seven hardtops were also built in 1946. The eight cylinder sedan was discontinued during 1946 after 100 were built, and the six cylinder version ended in 1948, leaving only the convertible. The last convertible was produced in 1949, the first year of Chrysler’s true post war cars.

Despite its high asking price, the Chrysler Town and Country convertible sold quite well. With a total run of 8368 from 1946 to 1948, it easily outsold the much cheaper Ford Sportsman woody convertible.

Chrysler marketed the Town and Country as a ‘land yacht’. One wonders what it was thinking but its marketers must have felt it gave the car a suitably up-market image. Obviously they ignored the connotations of ponderous handling and leisurely cruising speeds. Indeed, Chrysler made it clear to owners that their new car had nautical-type maintenance requirements. They were to keep the timber joins free of dirt, and re-varnish the timber every six months.

Needless to say, few owners followed these instructions and John’s car, when he bought it, was a good example of the results. Patches had been inserted to replace rotted timber and there was plenty of splitting and evidence of more rot. Graham Heyward says the car was a tidy driver before the accident, but they also found bodged steel repairs during its restoration.

Maiden Voyage

The trip down the mountain and across the Waimea Plains was the Chrysler’s maiden voyage. Although the engine was still tight, the big car accelerated briskly and everything worked as it should.

Graham initially had a little difficulty with the ‘Fluid Drive’ system, which apparently is normal. Nelson’s Sunday morning traffic almost came to a standstill as the Chrysler cruised by, and it’s a wonder there were no accidents as drivers craned their necks for a better view. What most of them couldn’t experience was the smooth, powerful exhaust note that’s unique to straight eights.

We were heading for Russ Sawmills, where the owner, Grant Russ, met us with his two beautiful black 1948 Chryslers, a New Yorker and a Windsor. Grant’s cousin, Murray, kindly allowed us to take over his adjoining firewood yard for a couple of hours as well. Grant has owned the New Yorker for 10 years. It was originally imported by a farmer in the Rotorua area who had the necessary overseas funds to buy it, thanks to booming wool sales during the Korean War. It was then used for weddings and other chauffeuring duties until Grant bought it.

Grant’s father bought the Windsor when Grant was seven years old. After many years of family use it was parked on blocks until Grant decided to restore it. The Windsor has a flathead six engine, while the New Yorker has a straight eight and is the same as the Town and Country under the skin. The eight cylinder cars have a longer wheelbase to accommodate the longer engine. All three have Chrysler’s ‘Fluid Drive’ semi-automatic transmission which uses a torque converter instead of a flywheel. The gearbox has four speeds in two ranges. A clutch is used to select first gear (low range) initially. A flick of the gear lever changes the transmission to second gear, and the clutch is used again to select third (or first gear in the high range), after which the lever selects fourth.

Sailing Away

Sadly, New Zealand’s only 1948 Town and Country convertible has left our shores. Just two days after we visited the workshop with the million-dollar view the car was carefully stowed in a container and dispatched to America. John sent some photos of the Chrysler in its beautiful new home in Montana, where it keeps company with a few other desirable classics. Still, at least we know it was here for seven years and restored by local expertise.

John says, “My hat truly goes off to the Heywards for their honesty and perseverance in completing this project for me. This car has a piece of my heart with it and I will enjoy the workmanship that the Heywards have put into it for many years to come, and who knows, maybe some day I may return it to New Zealand where it was surgically brought back from the dead.”

1948 Chrysler Town and Country Convertible – Specifications

Engine Eight-cylinder in line, water-cooled
Capacity 5300cc
Bore/ stroke 82x124mm
Comp ratio 6.7:1
Valves L-head
Max power 100kW at 3400rpm
Max torque 366Nm at 1600rpm
Transmission Four-speed ‘Fluid Drive’ semi-automatic with ‘Safety Clutch’
Suspension (F/R) Independent with coil springs/ solid axle with semi-elliptic leaf springs
Brakes Drums front and rear
Wheels/ tyres Steel wheels, 7.10×15-inch tyres

Dimensions:
Wheelbase 3238mm
Overall length 5944mm
Width 2007mm
Height 1778mm
Weight 2089kg

Performance:
Top speed 140kph
Avg fuel cons 18.9l/100km
Production 2936 (1948), 8368 (1946-48)

Words and Photos: Gordon Campbell

This article is fron NZ Classic Car issue 238. Click here to check it out.

Kaikoura’s Dick Appleyard admits that his favourite car is the Studebaker, in particular this outstanding 1924 Studebaker Light Six.

Dick and his wife, Trish, participate in as many VCC events as possible and enjoy driving their old Studebaker, especially on long trips such as the recent VCC South Island Easter Rally in Gore followed by a nine-day Veteran/ Vintage tour via Invercargill, Bluff, Catlins, Southland, Otago, South Canterbury, Canterbury and back to Kaikoura. Interestingly, most of that tour was on farm roads, forest tracks, secondary roads, shingle and even the Old Dunstan Road (sign says not suitable for cars and it is closed during the winter – this road was used to transport gold from Central Otago to Dunedin in the gold mining era). The total trip, Kaikoura to Kaikoura, was just on 3000km with 459 litres of petrol guzzled – and was a real buzz according to Dick.

Since purchasing the Studebaker, Dick has clocked up a respectable 48,000km of thoroughly enjoyable and memorable driving and, as you would expect, he has complete confidence and faith in this old car and considers it virtually bullet-proof and extremely comfortable to drive.

Dick is also a keen supporter of the Studebaker Drivers’ Club NZ – which currently has up to 200 members, mostly owning more modern, V8-powered models. However, the club welcomes older models driven by older-model drivers.

Working Life

Dick Appleyard was born in 1942 and, after attending Christchurch Technical College, started his apprenticeship as a motor mechanic in 1958 at Scott’s Garage, situated in Gloucester Street opposite the end of New Regent Street, Christchurch. He graduated in 1962 with an Advanced Trade Certificate.

Dick recalls that there were only two towing firms in Christchurch at that time, pride of the fleet at Scotts was a 1936 Diamond T tow truck. He drove this truck a number of times and thought it was a real pleasure. Diamond Ts were built in Chicago and were renowned as very high quality vehicles. In the early ’60s this old truck had reputably been around the clock 10 times (over one million miles or 1.6 million kilometres) and was still fitted with its original side-valve six-petrol engine. However, age was catching up on the old girl and it was decided to fit another engine. A second-hand GMC engine was purchased and fitted, but the truck was never the same again. Not long after this, she was on sold and, following a few others owners, the truck can now be seen at Richardson’s Truck Museum in Invercargill. For Dick, it was great to see her again during a recent rally down south – he says she still looks the same as when he last saw her nearly 50 years ago, the only thing missing being the original signwriting.

From 1973 to 1992 Dick owned and operated a Christchurch garage and service station business and was involved with Peter and PG Knight in power boat racing into the late ’70s and ’80s. Dick then moved on to NZAA Sydenham where he was mainly involved in carrying out compliancing of overseas imports before eventual retirement in 2005, when he and Trish moved to Kaikoura, demolishing their old bach and building a new home.

Dick’s Studebaker

Dick purchased our featured 1924 Studebaker Light Six Three-Seater roadster from Alwyn Hoskins of Invercargill in 1991, Alwyn having purchased the car from David Lockhart in 1989, who had restored it in Outram, a small town west of Dunedin, around 1974, according to Dick’s research on the car.

There were, in fact, three six-cylinder options on offer from Studebaker during the period 1918 to 1928, the Light Six, Special Six and Big Six. During this period Studebaker also offered no less than 13 individual models ranging from the Three-Passenger Roadster to the Seven-Passenger Big Six Sedan.

The Studebaker Light Six was introduced in 1918 and was produced through until 1927. In 1924 the Light Six was renamed the Studebaker Standard Six, and whilst they represented value for money as the lowest-cost Studebakers on the market they were still offered in an extensive variety of body styles during their production period. In 1927 the model was renamed again as the Studebaker Standard Six Dictator in preparation for the 1928 model, which was to be named the Studebaker Dictator.

Studebaker’s mid-range model was known as the Studebaker Special Six and was built from 1918 to 1927. Like its less expensive cousin, the Special Six was also offered in many body styles including a roadster, touring, four-passenger coupé and sedan. It was renamed the Special Six Commander in 1927.

Rounding off the trio was the Big Six, which also commenced production in 1918 and lasted until 1926. It was eventually renamed in 1927, becoming the Studebaker President, and was the most luxurious and largest of the Studebaker models during that period. Up until 1920 though, the Big Six could only be purchased as a four-door touring vehicle, as this was the most popular body style for vehicles at this time. It wasn’t until the start of 1921 that the price of ‘enclosed’ vehicles became affordable, and buyers began to appreciate the advantage of both closed and semi-closed passenger compartments and a wide variety of body styles became available.

Reviving the Studebaker

Unfortunately, when Dick got his hands on this Studebaker roadster it wasn’t in terribly great shape and required more than a little tender loving care.

For starters, reliability was somewhat of an issue as the mechanicals were completely original and unrestored. Overheating was a major issue – fairly easily cured by replacing the radiator core. Dick also recalls that the engine was still running heavy, boasting cast-iron pistons with plenty of audible piston slap and, following a disastrous Easter Rally to Timaru – where a valve rocker decided to vacate the engine through the side of the sump – a major overhaul was carried out, including a rebore, shaft grind, re-metalled bearings and stainless-steel exhaust valves. Reliability was improving, however, the driveline consisted of three fabric universal joints, one between the clutch and gearbox and two on the driveshaft. The clutch coupling was sorted by making up a coupling with neoprene/ steel-backed bushes and the driveshaft was replaced with one from a Super Snipe, with Hardy Spicer joints. The only other outstanding issue remaining was the car’s poor brakes, only fitted on the rear, and which Dick reckons were dubious at best and downright scary in the wet. This was improved by having new brake drums made up by Don Bennetts, and bonded linings supplied by Safe R Brakes.

At this point Dick also decided to tackle the gearbox, which was stripped and rebuilt with better seals. The differential was also in poor shape, and a diff head from a Big Six Studebaker was purchased, rebuilt and fitted. This resulted in higher gearing which, says Dick, means the car is marginally slower uphill but gives the advantage of lower engine revs when cruising.

The Studebaker is equipped with 23-inch wheels which, as standard, make for an overall wheel/tyre diameter of 32 inches. The two new Dunlop 32-inch by 4.5-inch tyres that came with the car when Dick bought it, are now fitted on the front. He also thought a new pair on the rear would be a good idea due to the poor brakes, and decided to increase the width to five inches, which resulted in the diameter going up to 33 inches with more rubber on the road. The Studebaker was already angled downwards in the front, so in order to level the car up, Dick lowered the rear, which resulted in lighter steering. Dick reckons he’s not getting any younger and the steering was a bit heavy, so he needs all the help he can get.

Rallying the Studebaker

Dick was fully aware that there would be plenty of shingle, complete with corrugations, on the Veteran/ Vintage Tour mentioned previously – and wisely chose to install a new set of telescopic shock absorbers to the rear as, in its original set-up, the Studebaker was inclined to get a bit skittery, jumping sideways, resulting in bad doses of axle tramp. Dick had to fabricate new brackets top and bottom to support the new shocks, which give a firmer ride but cured the above problems. Things were going well on the tour until they reached the Old Dunstan Road – Dick was certain the river beds would have been in better condition, though bare rock, huge holes and large pools of water disguising all manner of unseen hazards finally took their toll. As it turned out, the springs held up with no problems. However, the time and effort Dick spent making the shock brackets was lost when both top brackets broke.

Since the tour, Dick has fabricated stronger brackets and is looking forward to testing them out on a trip with the Studebaker Driver’s Club to Punakaiki on the West Coast this September.

After all his work on the Studebaker, including some steering adjustments, the only problems remaining involved several oil leaks – the original oil seals being mostly made from felt. This was overcome by fitting neoprene seals and Dick can now can park on concrete driveways with confidence of not leaving behind tell-tale evidence of the car’s presence.

Actually, this reminded Dick of a bumper sticker he noticed on a Model T Ford at the Bay to Birdwood Rally he and Trish attended (in a modern car) late last year. That rally attracts nearly 2000 trucks, cars and motorbikes up to 1955 vintage and is held bi-annually with later model classic cars every second year between. The rally starts in Adelaide and travels 60km to Birdwood through the picturesque Adelaide Hills. The bumper sticker Dick saw read – “Old cars don’t leak oil, they just mark their territory.”

Birdwood is home of the Australian National Car Museum, and over the road from a shop called Bills Bikes and Bits, which is packed full of second-hand motorbike parts. Dick got talking to Bill and he invited them out the back to where he had a large collection of old speedway bikes. Bill had recently been to New Zealand and ridden at Invercargill, Wanganui and Christchurch, and claimed to have one of Ivan Mauger’s bikes in his collection.

The Studebaker’s Companions

As members of the Vintage Car Club (Canterbury Branch) and the Studebaker Drivers’ Club, Dick and Trish regularly take part in most rallies. The old Studebaker cruises at 50mph (80kph) on the open road, is very comfortable and easy to drive and, best of all, is now mechanically strong and reliable.

Dick also has two other old cars tucked away in his garage awaiting attention – a 1935 De Soto Airstream and a 1936 Austin 10 Sherbourne, the latter being owned by him for 40 years. Trish drove the Austin 10 for many years and would take their two children to school in it, which they disliked immensely, ducking their heads down so their schoolmates couldn’t see them. However, over the 40 years the little

Austin has proved to be extremely reliable and has never let them down. The De Soto has had virtually no use in 30 years and is surplus to requirements, so will probably be sold.

Also tucked away in the garage is a TEA Ferguson Tractor. The governor on the old Fergie was faulty and throttle control has been modified to do away with the governor completely. Dick’s currently on the look-out for a gullible driver to pilot the Fergie on a Kaikoura Land Speed Record attempt (Fergie Class) – just joking! Handling at speed is hazardous to say the least. Anyway, a requirement of living in Kaikoura is to have a Fergie tucked away in the shed!

1924 Studebaker Light Six – Specifications

Engine: Inline six-cylinder
Capacity: 3394c
Valves: Two valves per cylinder
Bore/Stroke: 79 x 113mm
C/R: 4.38:1
Max power: 29kW
Fuel system: Stromberg carburettor
Transmission: Three-speed ‘crash’ gearbox
Suspension: F/R – Semi-floating
Steering: Worm and gear
Brakes: 14-inch brakes – handbrake internal, service external, rear  wheels only

Words: Ashley Webb Photos: Adam Croy

This article if from NZ Classic Car issue 249. Click here to check it out.

Chopped apart in the ’50s and used as a milk can-carrying utility, this Packard has been returned to its original form after a truly challenging restoration.

Looking back through automotive history, the Packard had arguably the most legendary beginning of any car. It all started when James Ward Packard, a respected mechanical engineer, purchased a Winton in 1898. Alexander Winton had a reputation for quality built, high-speed cars but, as luck would have it, the one he sold to Packard must have been a lemon, because on its first road trip the new car spluttered, stalled, and finally quit altogether.

Packard was not a man to take this lightly and returned his new car to its builder, which consequently led to a furious argument. At the height of the verbal battle, Winton challenged Packard to build a better car. James Ward Packard not only accepted the challenge, but also went to work immediately, and within one year, he and his brother, William Dowd Packard, started a new automobile company based in Warren, Ohio. Their first model was a single-cylinder, buggy-type vehicle, but much larger engines and advanced, stylish body designs followed rapidly.

The business was originally named the Ohio Automobile Company, but in 1902 was renamed the Packard Motor Car Company when fresh investors came on board. The Packard brothers were determined to build a quality and dependable car, proving them by entering their robust machines in various endurance tests, winning many cross-country reliability runs. However, their early fame was secured with an all-out racing model named the Grey Wolf. This machine – a four-cylinder speedster with an aluminium body – appeared in 1904 and set many records, but its greatest triumph was placing fourth in the 1904 Vanderbilt Cup race. Incidentally, the Grey Wolf, in full racing trim, was available in quantity to the public, a policy that made Packard one of the first American car companies to sell a pure racing model.

A Challenge Fulfilled

By this time, the cars built by the Packards had truly surpassed those early Wintons, and that original challenge had been met and fulfilled. James Ward Packard had undoubtedly built a finer car, but he did not stop there. He continued to develop larger limousines; exciting luxury cars that sold at comparatively high prices. Like Rolls-Royce, these early Packards had a distinctive flat radiator, which slowly evolved into the classic ‘pointed’ shell.

In 1919 a Packard returned the Land Speed Record to America, for the first time since the American 1906 Stanley Steamer had travelled a measured mile quicker than any other earth-bound vehicle. With Indianapolis hero Ralph De Palma sitting behind a monstrous 12-cylinder engine, the big disc-wheeled Packard sped across the hard sands of Daytona Beach at an impressive 239.8kph.

But it was not on Packard’s agenda to continue this pursuit of speed records and, following this triumph, the Packard Corporation concentrated its efforts on building expensive passenger machines. By the ’30s it was producing some of the finest prestige cars available.

The company struggled through the Great Depression, when most luxury car companies such as Duesenberg and Pierce-Arrow failed. Packard’s strategy during the beginning of this austere period was to target its models to higher-status owners, this being possible when its direct competition began to fall by the wayside. It was a tactic which ultimately paid off for the luxury car manufacturer, allowing it to weather tough economic conditions far better than most luxury car makers of the time.

In 1937, Packard released its first six-cylinder engine model, the Packard 110. This seemed like a perfect timing but, in actual fact, it damaged Packard’s reputation. The six-cylinder model, along with the junior line of models, tarnished its elite status. However, worse was to come. After World War II, Packard suffered severely by offering body styles that did not go over well with the public and was unfortunately unable to take advantage of the booming post-war market. Nash Motors approached Packard with talks of possibly merging the two companies, but Packard held out. Nash eventually merged with Hudson in 1954 to create AMC (American Motors Corporation).

Soon after the Nash and Hudson merger, Packard purchased Studebaker – creating the Studebaker-Packard Corporation. Packard was hoping the increased number of dealers would help sell its product, but soon discovered that Studebaker was in severe financial strife. Although Packard’s sales climbed in 1955 – thanks to its first V8 engine – disastrous engineering woes that same year unfortunately caused hundreds of cars to be returned for repairs by dealerships before they could be sold, making 1956 one of the worst years in sales ever for Packard. From that point on, sales would continued to go downhill, with Packard dealers closing down all over the US. The writing was on the wall, and 1958 proved to be the final year of Packard car production.

Interestingly, during the early ’60s there emerged the possibility of a Packard revival when French automaker, Facel-Vega, considered rebadging its Excellence saloon as a Packard for subsequent sale in the US. However, this idea eventually fizzled out.

Three decades later, in 1995, Roy and Barbara Gullickson bought the Packard name and began work on a V12-engined luxury car, with the idea of entering limited production. The prototype – complete with a 8.6-litre, fuel-injected V12 engine – was displayed at the prestigious Pebble Beach Concours d’Elégance in 2003, where it attracted considerable attention. Once again, though, the project never reached fruition and the prototype was sold in 2009.

Packard Lives On

Despite these spurious attempts at a revival, it should be remembered that Packard was a pioneering car company. It built the first American production cars to use the H-pattern for the gearshift; to utilise a mechanically practical hypoid bevel gear system in the rear end; two-tone paint jobs; and let’s not forget the greatest device of all – a steering wheel rather than a tiller. Packard outlasted most of its early contemporaries and left a host of classic cars for the collectors to cherish – cars such as this magnificent example owned by Arnold van Zon. However, when Arnold first acquired this Packard, it was far from being in prime condition.

When a fellow Vintage Car Club member offered him a dilapidated 1929 Packard 640 Victoria in 2001, he took up the considerable challenge to restore this car to its former glory.

The car was in a sad state, to say the least, and it had also been modified – hacked up would be a closer description – back in the ’50s to make it suitable for ferrying milk cans to a dairy factory near Gisborne. The rear top of the body had been chopped off to take a wooden tray.

Sadly, in 1965 the car was left abandoned in a paddock where the elements began to take their toll. What was left of the body was eventually separated from the chassis and stored under a lean-to barn. The engine was seized, the shock absorbers were rusted solid, the brakes were locked so the wheels would not turn and a lot of the hardware – such as the taillights, door hardware and instruments – had been cannibalised over the years. However, the chassis was still in good condition.

The first jobs for Arnold were to sand blast and prime the chassis to prevent further corrosion, and reset the springs and to free up the brakes so the car could be transported without problem to John Ascroft in Kamo, a specialist in vintage and classic car body repair.

It was decided that the rear guards were totally beyond saving, so John very skilfully fabricated new items, repaired the front guards and straightened the valances. As the door hinges were missing, Arnold made wooden patterns and had them cast in aluminium-bronze, a very strong alloy, and machined them so they looked like the original items. They were then polished and chrome-plated.

John re-skinned the doors and fabricated a new top on the tub as well as a new petrol tank and a steel luggage box, which nestles between the rear wheel guards. The next challenge was to remake the missing windscreen. The special brass extrusion came from Australia, which Arnold rolled to match the shape of the scuttle, and the various sections were silver soldered together to complete the job.

Luckily, Arnold found four wire wheels in the Waikato and managed to locate and two more from across the ditch. They were stress relieved and expertly re-spoked by Rex Jamieson of Auckland.

The next problem was the differential. As mentioned earlier, Packard was the first car company to use hypoid differentials, (in the hypoid the pinion gear contacts the ring gear below the centreline. The size of pinion gear in hypoid differential is much smaller and the contact ratio is high, comparatively hypoid differential is much stronger than the spiral differential) and, unfortunately, sometime during this car’s life normal gear oil was used, causing the gears to wear so much that proper adjustment was impossible. After many hours of intense searching, Arnold was able to locate and purchase a set with the correct ratios from Adelaide.

Total Rebuild

Not surprisingly, the Packard’s straight-eight engine needed a total rebuild. The crankshaft was reground and the nine main bearings were re-metalled and line bored by Harry Canham – an expert who is now his 80s and still very active in his trade. Peter Le Gros looked after the final fit of the bearings and rods, and also honed the bores to match a set of original oversize Invarstrut pistons, which ensure a quiet engine. New valves and guides were obtained from the US.

The interior seats had to be made from scratch, by following old photographs. The hinged frames for the front seats were laser cut from stainless steel plate, which actually took three attempts before the correct shape was finally established. John Stringer from Whangaparoa, who also helped to get the correct shape for the convertible top, meticulously constructed the woodwork for the seats and roof bows. The beautiful full leather upholstery is truly a work of art, and was skilfully put together by Lars Wedinger, also from Whangaparoa.

Well-known painter and airbrush artist Steve Levene applied his talent to the walnut wood graining of the dash and door tops, whilst Auto Colour Matrix in Glenfield applied the flawless green paint job.

Countless hours were spent making the numerous stainless steel components required for the soft-top mechanism, as all the original fitment were missing. They had to be drawn first on computer and then laser cut and polished.

Looking around this magnificent Packard it’s clearly obvious that Arnold is no stranger when it comes to restoring cars. Before he and his wife Marieke immigrated to New Zealand from the Netherlands 39 years ago, he restored a 1933 Hillman that was sold before moving here. Once in New Zealand, Arnold wasted no time before a 1954 Citroën L15 was completely restored, followed over the years by a 1926 Essex and a 1972 Citroën Dyane.

Arnold reckons the Packard is the last car he will restore – much to the great relief of his wife. Yes, we’ve all heard this before, and as a 1942 Harley-Davidson WLA is lurking under Arnold’s house, it looks as if he won’t be laying aside his tools anytime soon.

1929 Packard 640 Convertible Victoria – Specifications

Wheelbase 3550mm
Engine Straight-eight
Capacity 6.3-litre
Bore/stroke 89x127mm
Max power 79kW
Clutch Borg Warner twin plate
Gearbox Three-speed manual (no synchro)
Diff ratio 3.69
Tyres 20×6.5”
Brakes Bendix three shoe system (cable and rod operated)
Kerb weight 2029kg

Words: Ashley Webb Photos: Dan Wakelin

This article is from NZ Classic Car issue 234. Click here to check it out.

Talk to any American car enthusiast and ask them for their definition of a true muscle car, and I can almost guarantee they’ll all give a different answer. I’m not sure why, but there seems a general consensus that if it’s American, before around 1985 and V8, then it’s probably a muscle car.

There are of course die-hard American muscle car fans like John Murray – a life member and past president of the American Muscle Car Club, current owner of a genuine LS6 Chevelle, Buick GS 455 and this magnificent Oldsmobile 442 W-30. John’s one of those guys who can tell you exactly what muscle cars are all about.

He’ll no doubt tell you that a muscle car is a high-performance vehicle, generally mid-sized, with a large powerful engine, usually a V8, intended for maximum acceleration on the street or drag strip and predominantly of American origin produced between 1964 and 1972.

Muscle cars are quite distinct from sports cars, which are generally smaller, intended for high-speed touring and possibly road racing. High-performance full size or compact cars are arguably excluded from this category, as are the breed of compact sports coupés inspired by the Ford Mustang, typically known as pony cars, although few would dispute a Boss 429’s credentials as a muscle car.

442 Muscle

According to some, Oldsmobile created the first muscle car when it shoehorned its new at the time, full-size Rocket V8 into its mid-size model to create the Olds 88 and Super 88 series back in 1949.

But in actual fact, it was the success of the Pontiac GTO that spurred Oldsmobile to return to the concept in 1964, thanks to Oldsmobile engineer and performance enthusiast John Beltz. Oldsmobile was the first GM division to follow Pontiac’s lead by offering a full-size muscle car in its mid-size Cutlass and F85 models. It became a model in its own right from 1968 to 1971 and then reverted to an option again through the mid-1970s.

Oldsmobile’s muscle car package included its most potent 5.4-litre (330ci) V8 engine complete with what was known as the police package that included a four-barrel carburettor, heavy duty valve gear, Positrac and a hotter camshaft raising the output to 231kW (310bhp). The package also included a stiffened frame, boxed rear control arms, heavy duty clutch, and of course a four-speed manual gearbox. And that’s basically where the name 442 derived, originally signifying the engine’s four-barrel carburettor, four-speed manual transmission, and twin exhausts. Although the specifications would change through the years, the name stuck.

Oldsmobile’s muscle car package proved not to be the fastest kid on the block, nor was it indeed the biggest seller, however the 442 did earn an enviable reputation for its balanced performance and exceptional handling capabilities.

W-30 Option

It’s not hard to believe that diehard 442 enthusiasts appreciate one particular option above all else – the W-30. This is the ultimate in performance packages as far as they are concerned, and one that transformed a good-performing car into a tyre-shredding monster capable of holding its own against just about anything that Detroit could muster.

It was 1966 when the first W-30 package was introduced consisting of three, two-barrel carburettors, an external air induction system which forced cool air to the carburettors via tubing from the front bumpers, a hotter cam and a Hurst shifter. The battery was relocated to the boot in order to make way for the induction tubing.

Unfortunately, GM banned multiple carburettors on all vehicles except the Corvette in 1967, which meant that 1966 was the only year that three carburettors were available on the W-30.

The W-30 continued to be offered with various factory power ratings (generally underrated) through until 1972, peaking in 1970 at 276kW (370bhp). It wasn’t until 1972 that the W-30 could be identified by the VIN number with an X, making it almost impossible to replicate.

Other components of the W-30 package included a lightweight aluminium intake manifold, the W25 fibreglass ram-air hood, Positraction differential with 3.42:1 gears (3.73:1 available), and heavy duty cooling. Due to the low vacuum at idle, air conditioning was not available, and power brakes were only fitted with an automatic transmission.

But as we know, all good things must come to an end and 1971 was the beginning of the end for all muscle cars. The Oldsmobile 442 was in no way immune to change. Performance numbers took an immediate nose-dive with the ’71 Olds 442 boasting the W-30 option and 7.5-litre (455ci) V8 just a shadow of its former self, with power down 52kW to 224kW (300bhp). The writing was on the wall in letters 10 metres high; the 442 was at its end as a stand-alone model, and in 1972 it would return to its roots with its tail between its legs, once again as an option on the Cutlass models.

John’s 442 W-30

As pointed out earlier in this story, John Murray is passionate about American muscle cars. His magnificently restored and very rare 1970 Chevelle LS6 has graced our pages, as has his previously owned 1971 Oldsmobile 442 in earlier issues. Our sister magazine NZV8 has featured John’s pristine 1970 Buick GS 455 recently.

John’ s latest acquisition is this outstanding 1972 Oldsmobile 442 W-30.

John found the Oldsmobile 442 in sunny Texas (a good place to start when looking for a car – no rust) while surfing the internet.

It looked fairly sharp in the photos, but John wisely decided to have it thoroughly checked out by a third party just to be sure. A very nice and obliging gentleman named Ken Hawley from Fort Worth really went the extra mile, and sent John plenty of close-up detailed photos and provided him with a very detailed description of the car over the ’phone.

As it transpired, the Oldsmobile was very much the way the owner, Dan Reagan, had described it, not a show car but nice and tidy. John was very appreciative of the honest description and best of all it was a genuine W-30 with a four speed gearbox, bench seat and dog-dish hub caps, just the way it left the factory in 1972. John found both Dan and Ken great guys to deal with, and very obliging right throughout the process.

John also learned that the Oldsmobile had been repainted about six years ago in its original colour – Radiant Green – and is a relatively low option car with power steering, disc brakes (non power) and AM/FM radio.

From what John can determine, the car has suffered the usual upbringing for many muscle cars from that era, and appears to have seen the odd drag race, but has managed to survive and stay in good shape and most importantly, the original engine has remained in one piece. A previous owner, John reckons about three owners back, bought the car thinking it was just a 442 and intended to go drag racing in it, so he had the engine rebuilt quite stoutly. A short time later, he carried out some research on the 442s and W-30s and thought he had better check the VIN. Sure enough, he saw the X in the VIN and found that it also matched the engine. John realised he had quite a rare car on his hands, one of only 289 examples ever built.He made a quick decision not to race the car and proceeded to take out the bucket seats and automatic transmission and re-install the bench seat and four speed that the car originally came with. Shortly after that he sold the car to Dan Reagan, the person John purchased the car from.

Once You Start, You Can’t Stop

When it finally arrived in New Zealand John was very pleased with the car; as the previous owner had given him a very honest description there were no disappointments or nasty surprises.

After driving it around for a while John thought that he would tidy up a few things and started off by sending the bumpers to Otahuhu Chrome Platers for re-plating. He also had the seats re-covered in the correct original upholstery pattern, courtesy of Cut Loose Upholstery, which did a fabulous job.

John, all too familiar with the ‘once you start, you can’t stop’ scenario, decided to tidy up the engine bay which naturally meant pulling out the big block 7.5-litre (455ci) V8, tidying it up and repainting it in the correct factory colour.

So for the next couple of months it was cleaning, sanding and painting all the bits and pieces from the engine bay including the firewall, radiator support, suspension parts etc; in the correct factory shades of black that John had got from the GM factory paint chart. He then went on to tidy up the wiring looms before the engine went back in, and a very tight fit it was. And of course in true GM style it fired right up with the very first turn of the key, John reckons it sure was nice to hear that lumpy idle again.

He happily admits that the Olds drives nicely and is very fast. He took it to the American Muscle Car drag meeting recently and suffered major traction problems – too much power, not enough rubber. John feels mid to high 12s are easily achievable with some decent rear tyres.

John has also spent many hours on the paintwork – and it shows – to bring it up to a good standard; the colour is very well named as Radiant Green, it is very striking in the sunlight.

These cars were dubbed the executive hot rods and John is in no doubt that his W-30 optioned factory hot rod was the pinnacle of Oldsmobile performance – a true muscle car indeed.

1972 Oldsmobile 442 W-30 – Specifications

Engine: Oldsmobile Rocket V8
Capacity: 7.5 litres (455ci)
Bore/stroke: 104.8×107.9mm
Valves: Two valves per cylinder/ ohv
C/R: 8.5:1
Max power: 339kW (454bhp – in the featured car)
Max torque: 695Nm (513lb/ft – in the featured car)
Fuel system: Four barrel carburettor
Transmission: Four-speed M21 with Hurst shifter
Suspension F/R: Coil springs/ leaf springs
Steering: Optional power assist
Brakes: Non power disc front/ drum rear
Dimensions:
Overall length: 5161mm
Width: 1935mm
Height: 1341mm
Wheelbase: 2871mm
Kerb weight: 1743kg

Performance (standard car):
0-100kph: 8.9 seconds
Standing ¼ mile: 15.2 seconds
Max speed: 205kph

Words: Ashley Webb Photos: Adam Croy

This article is from Classic Car issue 249. Click here to check it out.

The ’50s was an era when gigantic luxury cars roamed the highways of the US like prehistoric dinosaurs, and from that period came cars of epic proportions — like this 1958 Chrysler Imperial Crown.

Actually, in terms of nomenclature this isn’t really a Chrysler Imperial. The Imperial was created as a separate marque, but no separate dealership network was ever created to support these cars. This proved to be doubly confusing for the public, as they were used to the idea of Chrysler Imperial and were accustomed to getting them at their local Chrysler dealership.

However the Imperial stood proudly on its own, distinctive of contemporary Chrysler offerings, and was intended to redefine luxury in non-Cadillac style.

Competition amongst the Big Three’s top models was virtually militant in the late ’50s and, in fact, Cadillac’s leadership role in the field of outrageousness can be disputed, not so much because of the 1958 and 1959 Ford Lincolns, but because of a more kindred challenger — the Imperial.

This car’s radical styling incorporated imposing rear fins, masses of chrome and enough sheet metal to build half a dozen modern cars. It was considered unfathomable by the late ’60s, belittled as an environmental disaster during the energy-conscious ’70s and regarded as fodder for foreign investors in the ’80s. However, over the past decade or so these ’50s icons have re-emerged into the limelight and regained renewed recognition as symbols of the ostentatious, flamboyant attitudes that existed during an era of unrestrained spending.

That said, there’s something oddly attractive about the Imperial. Billed as ‘The Triumphant Imperial’, the 1958 model is long, slender and very low. The low belt-line accentuates the design concept as it sweeps upwards towards the rear fins. And let’s face it, when looking back at that era there is nothing more defining than the fin.

For 1958, changes to the Imperial were evolutionary, and included a different grille with six banks of slim, open rectangles stacked six high mounted over a simpler, multi-piece bumper, a filled-in variant of the previous bi-plane style.

Push-button Convenience

Inside, the Imperial’s dashboard seems relatively plain and uncluttered due partly to the absence of a gear lever and indicator arm. In the centre, two oversized pods house the speedometer, and a cluster of battery, fuel, oil and water temperature gauges flank a small clock. Selecting gears for the TorqueFlite automatic transmission is via push-buttons, grouped closely together and easily accessible by the driver. New interior trim fabrics added to the Imperial’s flair, with the introduction of Fontainbleu and Bahama. It was rather unfortunate that the Bahama fabric virtually fell apart at the seams, throwing Chrysler’s trim department into utter chaos as it worked to replace it.

Under the bonnet, Chrysler’s famous Hemi 392ci (6424cc) V8 powerhouse remained with few modifications since its historic 139.7mph (225kph) runs at Daytona several years earlier. The engine compression ratio was increased to 10:1 and power to 257kW (345bhp).

All 1958 Imperials also employed the lower, shorter, and lighter four-barrel Carter four-barrel carburettor and off-centre, spool-type front engine mounts. The 257kW brute was only available in the Imperial and New Yorkers and these engines were mated to the TorqueFlite automatic transmission that had been introduced the previous year.

The three-speed unit boasts manual override in first and second gears, all operated by the push of a button at a time when push-button convenience was being applied to just about every appliance known to the American consumer.

Nevertheless, the push-button drive was short-lived due to government regulations prohibiting the system as a result of incidents involving inadvertent gear shifting, as it was deemed a safety hazard.

Underneath, the engineers at Chrysler paid significant attention to redesigning the suspension. The end result was a torsion bar suspension that, in part, was an effort to gain more space in the engine bay and to keep the car as low and sleek as possible. In actual fact, this front-end suspension, coupled with rear leaf springs, proved better than expected, providing a softer ride.

Other new options introduced in 1958 included electric door locks, a remote control, outside rear-view mirror, Sure-Grip limited-slip differential, run-flat Captive Air tyres, and the precursor of today’s cruise control; Auto-Pilot.

Developed by supplier Perfect Circle, the Auto-Pilot not only automatically maintained a constant cruising speed, it also could be set to act as a speed reminder, applying back pressure through the accelerator to warn the driver that he was at his preset speed.

A Shocking Year

By now the suits at Chrysler were fairly certain that their slightly up-spec’d (from the previous year) luxury Imperial could stand up to any challenge in 1958, especially from the Big Three.

As the advertisement at the time read — “The Imperial is the car for you, IF your eye is pleased by sleek, sweeping bodylines that make the Imperial different from others in the field, IF you are willing to accept lower seating positions as the price of outstanding vision and a sway-free ride, IF you appreciate the outstanding manoeuvrability that stems from Imperial’s quicker power steering and push button transmission.”

As history has shown, 1958 was a shocking year for the American car manufacturing industry. Chrysler fought for survival as GM fielded a heavily reworked Cadillac, while a determined shove from Ford resulted in the massive, angular Lincoln and Continental MkIII twins.

After all, it was the ‘Eisenhower recession,’ a time of plunging sales summarised by that desperate plea; “You Auto Buy Now!”

Hemi Behind the Shed

Dave Vazey was on a mission to find a Chrysler Hemi V8 motor for a restoration project. The project involved his brother Keith Vazey’s Model A roadster which he had raced for many years during the ’60s and ’70s. When a friend of Dave’s told him of an old Hemi-powered Chrysler for sale in Henderson, parked up behind a paint shop, he wasted no time checking it out.

To Dave’s surprise the old Chrysler was in fact a genuine Imperial Crown coupe with its numbers matching Hemi V8 engine and original drivetrain completely intact. In fact the car was so complete, original and unmolested that Dave decided to buy it on the spot.

This happened in August 2008.

Dave knew that stripping the running gear out of such a rare car would be a crying shame, especially after closer inspection discovered that the two-tone blue paint had been virtually untouched since the day the car left the factory.

After some further delving into its past, Dave also discovered it had been owned by a wealthy surgeon in Pennsylvania, being part of his Mopar collection until he passed away. The Imperial was purchased from the estate and brought to our shores in 2005. Further investigation revealed no other information about the car, except the fact the engine was never started, and the car sat still for many years.

Unfortunately it was in poor mechanical shape, so Dave hauled out the colossal 6.4-litre Hemi V8 which was rebuilt by Carr Engine Rebuilders. The crank and rods were basically the only original parts to be salvaged from the engine’s internals. Dave also took the opportunity to have the original starter motor and generator rebuilt and a complete 2.25-inch exhaust system was fabricated including full-flow mufflers.

Dave chose to mount a 750cfm Demon carburettor onto the original intake manifold and install an MSD ignition system to make the engine more reliable. He has, of course, retained all the original components should he wish to put everything back to its original state.

By this stage, Dave’s Imperial had turned into a full body-on restoration project, and the next item to be rebuilt was the TorqueFlite 727 automatic transmission. The suspension received new bushes all round, including new torsion bar bushes, while new shock absorbers were installed and the original rear leaf springs were re-tempered.

When you’re driving almost 2200kg of Detroit’s finest then stopping becomes paramount, especially when you consider that drums sit at each corner of the Imperial. Dave rebuilt the entire system including re-sleeving the cylinders and rebuilding the handbrake mechanisms.

Apart from the mechanical aspects of this Imperial, the only other item to be replaced was the front windscreen.

Maintaining Originality

Walking around this imposing machine — and that takes a while as the Imperial is around six metres long — Dave proudly points out that virtually everything you see is original. The paint, upholstery, jack, spare wheel and even the driver’s handbook and service manual are still intact. He also points out that everything, including the clock, power windows, electric seats, aerial and radio, is in fine working order.

However, Dave is not one to let the grass grow under his feet, that’s for sure. As a hot rodder from way back, he comes from a family of engineers, so it’s hardly surprising to learn that he loves to make things and has several projects on the go. These include an early Holden V8-powered hot-rod, his son’s Pro Stock-style Plymouth ’Cuda and his motorcycles — which include an early racing Ducati and a Street Fighter-style superbike which he built himself.

Dave also makes wrought iron furniture; in fact anything out of steel, as a tour around his property revealed that he’d built virtually everything — including his magnificent Moroccan-style home.

With this in mind, I have no doubt that we’ll be seeing more of Dave’s handiwork in these pages.

1958 Imperial Crown Coupe – Specifications

Engine Hemi V8
Capacity 6423cc (392ci)
Bore/stroke 102.5x100mm
Valves Two per cylinder
C/R 10.0:1
Max power 257kW (345bhp) at 4600rpm
Max torque 610Nm at 2800rpm
Fuel system Single Carter four barrel carburettor
Transmission TorqueFlite 727 three-speed automatic
Suspension F/R Independent by torsion bars R – Live rear axle, leaf springs
Steering ‘Constant Control’ with symmetrical idler arm linkage
Brakes Power assisted drum

Dimensions:
O/all length 5735mm
Width 2062mm
Height 1447mm
Wheelbase 3276mm
Kerb weight 2187kg

Performance:
Top speed 192kph
Standing 1/4 mile 17 seconds

Words: Ashley Webb Photos: Adam Croy

This article is from Classic Car issue 240. Click here to check it out.

The first Hudson was built in July 1909 — only 10 months after Henry Ford built his first Model T — so it’s appropriate that we celebrate Hudson’s 100th anniversary.

From time to time I’m reminded of how motor cars of the 20th century reveal so much about the national characteristics of the people of their country of origin — or what I imagined to be the national character of each of those various races.

Britons of the ’30s with their pretensions to sportiness coupled with those cheap little family cars; Germans with their relentless mechanical perfection; the French with their compromises between conflicting expectations, not to mention their lateral thinking in styling; and the Italians with their fetish for high performance and superb styling, albeit dodgy electrics.

I think that these nationalistic projections are amply pointed up by this gigantic Hudson, so typical of the cars of the USA — usually enormous and super-powerful, and always over-conscious of their regal appearance.

I guess that those facile judgements are invalid now that the Japanese have revolutionised design and manufacture to the point where everybody else is looking to them as a criteria to be matched. Japanese cars are superbly long-lived and whatever you want them to be.

Long Service

Kevin Williams has owned this Hudson Seven Passenger Sedan for about 47 years. In fact, he’s only the car’s second private owner, having bought it from the first private owners — Iona and Pam Shepherd — during the very early ’60s. Don’t be fooled by the name ‘Pam’ — he was the husband and was in a wheelchair so, of course, a Service Car offered enough space in the rear to mount several wheelchairs and their drivers if necessary. The Shepherds were both professional musicians, mostly operating around Auckland, and with this vehicle Pam was easily loaded and unloaded via ramps and, of course, you could put a lot of instruments in with him. They drove from gig to gig and were well known, particularly as Iona had long red hair, was a striking character and complemented their impressive car.

Prior to the Shepherds, this Hudson was owned by several commercial owners in its role of ‘service car.’ This particular car was in service with NZ Railways until the late ’40s when it was successfully tendered for by the Shepherds.

Iona must have been a very competent driver, this gigantic car is about two and a half tons without luggage, has no power steering, no hydraulic brakes, and has an H-pattern non-synchro ’box controlling what is a very torquey 5.0-litre motor with loads of lugging power. I’m not too sure how many modern, liberated ladies could drive this car. Mind you, if it comes to that I’m not too sure how many blokes under the age of 65 could drive it either.

When Pam died, Iona went to Australia and the car languished in a local garage. Eventually — about 1962 — Iona agreed to sell the car to Kevin (who’d kept on the trail as a persistent car collector does). He paid £300 and it was his, but by now it had sat for several years so needed some work — although Kevin says that it wasn’t too bad. Those wood framed bodies, factory built, did have their problems. They were not well built, some of the wood wasn’t much but did provide patterns, and of course the rough roads in the early days hadn’t done a lot for body tautness, consequently there were the odd after-market coach bolts judiciously located. Mechanically, it was excellent — these big American motors can’t be overworked.

Restoration

When Kevin bought the car, it was still useable and he — being a surfer — got many trouble-free years out of it. At this point I wanted to ask Kevin about the other advantages to be found driving such an ideal ‘birdmobile’ — I can only speculate that it was the perfect vehicle for any red-blooded young male surfer. However, he did comment that of a Friday he and various mates would load their gear into/onto (eight surfboards) the Hudson and, with a double mattress in the back they would head for Ahipara, Coromandel or Raglan. Never once did it let him down.

Kevin comments that these cars were the top of the Hudson range, very elegant, ranking with Packard, Cadillac and similar high end trans-continental cruisers, and in fact this particular car has been accepted into the American Classic Car Register. As a matter of interest it appears to be the only survivor here, but when I was a lad in Cheviot in North Canterbury these sorts of big service cars, mostly run by Newmans I think, were seen daily and the contemporary photograph, showing a fully-loaded car, gives you an idea as to why these massively-built vehicles were strong enough to cope with the attrition of the rural roads.

When I was a kid in the late ’30s and ’40s, a tar-sealed road was reserved for the shortest distance between two towns, and once you were off it, metal and mud soon formed massive ruts able to lose little Austins and similar toys. Hence the popularity of US cars for so much of that century. Now that everything is asphalted, the Japanese car is having its day as the car that fulfils all our needs in a personal conveyance.

Restoration of the Hudson started in the very late ’60s. There was an international rally coming up, and by then Kevin had joined the Vintage Car Club. So it was done properly, stripped down to the chassis and body removed, which is no mean feat. The massive body was by Murphy, a factory job in the name of Biddle & Smart, and by this stage was offering a few challenges once you got behind the panels.

Being a good Kiwi, Kevin soon got into that issue and was ready for the international rally in 1972. Interestingly, the motor was still in excellent order.

Having owned and used this car for half a century Kevin must feel that this taonga is an extension of himself. It’s shared his life in every facet ranging from everyday driver to family transport. He’s used it a lot as a wedding car for friends (that raises a question or two about fortune these days) and while he was in the record industry he would commonly pick up bands and artists at the airport — something different and enjoyable.

It’s been a constant companion and I envy him.

The Motor

When the bonnet was lifted I was bulgy-eyed. I’d expected the usual gigantic slab of American side-valve cast iron flathead — like a ’30s Dodge Six. Instead, I thought that I was looking at something from Europe: a huge alloy crankcase with an enamelled iron cylinder block topped by a similarly finished cylinder head, complete with polished alloy rocker cover running full length — and big!

It’s an F-Head motor, ohv intake and SV exhaust, a system patented by Hudson and later used by Rolls-Royce, which also used Hudson’s crankshaft balancing system.

It’s rated at 69kW (92hp) using 4800cc of capacity which comes from six big, long-stroke pistons. A once every few hundred kilometres check is the timing chain which is readily accessible and easily re-tensioned.

A cute feature is a clear housing that allows you to visually check a float indicating the oil level in the sump — no dipstick is fitted!

Hudson Restoration

This car was fully overhauled by Geoff Clarke (NZ’s Hudson specialist) starting in 1972. Kevin had carried out a smaller refurbishment earlier, but a major restoration was now called for and out of the blue came a long hoped for call from Geoff. He’d promised Kevin that eventually he would restore this car, but it had to be at his leisure he wouldn’t be hurried. “I kept to that part of the bargain with great patience,” Kevin says.

By this date the car had been in service for 40-something years, and was showing the consequential wear and tear. Geoff went over everything including the wire wheels and the body.

A look at the car today shows what a superb job was carried out, not to mention how well Kevin has looked after this car subsequently. None of the refurbishing has been overdone, the car looks as if it has very recently left the factory. For me, it was love at first sight, what a magnificently regal motor coach it is, but unlike Kevin’s other car, a Rolls Royce Corniche, the Hudson still preserves a degree of under-statement that appeals immensely to this aging colonial.

Geoff wrote on the work he carried out making the comment, “This is the third of these Biddle & Smart classics I have rebuilt. I think that it will be the last. They are perhaps the pinnacle of Hudson’s achievements as far as elegance and class are concerned. Although horribly built, they have an air of grace and style that is up there with the best.”

Incidentally, in the course of this article I came to realise that the Essex, Hudson’s little brother, was put out to compete with Ford and Chevrolet and included a great deal of the Hudson quality. Hence the success of Essex.

The Owners’ Manual

Kevin has it — a bit tatty but still valid and useable and even more important, very informative on the specific maintenance required that the owner must take responsibility for, either doing it himself or ensuring that it is carried out by his chauffeur.

The index details the contents of 32 pages ranging from all aspects of mechanical maintenance short of dismantling the motor and gearbox, to brake adjustment and a wiring diagram. It finishes with a page on troubleshooting. I guess it comes from the days when it was a long way between knowledgeable garages.

How about nine quarts — 10.2 litres — of oil for the motor?

Words and Photos: Penn McKay

Hands up all of you who saw the movie Christine and thought, yeah, that’s not a bad-looking car — even after the prolonged attack left her almost totally destroyed

Styled with the ‘forward look’ evolved by Chrysler designer, Virgil Exner, the Plymouth Fury — with its brash tail-fins — almost immediately raised Plymouth’s stature from drab to dramatic, giving rival makes a serious run for their money. This new-found success meant that by the late ’50s Plymouth’s reputation had increased steadily, from a position as a largely unheralded low-price division in the Chrysler stable, to claiming a unique and exciting identity of its own. Leading the charge of the division’s drive to attract youthful, style-conscious buyers was the new Fury model originally introduced for 1957.

The Fury was based on Plymouth’s basic two-door hardtop body, which featured a large, toothy lower and anodised gold-coloured upper grille and, of course, those tall tail-fins sprouting from the rear guards. The Fury could be ordered in any colour as long as it was Sand Dune White. Another distinctive feature was the gold, spear-shaped trim that ran the length of the body side, culminating at a sharp point just before the car’s broad front grille. A total of 7438 Special Edition Plymouth Furys were built in 1957.

In 1956, Furys had been Egg Shell White, and in 1958 they were Buckskin Beige. But from 1959, Plymouth Furys were no longer an exclusive limited edition model, and they were available in different colours and styles.

All 1957 Furys came with only one engine option, the 216kW (290bhp), V-800 5.2-litre (318ci) V8, equipped with dual four-barrel Carter carburettors, a twin point distributor, high load valve springs, solid lifters and a special high performance camshaft.

Standard equipment on the 1957 Fury also included a dual exhaust system, Torsion-Aire suspension, bumper wing guards, gold anodised side trim, variable speed electric wipers, a Jiffy-Jet windshield washer system, dual outside rear view mirrors, a safety padded dash, electric clock, dual interior lamps and eight-by-14 Goodyear bias ply whitewall tyres, plus a 240kph (150mph) speedometer, a 3.36:1 rear axle ratio, heavy duty torsion bars, heavy duty shocks and six-leaf rear springs.

Furiously Passionate

I’m a fairly fussy type of character when it comes to cars, while those who know me think more along the lines that I’m probably just obsessive. So, how do you differentiate between a nicely restored example and a concours winner? Well, my friends, it’s called attention to detail.

Now, to some people that all seems a bit over the top when all they really want to do is drive their classic and, providing it looks the part when it’s parked up, that’s fine. Then there are those people who will painstakingly and meticulously restore every single last nut, bolt and washer to the Nth degree — ensuring not only perfection but originality as well.

Glenn Barratt is one such person. Remember in Christine, when high school nerd Arnie Cunningham (and his off-sider Dennis) have their lives changed when they discovered Christine, a 1958 Plymouth Fury, and then restored her to her original beauty? I think this storyline may apply to Glenn, as his 1957 Fury has undoubtedly changed his life. Over six years of hard graft has resulted in an absolutely stunning classic car and, when Glenn told me of his limited mechanical skills, I could gauge his outstanding achievement — especially as he carried out almost the entire restoration himself.

The Beginning

It all started back in 1985. Yes, Glenn saw Christine and told his brother — who has always been into finned tanks from the ’50s — all about it. His sibling mentioned that he knew where there was one for sale in Mt Eden and, without any further encouragement, Glenn was over there like a shot. Sure enough, the car for sale was a ’57 Fury. After some very brief negotiating, Glenn purchased the Fury (at full asking price) from the owner — who had possessed it for 21 years. The date was August 19, 1985, and after a few quick touch-ups, Glenn simply drove and maintained the car for the next 15 years.

His Fury had been imported from Hollywood in 1960 via Australia, where it was originally converted to right hand drive. It is believed to be the only 1957 Plymouth Fury in Australasia.

There was a lot incorrect on the Fury when Glenn bought it. Most annoying to him was the fact the car was right hand drive, as he believes all American cars should be left hand drive. Then a friend gave him a left hand drive dashboard. Initially, Glenn intended just to convert the Fury back to its original form and re-power it with the correct drivetrain but, as always happens, the project snowballed big time.

The original FP31 motor had been removed and lost long before Glenn bought the car, and replaced with a later model engine. Fortunately, the car retained the entire dual four-intake set-up, including the carburettors, filters and distributor.Glenn eventually imported an original FP31 V-800, rebuilt it to Fury specs, painted it up in the correct colours and had it sitting on an engine stand, awaiting transplant, while he was still driving the car.

The original transmission had also been removed and lost at the same time as the engine, and replaced with a Chrysler 727 unit. Glenn was also able to locate a correct air-cooled Torque-Flite transmission and dash control assembly push-button selector unit from Kansas.

The front hubs and brakes had also been removed, and replaced with later model items, so Glenn completely installed the correct ‘total contact’ brake system and rebuilt the entire front suspension. The differential had been replaced with a later model unit too, and Glenn acquired an original Plymouth differential, rebuilt it, detailed and painted it.

Serious Restoration

Unfortunately, the Fury had been seriously damaged at some stage, wiping out the front of the car. As 1957 parts were not available at the time of the repair, it had been rebuilt using slightly different, 1958 parts. After much searching and patience, Glenn was able to source correct new-old-stock (NOS) ’57 parts, including headlight/indicator assemblies and eyebrows, upper and lower grilles. The previous owner also removed the Fury’s original seat fabric and replaced it with vinyl inserts, no doubt due to the fragile nature of the factory cloth which was renowned for lasting only a couple of years at best. Once again, Glenn was also lucky enough to acquire the correct NOS Fury fabric from SMS Interiors.

Once the entire front clip was removed to commence the left hand drive conversion, work began on stripping the firewall, and it soon became obvious that there were some serious rust issues. Apparently, this is a common fault with all Mopars of this vintage due to the poor design and rushed assembly back in 1957, as assembly lines struggled to keep up with demand. This resulted in poor assembly techniques, ultimately causing rust issues after just a few years.

After hand stripping much of the car, it was quickly apparent to Glenn that rust was also alive and well under all those shiny layers of paint, so it was booked in for a trip to the Kiwi Metal Polishers in Rotorua, which uses an alkaline-based stripping method and has dipping tanks big enough to take an entire car.

Upon its return from the dippers about eight weeks later, the sad reality was revealed — years of very poor Australian and New Zealand metal repairs, evidenced by metal patches brazed over rusty metal. It was probably about now that Glenn wished he had never started his Fury project!

Mike Wood from Restoration Panelbeaters spent the next three years in Glenn’s garage, replacing all the rusty metal — which involved completely disassembling the shell. The rear quarters were removed from the car and put to one side while extensive rust in the areas behind the rear quarters was addressed. All repairs were carried out to a butt weld, hammer and file standard, even in areas which will never again be seen.

A lot of this panel fabrication was done from scratch, as very little is available for these cars by way of reproduction panels. Much of the floors inside the car were replaced, with Mike reproducing the panels exactly — including all the swages and grooves. The entire boot floor was removed, right back to the area behind the back seat and, using an incomplete rust-free boot floor from a ’58 as a base, Mike reproduced the floor and outer extensions. As a section of the original boot floor patch panel was missing, Glenn needed to recreate the missing original groove swages, so he had a toolmaker make up some rolling wheels which fitted a rolling machine owned by Tony Katterns, who rolled the new swage grooves into Mike’s new boot floor panel.

Like aggressive cancer, rust had spread into every panel over the years, even the roof hadn’t escaped its unstoppable force. Starting with the rocker panels, Mike fabricated every panel from scratch, reproducing every minute detail of the original assembly down to the size, angle and placement of the little drain troughs under the rocker panels. The boot-lid was completely de-skinned off its frame to address the rust around the edge, and was then repaired, hammer and filed, and reinstalled over the frame.

The new ’57 front panels which Glenn had acquired only required minor cosmetic repairs to become perfect, and the rust free doors just needed some final finishing. While the body was at its most disassembled state Glenn took the opportunity to polish the bare metal, then etch prime, undercoat and double topcoat all the areas that are not seen and come unprotected from the factory. Only then did Mike reinstall the outer skins.

All Plymouths of this vintage have a satin blue/grey-coloured primer in the areas that are not seen under the floor, behind all the panels, under the bonnet and boot-lid. This colour was matched from a local 1958 Fury that shares the same paint colour in those areas. Glenn turned his garage into a spray booth and sprayed all these areas in PPG DP40, followed by three coats of the blue/grey colour. With this treatment, Glenn knew the Fury would never rust again.

Countless Hours

As the months ticked by, Glenn started working on the chassis whilst Mike continued hammering and filing his way through the body panels.

Glenn had a certified welder swap over the steering idler bracket back to the correct side, the only certified welding needed for the LHD conversion. The chassis was then sent off to Rotorua for dipping whilst Glenn prepared all the chassis components for POR-15 primer, then POR-15 chassis black. The chassis was also given the POR-15 treatment when it returned from the dippers.
Over the following months Glenn proceeded to build up the chassis, restoring all the components piece by piece and replacing all replaceable parts, including fabrication of all brake and fuel lines himself. Eventually, the chassis was sitting fully assembled and completely independent of the body, to a point where Glenn was able to start the engine and break in the cam.

With the bodywork still underway, Glenn spent countless hours during nights and weekends restoring everything else on the car. He mounted the donor, left hand drive dashboard on its own mini-rotisserie stand and assembled the dashboard piece by piece, including wiring, without fear of the fresh paint being disturbed. Most of the dash gauges are genuine NOS parts, and the original Search-Tune radio was overhauled and re-chromed. Glenn also disassembled the odometer to reflect what was to become a brand new car — now reading 000000miles.

The dash pad was a problem. Glenn did not have a dash pad, because his car did not originally have one, plus it had been converted to right hand drive. However, by using a 1958 Fury dash pad as a template, he made a new two-piece mould out of fibreglass and cast up a dash pad. The recreated dash-pad was covered in vinyl, vacuum formed by Dashboard Restorations Ltd, and then coloured.

Tackling the glass posed a whole new set of problems for Glenn. He discovered that most of the original glass was scratched and damaged beyond repair, so he took digital pictures of the glass safety ‘bug’ and had printing screens made to recreate this bug on new side glass. He then took the old glass to Metro Glass, which cut new side glass in the correct tint — etching Glenn’s safety ‘bug’ before toughening each piece as it as from the factory. The result is NOS side glass with correct Mopar date-coded ‘Solex Herculite’ safety bugs.

During the disassembly and restoration of many components, Glenn found that most of the fasteners throughout the entire car were showing signs of rust and age. Whenever he disassembled anything, he would dip the fasteners in Jenolite — which removes the old zinc plating and any corrosion — dry them and then spend hours wire wheeling the finish back to shiny bare steel. Once he had a good selection of cleaned fasteners, he would go to a local zinc plating shop late at night, string the components up on copper wire himself, then return four hours later to pick up strings of shiny mint restored bolts, nuts, washers, screws, brackets and clips. Glenn found this to be quite a satisfying achievement.

Once Glenn was completely satisfied with Mike’s panel work, he began assembling the entire car including front and rear screens, side glass, regulators, door handles and catches, stainless trim and lights, virtually everything to make sure it all fitted and was gapped up nicely before final disassembly for paint.

The End in Sight

Again the body was disassembled and removed from the chassis for Steve Levene and Aaron of Imagin-Airing to apply a fresh and gorgeous coat of Sand Dune White paint.
Once painted and safely back in Glenn’s garage, the task then was to remarry the body with the chassis.

Glenn and a good buddy, Anthony Hannon, devised a way of lifting the body in the garage high enough to wheel the completed chassis assembly back under it, so it could be lowered and bolted onto new rubber mounts.

Glenn spent many more months reassembling everything in his spare time after work and on weekends. Items like the dash had been restored and covered for years, so it was a real buzz for Glenn to install all those items, which he had personally restored.

Craig Reynolds had carried out the daunting task of removing 50 years of dents and poor workmanship from the stainless trim on the car, delivering excellent quality and an outstanding finish. A large portion of the trim parts were bad — peppered with 1/8th drill holes — and all of it had suffered from previous poor repair work. The stainless trim on this car is probably better now than when it was new, thanks to Craig.

The next job was to fit the front clip and make all the connections to the engine and transmission.

To date, as far as building this car goes, Anthony Hannon was the only other person who has turned a wrench on a few nuts during the final assembly, Glenn did the rest.

The only time the Fury left Glenn’s garage during these final stages was for the fitment of a new exhaust, a wheel alignment and new carpets.

Surprisingly, as a self-employed contractor Glenn had no prior experience with building cars except for some occasional maintenance — he even had to buy his first torque wrench to tighten everything up!

Extraordinary Lengths

Glenn’s Fury was manufactured on April 16, 1957 in Detroit, Michigan, and on its 51st birthday — April 16 2008 — Glenn drove it for the for the first time after the restoration, and for the first time as a left hand drive car.

The car currently now has 1100km on the clock and has been completely trouble-free apart from the transmission, which lost all forward gears at 100km. Turns out that installing a 50-year-old NOS transmission rebuild kit and then using new 2009 ATF fluid was not a good idea.

Throughout this restoration, Glenn has gone to extraordinary lengths to ensure that every single part used is either original or NOS — you will not find any foreign reproduction parts on this car. That made finding things like speakers and many other various parts extremely challenging but, with enough effort, Glenn found everything he needed.

Optional equipment fitted on this Fury includes the TorqueFlite three-speed, push-button auto transmission, full-time power steering, power brakes, safety seat belts, heater, Search-Tune radio with dual rear speakers and fader, Highway Hifi 16 and 33rpm record player, dual rear antennas, twin strut rear view mirrors, under-hood lamp, trunk lamp, courtesy lamp package, glove-box lamp, tinted Plexi-glass visors, tinted Solex glass, handbrake warning lamp, rear screen defogger, bumper grille guard, and licence plate frame.

Glenn’s ultimate goal was to build a brand-new 1957 Plymouth Fury, just as it would have rolled off the assembly line. And, of course, to enjoy driving it — he’s not one to subject the Fury to travel by trailer, or to leave it parked up in the garage for very long as he enjoys every chance he gets to drive this beauty. Every time he steps aboard he relishes the new car smell and reckons the ’57 Fury has one of the sexiest rooflines in the business.

Having now owned this car for the past 23 years, Glenn has also been in contact with other Fury owners throughout the world and has collected a database of less than 50 1957 Furys left in existence.

The Fury shares a garage with a Dodge Ram daily-driven work truck and a one previous owner 1971 Dodge Monaco, the latter owned by partner, Michelle. Also on Glenn’s property are a very original Holden Kingswood and a Ford Fairlane — an unbiased mix of American and Australian marques.

During my time with Glenn, I realised that not only is he one of the most dedicated, committed and passionate people I have met, but his level of workmanship and supreme attention to detail have resulted in one truly outstanding car. We can’t wait to see his next classic project.

1957 Plymouth Fury – Specifications

Engine Chrysler V8
Capacity 5204cc (317.6 ci)
Bore/stroke 100mm/85mm
Valves Two per cylinder
C/R 9.25:1
Max power 216kW (290bhp) at 5400rpm
Max torque 440Nm at 4000rpm
Fuel system Dual four-barrel Carter carburettors
Transmission TorqueFlite three-speed automati
Suspension F/R Coil springs/semi-elliptic leaf springs
Steering Recirculating ball
Brakes Power assisted drum

Dimensions:

O/all length 5230mm
Width 2.01m
Height 1350mm
Wheelbase 2990mm
Kerb weight 1644kg

Performance:

Top Speed 193kph (120mph)
0-100kph 8.5 seconds
Standing 1/4 mile 16.4 seconds

Words: Ashley Webb Photos: Dan Wakelin

This article is from Classic Car issue 224. Click here to check it out.

Tim Chadwick meets a charming Swiss immigrant with a penchant for old Shaft movies and classic American cars

When Kiwi classic car enthusiasts think of Ford’s in-house Mercury brand of car, they often think of the old post-war Mercurys, the classic Cougar or the TransAm racing and muscle car era models.

However, Mercury did build some rather long and large cars back in the days before America finally woke up to both the Japanese industrial invasion, and the depth of the oil crisis.

During the’ 60s and up to the mid ’70s the top line Mercury, almost on a par with Ford’s flagship Lincoln brand, was the Mercury Marquis. The original Marquis model of the late ’60s was a two-door luxury coupe, based partially on the four door Brougham model, and powered exclusively by Ford’s 246kW, 6719cc V8 (330bhp, 410ci), with 6391cc and 7104cc (390 and 428ci) engines also on offer before the ’60s finished.

From the end of ’60s through until 1972, the Marquis models were known as being part of the ‘Continental Styling’ era as Ford tried to lift the standard of the Mercury Marquis line to a level that was virtually the equivalent of a Lincoln coupe, yet more affordable than a Lincoln.

The Marquis model was extended beyond just being a two-door coupe, with various sedan and wagon versions available, while a convertible sister was created in the Mercury Marauder. Two-barrel and four-barrel carburettor 7030cc (429ci) V8 engines were the mainstay powerplant during this period, which also saw the Marquis cars styled along with Lincoln, with retractable headlamps. The fold-away headlamps became a Mercury and Lincoln characteristic throughout the 1970s, seen down here, closer to home in the South Pacific, on Ford’s Falcon-based LTD and Landau coupes. Come 1973, and the Marquis received a major restyle to take it through the middle of the decade.

Flares, Afros and Perms!

As with flares on trousers, afro hairstyles and perms, during the ’70s the Mercury Marquis just got bigger and bigger! The large Mercury gained an energy absorbing bumper and a lower, sleeker roofline which highlighted the car’s length. The overall style was quite boxy in shape. In 1975 Ford dropped the long running Mercury Monterey model, and instead introduced a top-of-the-line Marquis model known as the Grand Marquis. In a badge rationalisation, all other Mercurys of this period were badged as a plain Marquis or, of course, as the Cougar, which had grown a middle-aged spread after its former muscle car days.

Although I have a later model Mercury Cougar in my garage, I had not ever heard of a Mercury Grand Marquis, or had perhaps overlooked it in American motoring books, until Michael Glamsch glided by one day in his original unmolested ’77 Mercury sporting a SH4FT (SHAFT) number plate.

Michael’s 1977 Grand Marquis is powered by the 7538cc (460ci) Ford V8 engine, and was imported by him personally in May of 2007 from Scottsdale, Arizona, as a product of surfing the net.
The Grand Marquis is one of the rarer Mercury cars around, and this may be the only 1977 model in New Zealand.

Whereas people were importing classic finned American cars or classic muscle cars a couple of years back when our Kiwi dollar was high against the greenback, Michael Glamsch sought a car which reminded him of both his more youthful days in the 1970s, and the cars seen in his favourite Shaft movies starring the Afro-American actor, Richard Roundtree. Although Swiss in his origin, the food and beverage lecturer at the Pacific International Hotel Management School (PIHMS) in New Plymouth grew up with American cars.

Swiss GM Factory

Back in Switzerland, his father had always driven American cars. “My dad started off with a rear-engined Chevy Corvair,” Michael said, “and throughout my younger days back home we had loads of Buicks, from Skylarks through to the Century model. You see, GM had a factory in Switzerland at that time, and so GM cars were mostly what we had, as far as American cars go. I recall that my parents also had a Pontiac, an Olds [Oldsmobile] and now they have a Chevrolet. I had Cadillac cars mainly, as well as the obligatory Ford Mustang, which was my first car, 20 years ago. It wasn’t until I came to New Zealand eight years ago that I drove my first Japanese car!”

In New Zealand Michael was missing the long low American cars of his youth, and so one day, while cruising on the internet highway, he spotted the untouched Mercury Grand Marquis of 1977 vintage and had to have it. “I liked the shape of the car when I saw it in the pictures on the internet,” Michael continued, “It reminded me of childhood TV programmes and of course the action-packed Shaft series of movies. In fact, Shaft is still one of my favourite movies. Perhaps I should see a psychologist!” At this point Michael burst into restrained laughter, but I understood his admiration for the kitsch glamour of the big ’70s cars, and we stood back to admire the sheer folly and audacity of such a land yacht as the Mercury Grand Marquis.

At the front, the wide imposing grille is a chromed set of six ‘waterfall’ modules balanced with the retractable lamps either side, protected behind vinyl or vinyl-like panels emblazoned with the dual ‘crowned-lion’ Marquis coat of arms, complete with a shield featuring the head of the ancient Greek god Mercury.

Blunt Effrontery!

The high impact bumpers are massive and sport yards of chrome, in a perhaps blunt effrontery to the world at large! The front corners of the car feature the marker lights and indicators in a type of razor-edged styling. This sharp-edged outline continues right along the outer edges of the front mudguard area on into the cabin area proper. For such a long car, the cabin does not take up a great area of the Grand Marquis. The doors are of a pillarless design, with the bulk of the side area support coming from one of the very stylish facets of this car, its wide rear pillar area, which swoops up and over the roofline with a thin chrome strip separating the two tone gold and cream colour scheme. This is probably the part of the Grand Marquis that I find the most aesthetically pleasing. The rear of the big Mercury is fairly straightforward in design, with a tidy set of horizontal strips encompassing the lights, and the chromed lettering spelling out the company brand name in a bold serif font. The words ‘Grand Marquis’ mounted on the right rear of the boot-lid are in a more flowing or semi-scrolled font, to give off an air of grace befitting this luxury liner.

The interior of this particular Mercury Grand Marquis is based on a light tan or caramel theme featuring inlaid wood veneer, and two-tone caramel and white leather seats with buttoned upholstery. This car’s interior will not appeal to all classic car enthusiasts, and some will find it quite kitsch, but for those into ’70s cars this is really a major draw-card, a tidy faux glamour veneer, plastic, carpet and leather amalgamation that simply and unashamedly now screams ’70s at you!

Michael invited me to go for a short cruise in his big Mercury and I was keen to sit back and enjoy the open interior of the car, partially wishing that I had brought along an old pair of genuine mid-’70s Lee brand flared pants that hang in my wardrobe for fancy dress events. After all, this was a fancy event, in a fancy car!

Michael had no trouble starting the slab-sided leviathan, and we eased off out onto the road. The Mercury floated along in a steady fashion, and I found myself looking out along a large piece of sheet-metal real estate, as wide as Arizona itself!

The dry desert state has been kind to Michael’s imported Grand Marquis, although the paintwork is now starting to blemish in places. This does not bother Michael, as he’s quite keen on unsullied and original US motor cars which exude their era. He has, however, made some quiet investigations about the cost of a respray just in case, and the figure for such a large car looks to be around the six grand mark, at a professional paint shop.

As we glided along, I asked Michael a bit more about his importation of the big car.

Long Beach to Auckland

“I found it on the eBay website originally,” Michael said, “and I made enquiries before arranging the whole import procedure myself. I simply went to a website called shipoverseas.com, and then all I had to do was fill in some forms and they organised transport for the Mercury, from Scottsdale to Long Beach at the coast, and from there it took only three weeks to come out to New Zealand by ship. After its MAF clearance, it was trucked by Cart-A-Car Ltd down from Auckland to New Plymouth, where Eagle Automotive Ltd put in the required seatbelts for compliance and oversaw the VIN process for me. It all went really smoothly.”

Both car and driver are imports — “Yes, the Mercury from Arizona and me from Switzerland, of course, but I’m a true Kiwi now. After serving my time in the Swiss army because it’s compulsory there, and gaining my degree in hotel management and working in various hotels, catering situations and casinos, I met and married a Kiwi lady, and so I came here and I really love living here. I’m not going anywhere now, unless it’s somewhere nice like Hawaii or Samoa for a warm holiday!”

The Mercury Grand Marquis continued rolling along on its 235/75-15 Uniroyal tyres in a comfortable glide as I then enquired about the cost of running such a big car. “Well, she is certainly big,” Michael replied, “close to six metres in length and about 2.03 metres wide and around 2.3—ton in weight! We had a 454 Impala that was doing about 22 or 23 litres to 100 kilometres and so I’d say that this would be similar, but of course it has a lot to do with your foot too. You need a big engine to power a heavy car like this along the highway, but if you drive it well you can keep the economy figures reasonable.”

After a while, Michael parked the Grand Marquis and we lifted the bonnet to look into the huge engine bay, at the big 460 donk. Despite the car being from the Mercury stable, the Ford blue engine gave no hint of being disguised as a Mercury or anything other than a true-blue Ford powerplant. Although a mass of wires and cables, the beauty of this engine area is that it is from an age just prior to the advent of overkill on electronics, solenoids, engine-management features and the suchlike. Large, but all pretty straightforward.

Isaac Hayes

Our conversation, from either side of the wide engine bay, took us back to our childhoods in the 1970s; American television; Shaft; The recent death of Isaac Hayes, who wrote the indelible Shaft theme music; and the matchbox toy Mercury Commuter station wagon produced by Lesney Matchbox during the early ’70s.

Old American cars with fins bring back ’50s rock ’n’ roll nostalgia for a lot of folk, and the ’60s Lincolns remind people of James Bond’s Goldfinger, JFK, and so on — but for sheer ’70s over-the-top flares, disco, and afro-headed cop movies, Michael Glamsch’s Grand Marquis fits the bill.

Michael is making some new motoring plans at the moment, and so he is putting the Mercury Grand Marquis up for sale, but he still has a rare Ford Galaxie in his shed that you shall meet between the pages of NZ Classic Car at a later date.

As befits a food beverages lecturer, as I went to leave Michael’s house, he gave me a parting gift of a plastic hamburger telephone! Yes, a real working Telecom-compliant burger phone! Michael really is the grand Marquis of Mercury mirth, the burger-meister of big barges — or the Marquis de Shaft — and I thank him for his time and charming hospitality.

1977 Mercury Grand Marquis – Specifcations

Engine Ford V8 (460ci/ 7538cc)
Carburettor Four-barrel downdraught
Power 158kW (212bhp) at 4400rpm
Brakes Disc/drum
Overall Length 5.85 metres
Width 2.03 metres
Max speed Approx 185-190kph
Economy Approx 22.2l/100km

Words and Photos: Tim Chadwick

This article is from Classic Car issue 219. Click here to check it out.

In New Zealand, blokes are only expected to work until they are 65 years old, so it was with great excitement that I made the journey to Matakana to see a car that was well past our standard retirement age — John and Kaye Murray’s 1908 de Dion-Bouton AV.

De Dion, Bouton et Trepardoux was founded by Albert de Dion, Georges Bouton and Charles Trepardoux in Paris, France, in 1883. Bouton and Trepardoux were engineers by trade and had long dreamed of building a steam car, but a lack of funds put paid to that idea. Then along came de Dion, inspired by a toy locomotive and with plenty of money, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Full Steam Ahead

The first car built by the company was steam powered, with the boiler over the front wheels, which were driven via belts. Steering duties were performed by the rear wheels. However, this early car burned to the ground during trials, and the following year a more conventional and successful rear-wheel-drive steam-powered car was built. Albert de Dion himself entered the car in a trial — advertised as Europe’s first motoring competition — in 1887, but he was the only entrant! The car did complete the course with de Dion at the tiller, having reportedly reached speeds as high as 60kph.

In 1894 Trepardoux left for reasons unknown and, as a consequence, the company was renamed De Dion, Bouton et Compagnie, and eventually the de Dion Bouton Automobile Company.
Despite those early forays into steam-powered vehicles, as early as 1889 the writing was on the wall as far as de Dion was concerned. Internal combustion engines were the only way forward, and by 1895 the company had produced its first engine of the type — a 137cc single cylinder.

The engine created plenty of headaches at its original running speed of 900rpm. Bearing problems and generally rough running were the main issues. However, those problems were apparently cured during the testing phase, when the engine was run to a then extreme 3500rpm.

The engine’s surface carburettor and atmospheric valves meant a running speed of 2000rpm would minimise running problems. In this they were successful, as the reliability of the de Dion engine became famous in the early 1900s.

This engine found its way into the back of a commercially available three-wheel frame from fellow French company, Decauville. With the addition of pneumatic tyres from Michelin, this became known as the Voiturelle. By the time the engine had made its way into the Voiturelle in 1896 it had been enlarged to 185cc, and delivered a whopping 0.9kW (1.25 horsepower), which increased to 1.3kW (1.75 horsepower) in 1897.

Power output continued to grow until production ceased just after the turn of the century in 1901, the final figure being 2kW (2.75 horsepower), with racing versions rumoured to have as many as eight raging horse under the hood!

World Leaders

By 1900, de Dion-Bouton had become the world’s largest automobile manufacturer, producing 400 cars and 3200 engines that year. During the course of the same year it also opened a factory in Brooklyn, New York, to cater for the demands of the American market. As well as this, it was supplying engines by licence to approximately 150 manufacturers.

Another move of factory by 1904 meant the company employed as many as 1300 people, who between them were hand building over 2000 cars a year — a staggering feat.
Another change around that time — 1903 to be precise — saw the first car de Dion-Bouton produced with a front-mounted engine, known as the Populaire, which was available with both 700 and 942cc motors. By the end of the year they even had a reverse gear!

Also in 1903, de Dion dipped its toes into the two-cylinder automobile market with the 1728cc, 12 horsepower S, and in 1904 also introduced a 2545cc four-cylinder option, the engine going in the AD model with 11kW and the AI with 15 and 24 horsepower. It was also around this time that all of de Dion’s cars became slightly more conventional, with the radiator moved in front of the engine and the clutch from a hand operated lever on the dashboard (with the throttle), to a floor-mounted pedal like the brakes.

A pair of twin-cylinder 10 horsepower de Dion cars were entered for Georges Cormier and Victor Collignon to contest the infamous 1907 Peking to Paris Rally. Both men faced an arduous task, travelling 16,000 kilometres across China, through the Gobi Desert into Mongolia, through Russia then all the way through Eastern Europe to the French capital. Both the de Dions finished, albeit 20 days behind the winning Itala. The following year Bouvier St Chaffray had an unsuccessful run in the New York to Paris Rally.

Despite being the first to mass produce a V8 engine, in 1910 — a 6.1-litre unit, closely followed by 7.8 and 14.7-litre options for the American market, and a 3.5 litre in 1912 for the European market — de Dion-Bouton started on a slippery slope downhill from 1908. The company had a stint building rail cars after WWI before finally shutting up shop in 1932.

Centurion

The car featured in this article is a 1908 de Dion-Bouton AV, a 10hp twin-cylinder model, the same type used for the 1907 Peking to Paris campaign. This particular car was found in 1953 abandoned in a sawmill near Taradale, any earlier history of the vehicle being near impossible to come across as all individual de Dion-Bouton factory records have long since been destroyed.

The car is believed to be one of five remaining in the world — amazingly, three of these survivors reside in New Zealand (the other two are in Christchurch). After moving to Auckland in 1953, the car remained in a sorry state until 1986, when Bruce and Wilma Madgwick purchased it and gave it a full restoration over the course of the next 12 years.

Since the restoration the car has been roadworthy, although the Madgwicks only used it to take part in veteran rallies, including the Sun Alliance event in 2000 and an event around Mt Egmont in 2004.

The car also appeared on occasional events around the Auckland and Waikato areas until 2006, when it was sold to its current owners, John and Kaye Murray. It can safely be said that they paid more for it in 2006 than the original 1908 asking price of £265 for a chassis, or £334 for a complete car.

For John, this car takes pride of place sitting inside his shed alongside his equally immaculate Model T Ford. However, with both cars he is of the attitude that they are there to be used, and if they get messy in the next 10 years or so — “Well we will just pull them down and restore them again!”

So, if you are out around the Matakana area it is not an uncommon sight to see John out for a cruise, and the car recently completed the Horseless Carriage Car Club of New Zealand’s Spring Tour.

Ten Horsepower of Grunt

The car is more or less as it left the factory, with a few modifications for practicality’s sake. The de Dion-Bouton originally came with a hand-operated throttle that stuck out of the dashboard, something that is more than a little impractical and bordering on dangerous in modern traffic. To replace this, John fitted a Model T carburettor with foot-mounted throttle. However, he still has the fully restored and functional original carburettor in the shed and, given about three hours notice, this could be refitted. The car also has a modern, greasable driveshaft for practicality.

John had a new set of wheels made around the original hubs (interestingly, the front has a five-stud hub and the rear a six-stud. As John explains; “It’s to handle the sheer 10 horsepower of grunt!”) to fit more easily available 30×3.5-inch tyres. Like the hubs, the standard wheels (and those used on John’s car) have 10-spoke front wheels and 12-spoke rears, for the same reasons.
The tyres for the car are made in Malaysia, and can come with the branding of any tyre from back in the 1900s.

Quite an Experience

The de Dion’s 1207cc two-cylinder motor struggles to get up John’s driveway, which is steep and gravel based; it can get to the top but it is strictly a one person job. However, once there it is an amazing experience to ride in a car that is 100 years old and not out. Although it will not get you anywhere in a hurry, once you take off and feel the wind in your hair — with everyone clapping and waving as you pass by — quite frankly there is not a care in the world that could ruin such an experience, and this is coming from a motor sport nut.

Driving seems like quite an experience — the gear shift alone resembles some sort of Olympic sport, and John definitely deserves a gold medal for it. Apart from that — and keeping a continual eye on traffic behind you — it all seems normal. The only point where the car really struggles is on any sort of incline. “It shows up hills where you would never have thought there were hills in the first place.

Sometimes I think it just sees the hill ahead and slows down,” John comments.

As the car cruised into the seaside town of Omaha, John was quick to point out how the car handles. “Look at this,” he said. “Absolutely no body roll!” Although that wasn’t exactly what this reporter was looking for in a test of a 100-year-old car, I have to admit he had a point. How many modern cars can take a 90-degree corner at about half of their top speed with absolutely no body roll, tyre squeal and neither under or oversteer?

John was kind enough to offer me a turn behind the wheel of his beloved de Dion-Bouton. However, having watched him work his way around the gearbox; and after hearing him tell me that although he has two spare engines, there are no transaxles that will fit this vehicle remaining in the world, and if one were to break it would be a rather expensive exercise to fix it; I chose to politely decline.

A big thank you to John for taking the time out to show his beautiful car off to us, all I can say now is if I ever make it to 100, if I can perform half as well as this old girl it will be more than a miracle.

Seldom has the story of a single, stark ’30s sports car, confected from an American chassis and a British body, gathered so much intrigue in Britain and, latterly, a world away in New Zealand

Our saga was a reversal of Carroll Shelby’s recipe for the Cobra — slotting a Ford V8 into an AC chassis, and later into a Sunbeam Alpine to create the Tiger — and it all started when Noel Macklin sold his Invicta car company to the Earl Fitzwilliam in the summer of 1933, and sought a new challenge in the concentrated world of specialised marques. As Shelby would do three decades later, Macklin chose the smooth power of an American eight-cylinder engine for his new car, which he based around the Hudson Terraplane. Legend has it that Macklin investigated the potential of the Hudson chassis in the garage of his friend, Frederick Gordon Crosby, already famous as house artist for The Autocar. Crosby would also design the handsome Railton radiator.

The name of the car came from the racing car design engineer, Reid Railton, who had worked with Thomson & Taylor inside the Brooklands Motor Course, and was responsible for the Brooklands Riley, the chassis of the ERA single-seater, the Napier-Railton in which John Cobb set the outright Brooklands lap record, and the Bluebird and Railton-Mobil Land Speed record cars for Malcolm Campbell and Cobb. Railton’s deal with Macklin was only the use of his name, famous by now in motor sporting circles, in return for a commission on sales. He had no involvement in the basic engineering.

The Light Sports Railton

The stripped-down Light Sports Railton was said to be the brainchild of Leonard Cushman, the racing driver who ran the factory in the grounds of Macklin’s home at Fairmile in Cobham, Surrey, not far from Brooklands. The original plan was for DPA 231 (the original British registration number for the car, by which it would always be known) to compete in the 1935 Ulster Tourist Trophy race on the Newtownards road course near Belfast in Northern Ireland.

This stripped-down prototype was built by EJ Newns at nearby Thames Ditton, with a skimpy four-seater door-less open body and cycle guards in accordance with the racing regulations. It was entered for Tim Rose-Richards and was given the number ‘3’ for the TT, but it would never make the start.

Perhaps shortcomings became apparent during the build of the car. The 4.1-litre Hudson Eight sat 178mm back in the chassis, which was thought to be from a previous Big Six Hudson. The fuel tank was the standard Hudson 15 US gallon (58-litre) unit and at racing speeds the car had a fuel mileage of eight to 10mpg (28 to 35l/100km), so the Railton would be stopping at least three times for fuel in the 478-mile (769km) race. The car used the standard three-speed, wide-ratio Hudson gearbox, damned by Railton historian James Fack, who pointed out that the Brooklands rear-end ratio “Would have drastically curtailed its acceleration at Ards, as well as encouraging excessive use of the weakest feature in the Terraplane’s entire makeup — the gearbox. Any three-speed car was severely disadvantaged at Ards, but one with an inherently weak second gear like the Terraplanes would surely never have survived 410 miles of manic ‘stick-stirring.” Fack pointed out that the Ford V8s with their three-speed gearboxes were two laps behind in the 1934 TT, and had to be flagged off the course!

Then there were the cable-operated, production drum brakes. They were larger and from a bigger Hudson limousine, but were narrower so were still quite inadequate for slowing a car with a maximum speed of 177kph (110mph) in a long race. Then there were the five-stud, heavy-duty wheels from the same Hudson limousine chassis. Fack noted that a tyre stop in the race would have cost track time “With 20 studs being laboriously undone and done up again, while its rivals were quickly receiving the same service from a few well-aimed blows with a copper hammer.”

So, the Railton was tactfully withdrawn from the TT and Rose-Richards drove an Aston Martin. A second Light Sports (DPL 94) was built a few months later as a more civilised version, but our saga concentrates on the original DPA 231. A week after the TT, the car was racing at Brooklands, then at the Shelsley Walsh hill climb where RRK Marker came second in the 5.0-litre class to Eddie Hall’s 3½-litre TT Bentley. In another Brooklands outing the Railton turned a lap at 104.85mph (168.7kph).

Contemporary Road Testing

The car was loaned to the British motoring magazines, and The Autocar photographer caught the Railton in flight, all four wheels well clear of the ground as it crested the Test Hill at Brooklands. Incredibly, the driver can be seen smoking a pipe during the ‘flight’. It coined the word ‘Terraplaning’ and Railton agent, Charles Follett, would make that photograph famous in his press advertising.

In his November 12, 1935 road test, The Motor tester started with verve: “From a standstill to 90mph [145kph] in 23 seconds; or to 100mph in 41 seconds; fleeting acceleration such as no other production model possesses. These are two of the outstanding performance characteristics of the new Railton light sports tourer, a close-coupled four-seater selling complete at £878. Stripped of its wings, hood and headlamps, the car is capable of touching a speed of 110mph and covered the flying quarter-mile at Brooklands at 107.14mph [172.4kph] ¦ far exceeding our anticipations and putting the car in a class of its own.”

Despite the enthusiasm of the motoring press, the Light Sports failed to find a buyer. In December 1936 DPA 231 was advertised for sale at £295! It didn’t sell. In March 1938 it was offered at £185, but it remained gathering dust at the Fairmile works until Follett had tuner RF (Dick) Oats — who had made vintage side-valve OMs competitive with overhead-cam Alfa Romeos — perform his magic for £300; reckoned to be twice the value of the car which had now covered 80,470km.

The Oats engine mods upped performance to the point where the Railton lapped Brooklands at 185kph (115mph) — 16kph faster than in standard form — and cut its climb time at Shelsley Walsh. The car had still not been sold. Perhaps it was assumed that Follett now owned it, as he was campaigning it on a regular basis. According to Follett’s Railton file, motorcycle racer Charles Mortimer expressed an interest in the car in March 1941. Mortimer had owned the Barnato ‘Blue Train’ Bentley coupe pre-war, and been delighted to sell it for £110 with war clouds gathering in 1939.

It seems that the Railton was used to tow gliders for the Fleet Air Arm late in the war, as was the Napier Railton. Late in 1948 the car sold for the first time — 13 years and a World War after it had been built! — to a Mr JB Stone in Hampstead, north London.

In a feature on the car in the April 18, 1941, issue of The Autocar, Follett was writing that his Light Sports was “The best all-round sports car available in Britain before WWII.”

An Intriguing Theory

Mr Stone must have soon tired of his stark two-seater and sold it to a dealer in the Finchley Road, which was where Peter Lumsden found it.

We are talking 60 years down the road here, and when present owner James Shand, who inherited the car from his father Rob, who bought the car and shipped it to New Zealand in the late ’40s, took it over he found a file of original correspondence relating to the Railton. But that is to jump ahead.

The first handwritten letters in the Shand/Railton file are not dated to year (presumably 1949) but the signature intrigued me — PJS Lumsden. Could it be Peter Lumsden who started racing in 1956 with a drum-braked Lotus IX, and subsequently raced a lightweight E-Type and Lister-Jaguar before hanging up his helmet in 1965? I consulted my British Racing Drivers’ Club yearbook, found Lumsden’s address and wrote to ask him if he had ever owned the Light Sports Railton. He had! Peter emailed to say he couldn’t remember anything about the Finchley Road dealer, apart from the fact that he was fond of wildfowling and had a fearsome eight-bore shotgun on the wall of his office.

“I bought the car at the end of my national service before going to Cambridge, but I soon realised that it was not a practical car for an undergraduate, so did not keep it for long. Petrol was rationed in those days so mileage was somewhat limited. It certainly had excellent performance, and I went to a VSCC meeting at Madresfield Park where it was fastest in the Speed Test.” Lumsden doubted that the Railton would have been very successful towing gliders “with its light weight and not much over the back wheels.”

He would sell the car to Rob Shand through Thomson & Taylor at Brooklands. In his first letter to Shand, Lumsden described the mechanical condition and noted; “The body is a very light four-seater, with rather skimpy back seats. There is a hood and tonneau cover, both in excellent condition. The front wings are of the non-swivelling cycle type and give excellent protection in the wet. The car is extremely reliable and had never given me any trouble. Petrol consumption depends on how you drive, because there is an accelerator pump. But I reckoned on 15mpg [18.8l/100km].

“A Mr JB Stone acquired it after the war and drove in a Gransden Lodge race. A friend of mine saw it and said it went very well and if it had been driven properly it would have been first instead of second in the race. Stone hardly used the car and I acquired it in May 1949, but as I went abroad directly afterwards and only came home in September before I went away again in October, it has only been used by me for pottering around and not for competition.

“You probably want to know why I am selling the Railton. I am studying economics up at Cambridge at the University which causes a great drain on my finances, and with the petrol I can get hold of and the cost of licensing and insurance, it is too expensive and I just can’t afford it.”

There followed a difference of opinion whether the price should be £300 (which Lumsden was asking), £200 (which was Thomson & Taylor’s valuation) or the eventual £165 that Shand paid and the car was sent to Thomson & Taylor for shipment. Thomson & Taylor had written to Shand in February 1950 advising that its valuation of the car — if it was in first class condition — would be £150/£200.

This was a coincidence of personal and national identities since Reid Railton had worked with Thomson & Taylor in the ’30s when he gave his name to the car, and the Thomson of Thomson & Taylor — Ken Thomson, a New Zealander from Rotorua who had come out of WWI with the rank of Major. He was first involved with racing driver and engineer, Parry Thomas, for some work they were doing for the Australian railways.

In our email exchange, Peter Lumsden also mentioned he had finished eighth at Le Mans in 1959 driving a 1250cc Lotus Elite, winning the 1500cc class. His favourite circuit was the Nürburgring.
The Railton Downunder

By chance Rob Shand’s son, James, who now owns the car, uncovered evidence of the Railton’s record after it arrived in New Zealand and the account of the car’s purchase — from one college student in Britain to another, aged 22, at the other end of the world.

Shand had driven a Railton in New Zealand and was aware of the performance urge from the straight-eight, so when he saw the Light Sports advertised in Motor Sport, he asked the advice of Walter Scott on how to go about purchase. Scott was a well-known Christchurch garage owner who had raced Edwardian Vauxhalls and, in 1935, imported one of the first Railton-Terraplane tourers into New Zealand. It was Scott who arranged for Thomson & Taylor at Brooklands to inspect the Light Sports and report on it.

“Weeks of waiting were rewarded with a three-page letter from Thomson & Taylor and a fee of only £10 for the work, which included a trip of 400-odd kilometres to inspect it,” wrote Shand. “Now all I had to do was find the fairy godfather with overseas funds and cash up my MG TA. The former was easy as the father of a very good friend had funds in most overseas countries, and the deposit was paid by a cheque drawn on the Ottoman Bank in Constantinople.” Finding overseas funds was a major problem when buying cars abroad in those post-war days.

The deal eventually went through, and the ship arrived in Lyttelton with the Railton in the hold. “Days then of waiting while the railways lost it in the course of a 13km journey to Christchurch and then the haggle with Customs about duty — was it of American or British origin?”

Rob Shand was not impressed with the body. “It was a bitter disappointment. It was not the attractive, original beetle-back with domed and moulded cycle guards, but a rough, slab-sided box with two old aircraft seats and flat guards made of light steel sheet — but never mind, I had bought it to GO, not to look pretty. Its acceleration was breathtaking and its exhaust note indescribable from the original Brooklands silencer.”

NZ Racing Debut

First event for Rob and the Railton in New Zealand was a standing kilometre sprint on Taeiri Plains near Dunedin at the end of November 1950 — but they replaced the regular battery with a motorcycle unit to cut weight and the wiring came adrift. Rob had to abandon his run.

With the Railton repaired, Rob’s mate, Lisle Lester, did the run in 32.13 seconds for second place in the three to eight-litre class behind George Smith’s famous GeeCeeEss V8 special on 28.16 seconds.
“George was a great character, having been in racing since 1919, and I remember his response when I asked him that evening after the sprint if he knew of any good Hudson motors around Auckland. With a characteristic jab of his plump forefinger into my chest and a twinkle in his eyes, he said ‘Listen sonny, there just aren’t any good Hudson motors!’”

“The most important event in the 1951 calendar as far as Canterbury was concerned was the Centennial Road Race on a road circuit in Mairehau, an outer suburb of Christchurch. The circuit was on sealed roads with a lap of about four kilometres. The Railton was on scratch for a 20-mile [32km] handicap race for Sports and Saloon cars, giving six minutes, 15 seconds to the limit man in a side-valve Morris Minor who had almost completed his first lap, and was in sight behind me when the flag dropped and ‘The Old Girl’, as Charles Follett used to call her, shot away to gather in the rest of the field. It was an exhilarating 20 minutes as one by one I sighted the front runners and gathered them in, all except Frank Coster’s Singer 9 roadster, and made fastest time at 60mph average — all in all a very satisfying outing after 10 years or more of enforced retirement.”

Next event was the New Zealand Championship Beach Race on Oreti Beach south of Invercargill. Rob and Lisle drove the Railton on the 1227km round trip from Christchurch.

“To those of you who have never raced an open-wheeler on the beach, it’s no game for girls with nice complexions or tender bottoms, particularly at 100mph-plus, but it’s thrilling and requires its own particular skills and technique. Unlike Mairehau, this was a scratch race and promised to be a tough one, so it was a case of using head instead of foot as some of the opposition were very fast but not reliable, and it paid off with a comfortable third place behind George Smith in the GeeCeeEss and Alec Edwards in his supercharged TC MG, the same car Sybil Lupp drove to second place at Wigram in 1950.”

The Christchurch Star reported that — “Shand’s performance was a noteworthy one last week because his car, although in the 100mph class, cannot be regarded as a racing car. It is a sports tourer which was built and used extensively in competition as a ‘works’ car by the Railton firm in England in the late ’30s.”

A week later and the Railton was on the inter-island ferry en route to two-mile Paekakariki Hillclimb north of Wellington, “¦rising from the sea to over 1000ft [305 metres] with a spectacular sweeping bend at the finish.”

Shand was fifth fastest, and left the car there for the Ohakea airfield race the following weekend. In practice with the XK120s of Gibbons and Roycroft, there was an ominous crunching noise which turned out to be six studs shorn in the crown-wheel-and-pinion carrier, and Shand was a spectator watching Smith winning again after a hard race with Tom Sulman’s 4C Maserati and Ken Tubman’s K3 MG.

The competition calendar was a busy one in 1951 and the following week, with repairs effected, Shand was ready for the start of the splendid 1.6-mile (2.6km) Governor’s Bay hill climb between Christchurch and the Bay. Sulman was fastest in the Maserati and Shand won his class and took second fastest time overall. The Christchurch Star reported that, “Once again the young Christchurch driver, Rob Shand, showed that he is fast approaching the top flight in car competition. He was one of the select few who broke two minutes for the course.”

Hillclimbs and sprints

The following weekend, Shand and the Railton were at the South Island Championship Hillclimb at Three Mile Hill, a classic climb on tar-seal through a pine forest.

“Showers made the road slippery and some do-gooding busy-body went to the traffic cop in attendance and had the climb stopped. I was so furious that words failed me for once, as I was lying in a strong position.”

Next weekend was the shingle hill climb at Briggs Gully for the South Canterbury Championship on the Saturday, and back to Christchurch for a standing quarter the following day, but bad-choice new tyres handicapped the Railton at both events.

In early April, Shand invited Lisle Lester and his wife to accompany him in the Railton to the sprint event in the Fryatt Street wharf area in Dunedin, collecting a speeding ticket (for 70mph, or 113kph) on the way.

“Preparation for the event involved removing the spare wheel, surplus seats and windscreen, guards and lights and putting some of our very secret fuel in the one-gallon [4.5-litre] sprint tank. The ‘Old Girl’ was well warmed-up after the 250-mile run down and we had also arranged for Lisle to have a run.” They did well. Rob had done 17.02 seconds and Lisle had done 17.03 seconds. We were both overjoyed, mostly for the ‘Old Girl’ which, after 16 years of hard work and the minimum of attention, had taken nearly a quarter of a second off her original time of 17.4 seconds for the standing quarter as per the road test in The Motor of November 12, 1935. We gained the Otago Championship Sprint Title and Blue Ribbon.”

Next up was another run up the Governor’s Bay climb, where Shand shaved 1/100th of a second of his previous time for second FTD to Les Moore, in the 2.9-litre P3 Alfa Romeo which Nuvolari had driven to win the 1935 German GP on the Nürburgring.

The race on South Brighton beach near Christchurch was on May 26. “I took a few precautions about keeping my bespectacled face free of sand, and gained second place in the Trophy Race behind Hec Green’s single-seater Wolseley special and in front of Jack Tutton’s XK120.”

A sprint and a hill climb over the winter kept the Railton aired, but the young Shand was now involved with study and university exams, and his next serious race was back on Brighton beach in December 1951. In the open 15-mile (24km) race the final order was Smith in the GeeCeeEss, Frank Shuter in the Edelbrock, Tutton in the XK120 and Shand.

“I was completely blinded by sand. I’d started wearing spectacles and a face visor on my skid lid with only an aero screen on the car, but as the beach was very wet I was soon covered in sand and blinded, and ended up wearing nothing over my eyes and just crouching behind the aero screen.”

In the 30-mile feature race Smith and Shuter ran one-two again, but Shand was third ahead of Tutton’s XK120.

“Again the V8s had beaten me, but there was clear evidence that there was no substitute for litres, especially American ones. A lot of the cognoscenti who favoured small fussy highly-stressed engines were constantly deriding our vulgar monsters, chiefly because they were usually in front. It was always a source of special pleasure to be able to have the better of the much-lauded XK120 Jaguars, as I have always considered cost as a fact of performance and XK120s cost three times more than I had paid for a 15-year-old car which could also carry four persons, not two.”

In the sports car race at Mairehau, in 1952, Shand was put on scratch with two XK120 Jaguars — “But the starter had a funny idea of scratch as I was placed five car-lengths behind the front XK120. This was done because on the narrow road the limit cars were already circulating, so we were placed nose to tail at the side of the road. I was damned cross at this blatant unfairness, so resolved to ‘do’ the 120s at flag fall, making good use of the ‘Old Girl’s’ 60mph [96.5kph] bottom gear. I certainly ‘did’ them, much to the consternation of the starter, officials, slower cars and the two XK120s. I took them both in bottom gear and was several lengths ahead of them by the first corner, but the oil seal in the back axle had failed — so did the brakes and I carried on up the escape road and I finally finished 14th.”
March 1952 and a class second and fifth FTD on the Canterbury Car Club Port Hills climb, then a flying quarter-mile in Dunedin slowed by battery problems.

From Race to Road

“The dawning of 1952 had brought me to the realisation that if I was going to continue serious motor racing, the old Railton would have to be replaced by a serious and more suitable racing car — competition was becoming tough. To this end, I decided the Railton would retire and be rebuilt as a four-seater sports/touring car. I commissioned Johnson & Smith in Christchurch to build a wooden-framed close-coupled four-seater, alloy-covered body with a 24-gallon [109-litre] rear slab tank and vertically-mounted spare wheel. The front of the car to the scuttle was left original. A new dash was fitted and a door provided on the passenger side. The work carried on while the motor was completely re-conditioned, and after about 15 months the ‘Old Girl’ was again on the road with a mohair hood and side curtains.”

By April 1955, Rob Shand was coping with a growing family and a new house and offering the Railton for sale, writing to Ron Roycroft — “The car has been completely rebuilt from the chassis upward. The motor has been completely done over and genuine American Hudson spares fitted wherever necessary. It has only done 6000 miles [9656km] since then and no competition. A complete new close-coupled four-seater open body has been built and very complete all-weather equipment of the best quality fitted, the hood and side-screens are made of silk-mohair.

“There is a new 23-gallon fuel tank, aero screens, tonneau cover and good tyres. There are various spares and the all-up weight is just over 23cwt [1168kg]. The steering ratio has been raised to two turns from lock to lock and the weight distribution improved. She runs perfectly on pump fuel with the present compression ratio of about seven to one.

“The most difficult job for me is to get put a fair price on her. The receipts for the body job are available and the engine spares and overhaul cost over £100, as you can imagine with American parts. I have a figure of £750 in mind, but you may think that is a bit high even though there are no four-seater sports cars of comparable performance available today.”

Shand was hoping that perhaps Roycroft would take the Railton in trade on a pre or post war American saloon, but was retrospectively delighted that Roycroft was not interested in a deal. As the Shand family grew, the Light Sports stayed parked, unused until Rob had an accident in the family Citroën in 1969 and the Railton was brought back into service.

There would be more racing, now with son Robert at the wheel, running faster than his father and winning two vintage races at Levels Raceway in 1970 ahead of the experienced Ray Archibald in an SS100.
Races at Ruapuna and a hill climb on Patmos Avenue in Dunedin followed, but power was ebbing and the car was sent to Ian Jones at Jones Motors in Fairlie, a famous old firm that had prepared the ’20s Sunbeams for CWF (Bill) Hamilton. The transformation was reflected in equal FTD at the Chelsea Walsh hill climb in Auckland and a good run at Dunedin’s Three Mile Hill in January 1979, where the old Railton beat three XK120s in the process.

Sadly, Rob died in 2002 and son James eventually took over the Light Sports, and is fettling the gallant old charger back to its former verve with a view to competing in vintage events. James enjoys the best of all worlds, with a 50-acre vineyard near Burnham, south of Christchurch, bottling under the Straight Eight Estate label as a link to the Railton, and he feeds the workforce south of the railway at Gobstoppers on Antigua Street in Christchurch.

The vineyard made a splendid backdrop for Terry Marshall’s photographs and, of course, a vineyard is always a favourite venue for your Humble Servant¦

Words: Eoin Young Photos: Terry Marshall

With unpredictable and often atrocious winter weather conditions including snow down to sea level at the drop of a hat, it’s no wonder that every second vehicle on the road is a 4×4. What I wasn’t expecting to see, though, was a 1942 Willys Jeep.

Kaikoura’s Jack Kemp has been a classic car enthusiast for as long as he can remember, previously owning the likes of a 1938 Buick Straight 8, and he’s the current owner of a fully restored 1953 Queen’s Coronation Ferguson tractor complete with pristine grey and gold paint scheme.

Jack also has a passion for military memorabilia, boasting a fairly extensive collection to go with his amazingly original 1942 Willys Jeep. Actually, as it turns out, we were quite fortunate to even see the Willys, as Jack commented that he only drives in on fine days and, due to the appalling weather on the day, we were fortunate that he decided to brave the elements and bring it along for our photo-shoot.

If the weather had been a little kinder we would have seen the Ferguson tractor as well; but not to worry, Jack has extended an invitation for us to visit his home garage at a later date. As you can see Jack was well prepared; notice the full-length military coat, it was bloody cold. I remember putting basically every stitch of clothing I had in my suitcase on to keep warm, I felt a bit like Bibendum — the Michelin man — but the show had to go on, as they say.

Kaikoura’s coastline is picture postcard perfect on a fine day, and quite spectacular when the weather closes in. We were fortunate to experience both during our stay, as we tried to capture the rough beauty of the white foaming sea with surrounding snow-capped mountains in the shoot. Our photographer was forced to abandon the first location after both he and Jack were drenched when completely swamped by a rogue wave.

Machine-gun Jack

Three years ago, Jack decided he would advertise throughout New Zealand for an original Willys Jeep. He knew this wouldn’t be an easy exercise, as most have been molested or wrecked over the years and robbed for parts. According to Jack, original examples are few and far between, and he didn’t have overly high expectations of finding anything terribly spectacular.
Jack was fortunate enough to track down this Willys Jeep from an elderly gentleman just down the road, in Rangiora. He couldn’t believe his luck, as it was just what he was searching for. The Jeep was almost perfectly original, apart from the 30-caliber machine gun that had originally been mounted on the back. Although, strange as it may seem, another elderly chap, the neighbour of the gentleman who owned the Jeep, had the original machine gun that belonged to the vehicle in his garage, and Jack is still trying to persuade the owner to part with it. Jack is also trying to trace back the Jeep’s history, as it was apparently used as a military vehicle for many years at the Burnham Military Camp, just south of Christchurch.

Military Connections

The word Jeep is derived from the letters GP (General Purpose), which when slurred together to form the word Jeep.
The history of this amazingly versatile little vehicle goes right back to around 1908, when John Willys purchased the Overland Automotive Company in Indianapolis, Indiana. The business was successful, and as sales grew the capacity to build reliable cars was increased to cater for increased demand, and a new manufacturing plant was build in Toledo, Ohio

In 1912 the Willys-Overland Company was formed and production commenced on the Willys-Knight series vehicles, as well as the popular Whippet. Bankruptcy during the depression caused the company to restructure and became Willys-Overland Motors Inc. in 1936.

During World War I, the British and American armies had four-wheel-drive trucks to travel across heavy terrain carrying troops and military equipment. The need for a more versatile, multipurpose on- and off-road vehicle was increasing. At around this time, the Army Quartermaster Corps was ready to consider a light reconnaissance vehicle. Actually it had been toying with the idea since the end of World War I in 1918, but really had no idea what it wanted.

The US Army had become largely a sort of country club in the years after World War I, as soldiers were enduring distressingly slow promotions, and long placements at demanding assignments with disagreeable conditions. Molly-coddled headquarters officers often turned down requests from the field, for fear that it might upset their cushy assignments. In addition, the President and Congress were not disposed to spending money on the military, and it showed. Even if they had been fully funded, many officers were not inclined to welcome the development of new motorised vehicles.

A vehicle with the capability to drive across any terrain suddenly became imperative for the military with the onset of World War II. The European war had started in 1939, threatening the entire world. Despite protestations against the US entering into a ‘foreign’ war, President Roosevelt was a practical man and understood that sooner or later, America would have to
get involved.

He quietly ordered the military to take action in getting items they needed to go to war should it arise. With the Truman Commission looking into everything the military was doing, the rush was on. Then, on July 11, 1940, Army QMC specifications for bid were released to 135 manufacturers. Bids had to be returned in 22 days. As well, it demanded that a pilot vehicle be available in 49 days.

Further complicating things, the bid demanded that 70 prototype vehicles be available for evaluation in 75 days. Only three companies were willing to take on the challenge — Ford Motor Company, the American Bantam Company and Willys-Overland.

Winning the contract

Initially, the American Bantam Company was contracted to supply its required 70 prototype vehicles to the military for testing, resulting in complete failure. With Word War II well under way, pressure was now on the other two companies to provide prototypes for rigorous testing, and it was eventually decided that Willys-Overland would get the final nod of approval.

Willys-Overland immediately stepped up to the challenge, producing America’s first four-wheel-drive quarter-ton utility vehicle. The vehicle proved beyond doubt to be dependable and supremely rugged, reaching high acclaim by the end of the war. The company also had begun to promote the versatility of the Jeep as a work and recreational vehicle as early as 1942, having realised the potential market for a civilian version with returned serviceman.

However, the focus was still firmly on the war, and all efforts were focused on supplying the armed services not only with Jeeps, but also munitions and military equipment as part of the war effort. The company was also responsible for creating the ‘Robomb’, which was the allied version of the German V2 rocket; plus shells, projectiles and bullet cores as well as aircraft landing gear parts. The military eventually purchased over 350,000 Jeeps during the ’40s at a cost of US$784.74 each, such was the support for the Willy’s Jeep.

At the end of the war, Willys filed for the trademark registration of the name Jeep and began production for the public. The original model, the Civilian Jeep (CJ) entered production in 1945, and before long Jeep became a household name for dependable, tough, go anywhere vehicles.

Over the follow years Jeeps became popular with farmers, construction workers and trades people as the new civilian models were equipped with a larger tailgate, larger headlights and a side-mounted spare wheel.

By 1962 the Jeep Waggoner was introduced as the first four-wheel drive vehicle with automatic transmission.

Previous to that, Kaiser purchased Willys-Overland for $60 million then American Motors Corporation (AMC) took over Kaiser Jeep in 1970. Four wheel drives had become increasingly popular not only as recreational and trade vehicles but as everyday drivers, pushing production to the limits at 600 units a day, 10 times that of only a decade earlier.

The introduction of the CJ-7 saw the first real significant change to the original Jeep design in over 20 years. With a longer wheelbase, it would also offer the automatic transmission as optional. The popular CJ-8, known as the Scrambler, was produced soon after.

In 1987 the American Motors Corporation was bought by Chrysler, which then merged with Daimler Benz in 1998. In an attempt to retain some of the old Willys Jeep’s character, the original-style grille has been incorporated into today’s models, but in my opinion, it’s a far cry from that versatile little Willy’s Jeep that diligently served so many military personnel throughout the wars of the last century.

Words: Ashly Webb    Photos: Sean Craig

Mark talks to Dunedin historic motoring racing enthusiast, Ralph Smith about the latest addition to his classic racing stable

A Lola T70 MkII is the latest addition to Ralph’s line-up, which includes three New Zealand hybrids — the Lycoming Special, the Citroën Spyder and a Rhubarb 3 — as well as a superb Jaguar-powered HWM single-seater replica. This 1966 CanAm sports car provides quite a contrast. It is a genuine factory car built for Italian driver Umberto Maglioli, who was better known as a Ferrari works driver, although he also piloted a Ford GT40 at Le Mans.

There is reason to suspect Maglioli never campaigned the Lola. It arrived here in 1969, ending up in the hands of Jim Boyd, a former owner of the Lycoming Special which Smith now also owns.

“It apparently arrived in virtually brand new condition,” Ralph says. “There has been some suggestion that it had never been raced. I’ve been told the engine was sitting in it and hadn’t been properly bolted in place.”

Early racing history

Jim Boyd soon sorted out the 350 Chevrolet-powered Lola and — with the car in Rothmans Cambridge livery — won the 1970 New Zealand sports car championship, holding out the Elfin-Chevrolet of Grahame Harvey which won the championship in 1969 and again in 1971.

Boyd had earlier secured third place in the 1969 championship in the chain-driven Stanton-Corvette. Ironically, it was this car which wiped out one side of the Lola at a meeting in Timaru in 1971, when both cars had an off in the same place.

The damaged Lola was sold to Baron Robertson, who planned to turn it into a road car. It then passed through several more hands until about three years ago it came into Ralph’s possession.

Restoration

By that stage Queenstown enthusiast Rob Boult, who drives the tremendous red Cadillac-powered Allard often seen racing at classic car events, had begun the task of putting the Lola back to its former glory.
Queenstown car restorer Ray Larsen had repaired the tub and was in the process of getting a new fibreglass body made.

Ralph then had the task of putting it all back together, along with a dry-sump 5735cc (350ci) Chevrolet engine which had been rebuilt by Bruce Saxton in Dunedin.

It took two years of Ralph’s ‘spare time’ — which he had to divide between the Lola and another major project, his beautifully constructed 1950s HWM replica. “I was also trying to keep another car in racing condition so I could go to the odd meeting,” Ralph says. While he may have seemed over committed, it was a case of flinging open the door when opportunity knocks.

“When the Lola came available I had to decide virtually then and there. If you don’t take that sort of opportunity it may never come again.”

Ralph says there are half a dozen or so such ¨Lolas competing in historic racing in the United States, and a similar number in England. However, it is the only one of its type in Australasia.

Lola SL71/30 today

Ralph’s T70 looks eye-catching back in the familiar Cambridge colours. One of the first things that strikes you, aside from its beautiful lines, is the fact it is so low. You could just about trip over it.

The highest point on the bodywork is where the guards gracefully sweep up over the wheels. At the front the nose drops away between the arches and there is an ingenious scooping system which takes air through the radiator then out again over the front windscreen — apparently helping to generate much needed downforce.

Inside, the driver’s most tender parts are poised only centimetres from the tarmac, the only protection a lightweight racing seat and a little aluminium alloy. One’s head is barely above wheel level and behind it the Dell’orto carbs poke their trumpets just far enough above the parapet to suck in the air. The curvaceous body is rounded out by the upwards flick of the tail spoiler.

Ralph is sensibly taking his time getting used to the 373kW (500bhp) he now has on tap from the 5.7-litre V8. To date he has used the Lola largely for demonstration purposes, including a few laps at Queenstown last year to gave spectators a small taste of its potential. An outing at Ruapuna was ended by a blown hose. “I was only just getting to work out the correct tyre pressures,” Ralph explains. “It’s critical, especially with a 500 horsepower-plus car with relatively skinny tyres. It has as much power as a Formula 5000, but considerably less rubber.” Ralph laments the lack of a permanent race track in Dunedin on which to test and familiarise himself with the car.

“The Lola lacks a tight enough turning lock to go on the Dunedin street circuit — you’d virtually have to slide it around some of the corners.”

It would be most at home on the wide open spaces of Wigram — where in its heyday it used to hit 241-257kph (150-160mph) — or even Teretonga. With two other race-ready cars to select from — the Lycoming Special and the HWM — Ralph can afford to pick and choose his events, however, enthusiasts can look forward to seeing the T70 at full cry.

Lola and the T70

Lola’s T70 is another successful example of marrying British chassis building expertise to American grunt. Founder and chief designer Eric Broadley — a quantity surveyor turned racing car builder — cut his teeth on his MkI sports racing car and a number of single-seaters, before turning his attention to a new MkVI coupe prototype for the 1963 Racing Car Show at Olympia in London.

This car set the pattern, using a monocoque tub with two D-shaped fuel tanks on each side of the cockpit while subframes held the suspension. A mid-mounted 4.2-litre (265ci) Ford V8, delivering 261kW (350bhp) at 7000rpm, supplied the push.

A pretty glass reinforced plastic body completed the package, giving an all up weight of 675kg, which required 200kg of ballast to meet the allowable minimum — a potent grunt-to-grams combination with handling to match.

The GT40 and McLaren connection

The new Lola caught the eye of Ford, which was looking to build its own supercar — the Ford GT40 — and it purchased two MkVI coupes for evaluation.

In a strange twist, the car was tested, and given an enthusiastic write-up, by Bruce McLaren, who would later become a great competitor of Lola.

Ford took Broadley on board, but they eventually fell out over several design aspects — particularly the widespread use of steel in the chassis rather than aluminium braced with steel.

In 1964 he left, revived Lola cars and set about building the T70 — the car some suggest is the one he wanted to build for Ford.

US success

While Broadley was at Ford in 1963, the US Road Racing Championship (USRRC) had been launched, and he could see that the Group 9 two-seaters with big American engines were the new wave and responded with the T70.
Again he used a monocoque tub using a sheet steel floor and large D-shaped sills. The engine, any American stock block up to 6.0 litres coupled to a Hewland LG500 gearbox, became a semi-stressed member.

Front suspension used upper and lower wishbones with coil and damper units, while steering was via a BMC rack and pinion unit, from the Austin 1100! The rear end used inverted wishbones at the bottom, and a single link at the top with twin radius rods. Wheelbase was 2410mm with a 1370mm track.

Once again the crowning glory was a beautiful, aerodynamic glass fibre body.

Lola joined forces with John Surtees, who soon demonstrated the car’s potential, beating Formula 1 times on several tracks.

T70 Mk 2

After making 15 cars Broadley wanted to make the T70 even lighter, and so developed the MkII — the version owned by Ralph Smith.

The tub became 85 per cent aluminium alloy with only 15 per cent sheet steel instead of 60 per cent. Rivets replaced welds, reputedly saving 30kg, while another 15kg was shaved by not colour impregnating the body.

Suspension geometry was modified and Lola moved to eight inch-wide wheels on the front and 10 on the rear. Stopping was via inboard 321mm-diameter ventilated discs front and rear.

The result was an appreciably faster car which won the 1965 Guards International Trophy at Silverstone on its first outing, ahead of none other than Bruce McLaren.

In a T70 Denny Hulme took six victories out of seven races in the UK, finishing the season with outright lap records at seven British circuits. However, the writing was on the pit walls, and Group 9 cars were dropped from the UK calendar at the end of 1966.

CanAm

Across the Atlantic, though, the first few lines of a golden chapter in Lola history were being written; Lola T70s were second and third overall in the USRRC behind a McLaren.

Soon after, the rich CanAm series was launched, attracting Formula 1 drivers and champions to sports car racing. John Surtees won the inaugural race — ominously followed by Bruce McLaren in second — and T70s won five of the six races in 1966.

In 1967 Team McLaren’s M6A turned the tables on the Mark 3 Lola T70, winning five of the six rounds and leaving Surtees with just one victory — the ‘Bruce and Denny show’ had arrived. McLaren was at the start of a five CanAm championship winning streak.

The Lola T70 in its various guises continued to taste success in other parts of the world for several years to come. The Mark 3 GT, a Group 6 coupe designed for endurance racing in Europe, showed it had the speed — often setting fast lap times — but struggled with reliability.

Mark 3B versions, both in open-top and GT form, continued to be built up until 1970.

In all more than 150 T70s were built, and it was number 30 — SL71/30 — which came to New Zealand and is now in Ralph Smith’s hands.

Words & Photos: Mark Wright

If you’re going to build a car yourself — why not build your own supercar?

One question I’ve often asked myself is what gives a car ‘supercar’ status?

It appears to me that the definition of a supercar varies hugely, and from what I can gather, three elements remain constant — a top speed in the region of 300kph plus; handling beyond your wildest dreams; and the ability to attract the unwanted attention of local police officers.

So, does the term ‘supercar’ equate solely to high-performance cars, or is high-cost and exclusivity sufficient to gain entry into this elite class? For example; would you consider a Bentley Arnage Turbo a supercar? Probably not, although it’s dependent totally on whose opinion you ask. As we all know, performance goalposts are constantly changing, and I doubt whether one can ascribe a certain minimum performance criteria standard — for example; ‘Must reach 320kph, must accelerate to 100kph in under 4.9 seconds.’

At the end of the day a supercar is a high-end sports car that often costs more than most people would ever dream of paying and, as such, usually only the very rich can afford such vehicles, which are considered more status symbols than practical modes of transportation.

The supercar designation could apply to any number of cars and the definition between an ordinary sports car and supercar is somewhat blurred. Generally, a supercar will have an engine that is capable of producing several hundred kilowatts enabling the car to achieve staggering top speeds and acceleration that would leave most drivers gasping for breath. In some cases, supercars are used as race-cars although, as a rule, this is not generally the case as supercars are specialized instruments built for speed and not necessarily for racing. The supercar often does not have the safety features needed for a truly safe racing experience.

While supercars have attracted the attention and imagination of many, they have also attracted the ire of some, often looked upon as gluttonous machines that do nothing but create envy while causing irreparable harm the environment.

Ultimate Dream

Mark Wilson confesses to not being a petrol-head and, in fact, is not at all mechanically minded, or so he says. His first and only experience with a classic car was when he owned a Corvette Stingray many years ago, and he has since built a mobile home, which has been home for the past five and a half years. Mark’s work involves extensive travelling around New Zealand, and the mobile home was the perfect choice. Looking inside his massive mobile home, which had been a luxury coach in a previous life, it was clearly obvious that Mark’s technical abilities are substantially higher than he was letting on, and his modest nature in this area was rather refreshing.

Mark has always admired exotic cars and hoped that one day he could construct his own. He was originally going to build himself a hot rod — that was until he spotted a picture of an Ultima GTR in a magazine whilst passing through Stratford, back in 2000. Mark believed that the Ultima would far exceed his budget, but after years of intense investigation, concluded that he could build one himself without blowing the budget.

Seven years later Mark ordered his Ultima GTR. It was just a matter of simply sending a cheque off to the British manufacturer of this beauty. In due course the car arrived in New Zealand, all wrapped up in dozens (45 to be exact) of boxes. No engine, though.

No engine, I hear you say. Well, before you turn the page you’re not going to believe this because, once the specially built engine arrived from Chevrolet specialist, American Speed, this car had the potential to be quicker than the latest Porsche Turbo or any standard Ferrari.

Mind you, to be fair, unlike these production cars the Ultima GTR is more or less a street-tuned race-car, which is difficult to climb in and out of while lacking such features as air bags and most creature comforts.

The street legal Ultima GTR went through 14 months of research and development before being launched in 1999. This extensive R&D ensured this low-volume supercar delivered the highest levels of fit, finish and performance. The chassis and suspension package has been extensively road and race tested in Ultima’s existing Sports model.

With a car capable of speeds in excess of 320kph, aerodynamic efficiency was of significant importance. With this in mind, Ultima’s engineers gave the car a long rear to help clean up the airflow and improve downforce — all fully tested at MIRA (the Motor Industry Research Association).

MIRA was so impressed by the results that it was happy to have the Ultima GTR as the centre of its show display at the 2000 Autosport International show at the NEC in Birmingham.

The Build

The Ultima GTR can be bought as a turnkey supercar, however, it is also available in component form, for assembly by home enthusiasts such as Mark Wilson.

Mark commenced building his GTR in August 2007. With 100 steps to follow Mark studied the assembly manual and CD intently, and usually had his laptop set up ready so that he could refer to the CD for any additional information along the way.

He was impressed by the superb quality of all the components and engineering throughout the car.

The chassis was developed over thousands of kilometres of track testing, and is a fully triangulated space frame with integral crash protection zones. It is also fully jigged for total uniformity and includes all suspension mounting points and an integral roll-cage welded to the main frame.

The chassis’ final finish is powder coated black to form a corrosion-free finish. The suspension components — including wishbones, uprights and toe links — are all precisely manufactured using the very best materials. The entire brake system includes lightweight TIG-welded pedals, a carefully balanced master cylinder with SVA approved fluid level warning system and specially designed AP Racing curved vane, cross-drilled 320mm brake rotors and four-pot alloy callipers suitable for road and track day use.

The centrally located steering rack, which allows for an angled steering column, features an alloy casing specially designed for Ultima by Triton. Other special items include the front hubs, brake lines, cooling system, gear linkages, custom alloy fuel tanks, coil-over spring dampers, drive shafts, wiring looms, stainless steel exhaust system, laminated front windscreen and shatterproof polycarbonate side screens — all supplied by Ultima and manufactured to the highest quality.

The Ultima GTR wheels are custom designed with CNC-machined, solid billet alloy centres bolted to anodized rims supplied by OZ Racing.

Inside the Ultima GTR interior is somewhat sparse, as you would expect from this type of car. However, the leather-wrapped seats and white instrumentation add a touch of class and contrast nicely with the body, which is constructed from unstressed GRP finished in red.

The Ultima GTR engines are developed and built specially for Ultima by American Speed, USA. Ultima chief, Ted Marlow, investigated many engine options from around the world before choosing American Speed as the exclusive engine supplier to Ultima.

The engine in Mark’s GTR is the 6.3-litre version boasting AFR 195 CNC-ported aluminium cylinder heads, an Edelbrock intake manifold with Holley carburettor, a Mallory distributor, competition hydraulic roller camshaft, Eagle rods and a RPM 4130 steel crankshaft combining to develop approximately 394kW (529bhp). The engine is mated to a Porsche G50 five-speed transaxle.

Mark is amazed at how well the car came together, and it required only a some phone calls to Ultima to confirm a few queries throughout the build process. The overall finish and build quality is what you would expect from a production vehicle and cannot be faulted.

Hanging On

After our photo shoot Mark treated us to a ride in his GTR, something I wasn’t expecting — but deep down hoped he would offer.

Firstly, the trick was climbing into this beast after a few instructions from Mark as what to hang on to. It was very important that every limb be strategically positioned in order to slide in. I expect that after a few entries and exits this could be achieved with a little more finesse than I could manage. Once I was snuggled inside the cockpit, Mark assisted in adjusting the full harness safety belts and ensured that I was well restrained. His entry was 10 times quicker than mine, and within a few seconds the small block Chevy V8 was rumbling behind my ears.

These engines have a completely different sound when gases are emitted through stainless steel exhaust systems, it’s somewhat crisper and emanates a higher note than from a standard mild steel system.

As we headed off rather sedately, my eyes were everywhere, trying not to miss anything — from the impeccably trimmed dash pad and refreshingly simple layout with its five plain white gauges logically placed, to the expressions on people’s faces as we drove by.

Mark was also talking to me, telling me all about the car’s handling characteristics and how easy it was to drive around town. It actually wasn’t that hard to hold a conversation, as the cabin was extremely intimate to say the least and, as the gear-shift was tucked neatly between the driver’s seat and right sill, there wasn’t much space between passenger and driver.

I was waiting for it — you know what I’m talking about! You don’t go for a ride in one of the world’s fastest supercars just for a leisurely cruise around the block and, as we were in fifth gear (I was counting), I was waiting a little nervously for the change down.

Then it happened — Mark’s hand reached down and selected third gear and all hell broke loose. Everything happened in split seconds as the hand-built Chevy screamed into action, producing relentless power and propelling us forward like nothing I could ever have imagined. I should have expected exactly this, knowing the GTR’s official performance figures — 0-100kph in around 2.6 seconds — but it still took my breath away as I was slammed into the back of the Ultima’s leather-lined passenger seat.

Although my eyes were being forced into the back of my skull, I managed to keep at least one sunken orb on Mark, who was utilising all his skills to keep the GTR’s venomous power under control as he attempted to keep this rocket-ship travelling in a straight line under full-bore acceleration. However, when the GTR’s rear rubber gained traction, stickability seemed almost endless and, after that initial burst of energy, the car never showed any further signs of becoming unstuck.

That instant acceleration was absolutely unbelievable, and in what seemed literally seconds we had run out of road and the sensational AP Racing brakes were sloughing off the speed as Mark set the car up for the next corner.

He told me that he hadn’t yet fitted the Ultima’s front splitter because it was too low to the ground, which would cause problems around town, and at high speed it was obvious that the front was starting to become a little unstable without this vital aerodynamic aid. He pointed this out as we stormed down the road — although, by this stage, I could barely hear Mark above the thunderous roar of the V8. As we ambled back to Mark’s home, my adrenaline levels slowly returned to normal. Even then, I couldn’t quite believe what I had just experienced. More importantly, how could I accurately convey the exhilaration of this machine without making it sound like just another fast car. I have read that there isn’t a car on the planet that can run with the Ultima GTR, and that it has broken just about every single speed record there is to break. On the strength of my eye-popping ride in Mark’s car, that’s something I don’t have any difficulty in believing. Sensational would be a severe understatement of the GTR’s capabilities.

The Ultima GTR is a supercar in every sense of the word. When coupled with the top spec engine available a maximum speed of over 320kph is possible — and you can build one yourself in the home garage!

Ultima History

The Ultima GTR was born in the UK. Lee Noble, a freelance car designer, designed and built the first Ultima in 1983 for a British kit-car racing series. It used many Renault parts, including a 200kW V6 engine mounted amidships. The Ultima was so successful on the track that Noble went on to sell 40 race-cars before 1988, when he updated it. One of the 13 new models was purchased for about $25,000 by a civil engineer named Ted Marlow.

Marlow was a weekend racer and did what most race-car owners do — he customised the Ultima to his liking by swapping the V6 for a 328kW (440bhp) Chevrolet small-block V8. In 1992 — after four years of modifying and perfecting his V8-powered Ultima — Marlow, then 44, purchased Noble’s enterprise. Marlow intended to transform the Ultima into a civilised street car, but one that retained track prowess.

During this 18 month project, Marlow replaced the Renault parts with Ultima-specific units. He outsourced various bits and pieces but did most of the work himself, for example brakes were designed and supplied by AP Racing.
Since 1995 Ted Marlow’s small factory in Hinckley, England, has turned out about 200 Ultimas and has recently began selling them in California through the Costa Mesa shop belonging to Mike Mullen, a retired marketing executive.

McLaren Connection

McLaren was so attracted to the Ultima’s excellent engineering, outright speed, lap times and racing prowess that it decided to choose the Ultima to be used as a drivetrain test bed during the development of one of the world’s most expensive and prestigious road cars, the McLaren F1. The fact that the Ultima was significantly under the design weight of the proposed F1 car and was proportionately very similar was also an important factor in the decision.
Postscript

Mark completed the construction of his Ultima in exactly one year and, due to ongoing University studies and the fact that he is unable to drive the GTR as much as he would like, has regretfully decided to put his self-built masterpiece up for sale. If you are in the market for something very special, direct serious enquiries to Mark at — signsandwonders@xtra.co.nz.

2009 Ultima GTR – Specifications

Engine        American Speed, Chevrolet V8        Capacity         6.3-litre
Valves         Two valves per cylinder/ohv
C/R         9.8:1
Max power         395kW
Max torque         700Nm at 4200rpm
Fuel system     Four barrel Holley carburettor
Transmission     Porsche G50 five speed transaxle
Suspension F/R     ¨Unequal length wishbones with Nylatron joints, adjustable coil spring dampers
Steering         Rack and pinion
Brakes         F/R power assisted AP Racing discs
Dimensions:
Overall Length     4000mm
Width         1850mm
Wheelbase         2560mm
Height         1070mm
Kerb weight     990kg
Performance:
Max speed         342kph estimated
0-100kph         2.6 seconds
Standing 1/4 mile     9.9 seconds

Words: Ashley Webb, Photos: Dan Wakelin

Tim samples two very different Cobra replicas — a traditional roadster and a spectacular Daytona coupe

The Superformance Cobra is probably the best you can get next to a real Cobra — surely one of the most replicated and classic sports cars in history — and has the blessing of Carroll Shelby and Pete Brock, the instigators of the original Cobra and Daytona coupe back in the ’60s. There are few cars more rare and valuable than a real Shelby Cobra, but the Daytona is one of them. Like the Cobra, the Daytona coupes were fast and beautiful to look at, with the body wrapped as tightly around the mechanical components as possible; a case of shoehorning the biggest power unit into the smallest possible package. We covered much of the Shelby Cobra story in our April 2004 issue.

John Tojiero designed the original chassis in the 1950s around an AC, and subsequently a Bristol engine, for AC Cars of Thames-Ditton. It manufactured all but one or two of the original chassis for Carroll Shelby, whose idea it was to put a large American engine into a lightweight chassis for racing, and who persuaded the Ford Motor Company to finance the exercise in order to promote Shelby and Ford’s sporting images.

Ford Credit paid AC for shipping complete cars to Dean Moon’s Venice workshop, where Shelby installed Ford’s new 3622cc (221ci) small block V8 to take on the Corvette and challenge Ferrari and Jaguar domination at the race tracks in the USA. Pete Brock and Ken Miles developed the Cobra, giving it disc brakes, rack and pinion steering, a bigger radiator and more cubes (up to 4736cc (289ci)). Halibrand wheels became standard wear, and the tyres soon started to outgrow the car’s wheel arches.

More power

Ford wanted to fit its bigger, heavier 6997cc (427ci) big-block engine, which Shelby had tried and found was way beyond the standard AC chassis.

Seeing Ford indulging in the GT40 programme prompted Shelby to try harder, as he wanted some of the action when Ford’s mid-engined GT programme got going.

Shelby persuaded AC to re-engineer the chassis for increased torsional stiffness, independent coil-over-shocks, wishbone suspension all-round and an increased track. On the short US tracks, acceleration won races, and the Cobra’s formula of high power and low weight was successful, but even with the 427 engine the Cobra’s bluff shape hit a wall of air on the long straight tracks of Europe, where world championships were at stake, limiting its top speed.

AC prepared two factory Cobras for Le Mans 1963, essentially standard Cobra roadsters fitted with Dunlop racing wheels. Both cars had the rare ‘Le Mans Hardtop,’ an early attempt at aerodynamic improvement. This increased top speed by 16 to 24kph down the 5.6km Mulsanne Straight. The Cobra finished seventh in 1963, first in the GT class for production cars behind six lightweight Ferrari prototypes. However, if the Cobra was to capture the World Manufacturer’s Championship, a significant further increase in top speed would be needed.

Need for Speed

At 280 kilowatts (375hp), the stock block Ford 289 V8 was approaching the limit of its reliable power potential. The body was already wrapped pretty tightly about the mechanicals, and weight had been pared to a minimum. Pete Brock (not to be confused with the Aussie racing legend of the same name), an ex-GM designer working at Shelby’s California base, understood that a higher top speed could only be achieved by low drag.

At least 100 examples had to be produced before a car could be homologated to race as a GT rather than a prototype. Ironically, Enzo Ferrari himself had masterminded the loophole in FIA regulations that Brock needed to get official approval for his low-drag Cobra body. Ferrari’s beautiful but rather blunt 250 GT Berlinetta had, by 1961, reached its own aerodynamic limits. Enzo needed the FIA’s blessing to drop an aerodynamic GTO body onto the Berlinetta’s chassis, without being required to produce another 100 replicas as required for homologation into the GT class. To get homologation, Ferrari lobbied for the creation of Appendix J in the FIA GT rules.

Appendix J stated that you could change the body or change the chassis, but not both. The FIA intended it to cover relatively minor tweaking of an existing body shape in order to allow a small manufacturer to revise an existing shape to new tyre sizes, lighting or cooling requirements, but Ferrari drove a bus through Appendix J, dropped the completely different aerodynamic GTO body onto the Berlinetta chassis and subsequently blew the doors off the lightweight Jaguars and Astons.

Pete Brock designed a sinuous tight coupe body, not unlike the GTO, to fit the AC Cobra. Shelby gave him a guarded go-ahead to proceed, provided the project didn’t take any resources from the team’s mainstream efforts. Only Ken Miles, a highly respected driver and development engineer from England, understood what Peter was up to and lent his considerable influence in convincing Shelby the coupe was worthwhile.

Kiwi Original

The American team’s regular fabrication crew wanted nothing to do with the proposed coupe, only temporary hire New Zealander John Ohlsen was interested. Ohlsen had yet to be accepted into the tightly knit Shelby teamsters, so they were relieved that Ohlsen could be assigned to the project, leaving them free to continue work on ‘their’ roadsters. Thus Brock, Miles and Ohlsen were the only people involved in the construction of the first coupe.
Brock’s objectives were to wrap the skin even more tightly and smooth out the air flow whilst, most importantly, meeting the FIA regulations for windows, windshield and spare tyre. His personal challenge was to make it aesthetically pleasing.

On February 1, 1964, Brock and Ohlsen’s work was first tested at Riverside by Ken Miles, who shattered the team’s lap record by three and a half seconds. Aerodynamics, they established, were important.

The coupe’s competition debut came three weeks later, at Daytona. The new Ferrari GTO dominated the field in numbers, but every one was left in the Kamm-tailed Cobra’s wake. The Shelby coupe was five laps in the lead when a pit fire took it out of contention, burning Ohlsen badly in the process. After that race, the press began to call it the Daytona Coupe. At Sebring in March, it took its first win in the GT class. By bending the rules for his own purposes, Ferrari had fallen on his own sword.

Impressed, Ford then discretely agreed to back Shelby’s bid to win the World GT Championship as the series moved to Europe. Ohlsen’s plywood body buck was sent to Carrozzeria Gran Sport in Modena, where the five coupe replicas required for the 1964-’65 season were to be built. The Italian craftsmen, who believed they were ‘improving’ on Brock’s radically shaped tail and correcting a mistake, reshaped it, and added an additional two inches of headroom in error. This turned out to be a blessing as it allowed 1.88-metre Dan Gurney into a cockpit designed around the smaller Ken Miles. The error was corrected for the remaining coupes when Ohlsen was sent to oversee the build of the remaining cars.  Both roadsters and coupes were campaigned in Europe during the 1964 season, the coupes showing their form on the faster courses. The first European win came at Le Mans 1964, with Bob Bondurant and Dan Gurney taking first in GT and fourth overall, well amongst the more nimble prototypes. After Le Mans, it was victory after victory.

Italian Retreat

Unable to beat the all-conquering Daytona Coupes on the track, Ferrari tried to get his mid-engined 250LM prototype homologated as a GT car, but with only a handful of cars in existence, the FIA refused. In retaliation, Ferrari then pressured the Italian organisers of the final Championship event at Monza to cancel it, depriving Shelby of an almost certain victory and the points that would have carried them to the championship; a bit like the Aussie’s underarm bowling.

By weight of numbers and political philandering, Ferrari won the World Manufacturer’s Championship in 1964 by the narrowest of margins.

Shortly thereafter, Ferrari announced he would not field a factory GT team in 1965. Having caught the attention of those in charge of the Ford GT40, Shelby got some of that action and abandoned his Daytonas to the English Alan Mann racing organisation for 1965. In 1965, under Alan Mann, the Daytona Coupes took one-two, one-two-three, or one-two-three-four in eight of the 10 races and, of course, the Championship.

Finally, the original coupe was taken to Bonneville in November 1965 for a series of land speed record runs. It achieved 301kph (187mph) and 23 USAC/FIA world speed and distance records. The Daytona Coupe was never tested in a wind tunnel, but the Bonneville data allowed a calculation that revealed a drag coefficient of 0.29. As beautiful and successful as they were, the six original Daytona Coupes were surplus at the end of the winning 1965 season. Ford didn’t want a threat to the GT40 on the track, and its contract with Shelby stipulated that the Daytonas must be shelved, making way for the GT40’s assault on Ferrari.

Tax and Specter

The cars then languished in Alan Mann’s shop, Mann threatening to dump them in the North Sea rather than pay the tax penalties due if the cars remained in England. Mann’s accountants figured that it would be cheaper to fly them to Los Angeles, where they were initially advertised for sale for US$8500; after several years most sold in the $4000 to $5000 range. Today, the six original Daytona Coupes are each worth millions of dollars. The very first one vanished for 20 years, and became the subject of a bizarre ownership court battle involving the last recorded owner, legendary pop producer Phil Specter, who had driven it as a road car when it was worth nothing!

Having been refused a coupe by Shelby, the British Willment team built its own, using Kiwi John Ohlsen and Frank Gardner to build it. In terms of race successes and longevity, this car actually had the best record of all of them. AC also built a one-off Cobra Coupe for 1964 Le Mans. On June 10, 1964, testing in the early morning hours, it attained a speed of 298kph (185mph) on Britain’s M1 motorway. The uproar in the British press led to AC being blamed for the subsequent imposition of national speed limits in Britain.

This car was involved in a tragic accident at Le Mans and written off. As for John Ohlsen, he died suddenly in 1998, having built two FIA roadster replicas and having started building one Daytona Coupe in New Zealand (see NZCC September 1999 for a story on this Ohlsen-built coupe). His wife Jean, and son Paul, are still knowledgeable supporters of the Cobra fraternity in New Zealand.

History repeats

What if these heroes had the chance to do it all over again — would they do it differently? Bear in mind the first time round, under pressure of deadlines, rules and budget shortcuts, compromises were made. Well, South Africa’s Jim Price, of Hi-Tech, manufacturer of the widely acclaimed Noble sports car, gave them the opportunity.

Jim’s early research told him several things. First, a replica was impossible, as there was no definitive Daytona Coupe design — all six Daytonas were different. Second, the original frame and leaf spring suspension design was antiquated in 1963 when the Daytona was designed. Brock had no choice about the chassis design (remember Appendix J). Third, the original cars were too uncomfortable to command a following as a practical and usable car. The solution would be to create a new, definitive coupe from scratch, drawing on history, but creating a more modern car with spiritual ties to the past. Jim knew there was only one person who could really say what the definitive shape was — Peter Brock, the designer of the original.

Worthy originals

During a 1996 trip to California, Jim looked Brock up in the phone book. Peter had been approached a number of times, and he didn’t want to become involved with a kit car. When Jim replied that he would drop the idea then, Peter was curious as to why Jim would not proceed on his own. Jim replied that he wanted to do it right, and without Peter on board to show them how to do it right, he wouldn’t proceed.

More curious, Brock continued the conversation.

Jim assured Peter that if he joined the project, he could pull the plug at any time and the work would stop immediately. Impressed, Brock agreed to help if Jim would allow him to select Bob Negstad to handle the new car’s chassis design.

Negstad had never had the budget or the facilities at AC Cars to do what he really wanted for the 427 Cobra, having arrived at AC cars in England in 1964 to find the frame tubes had already been cut for a 2286mm wheelbase instead of the 2362mm wheelbase he had envisioned. He was forced to redesign the entire car in a couple of weeks to fit the revised wheelbase. Negstad never considered the 427 his best effort, and didn’t deliver what he’d ultimately wanted for the design.

The dream team was formed — Peter Brock with the body, Bob Negstad with the chassis, and Jim Price with the collateral and manufacturing facilities. They agreed that the Superformance Coupe could be a real street-legal GT. The team extended the wheelbase 76mm and increased length, width, and height proportionally. The longer and wider chassis allowed room to optimise suspension design.

Aesthetic Illusion

Brock felt that it was important in resizing the form to retain the key proportions, including the roofline, which was never done to his satisfaction with the original cars. The windscreen has a sharper rake and more curvature. The new car evokes the image of the original, but is more spacious. There is not a single line on the car that parallels the original, and it looks small in the street but is larger in every dimension than Shelby’s. The search for the right-looking tyres would delay the project for several years, such was the seriousness of their quest for perfection. It was not until 2002 that appropriate rubber became available.

Superformance makes a high quality fibreglass body with several carbon fibre components. In the sills the fully functional side pipes have built-in mufflers. Interior noise can be reduced by internally capping the side pipes and routing the exhaust out the rear. The windscreen is heated, tinted, and shatterproof, the wind-up curved side windows replace the original flat Perspex with a porthole, and the rear hatch is Lexan, tinted to reduce interior heat load.

The dash is reminiscent of the ’60s with Stewart-Warner gauges, and an array of toggle switches. Air conditioning, radio, and glove box are added to make the Daytona a true GT car. The space-frame chassis was designed for better torsional stiffness using the latest techniques and principles, and to accept a Tremec T-56 six-speed transmission and a BTR Hydratrack differential. A number of ‘crate’ engine manufacturers and custom engine builders now sell guaranteed engines from 5752cc to 6997cc (351 to 427ci) with power ratings from 283kW to 410 (380hp to 550) and above, so that choice is left to the final purchaser.

Like the Cobra Mk II, the front features unequal length A-arms with coil-over shocks, but the rear features unusually long lower arms that pivot almost at the chassis centreline. Hi-Tech worked with Bilstein and H&R to design coil-over shocks specifically for the coupe, the result being a comfortable, compliant ride and outstanding handling — a fine tribute to Bob Negstad, who died shortly after the first car was completed.

African Core

In South Africa, the project’s instigator and manufacturer, Jim Price, durability tested the coupe at speeds approaching 160kph on the unsealed roads of the Shamwari Game Reserve in South Africa, so its durability is not in question.

More than 600 craftsmen work in the spotlessly clean 25,000 square metre factory in Port Elizabeth on the southern tip of the African continent to produce what you see here.

The Shelby drivers would have been cooked, deafened, cramped and exhausted after even a short race in their Daytona Coupes, but it in the Superformance version — brought over to NZ by its Australian agent, Colin Turner — there are no such handicaps. The car’s interior is trimmed in Alcantara leather throughout, and uses high quality mouldings all made in-house to ensure that the car feels like a well groomed production car — one with enough insulation to make the V8 sound superb, but not intrusive. The long angled gear-lever appears as if it is looking for trouble, but changes are slick and easy, as are the pedal movements, pivoted off the floor.

The steering is light and precise, and it’s as if the car changes character once you are inside it. The race car appearance leads you to expect a raw and harsh experience, but you get the performance, a throaty V8 soundtrack and stunning performance in something you could drive from one end of the island to the other without stopping — a true GT with handling and grunt that would be at home on any track. This is no kit car or thinly disguised track car, but a GT that walks the walk and talks the talk.

Truly a stunning feat of quality engineering from Jim and the ‘originals.’

Load of Cobras

Colin Taylor’s company, Cobra Technology of Warragul, Victoria, has just supplied Auckland’s Bruce Atchinson with a Superformance MkIII, the South African company’s version of the Cobra 427SC. No mean Cobra racer himself in Australia, Colin regularly puts his Superformance though its paces on Australian race tracks. Cobra tech is the agent for Superformance in Australia, and you can buy a Cobra, Daytona or new GT40 from it, built under license from Carroll Shelby Licensing Inc.

Bruce was project manager for the electrics in the Sky Tower and appreciates good engineering. He has owned a few classics, and undertook a wealth of research before he settled on the best Cobra replica he could find.

Although every replica represents an ageless icon, subtle changes meet the demands of modern motoring. Like the later 427SC, the Superformance MkIII has fully independent, unequal length A-arms with adjustable coils over Bilsteins specifically designed for Superformance, hanging off a much better, stiffer chassis than the original.

The car has a fabricated steel pedal box assembly with adjustable pedal pads, while a Tilton clutch master cylinder together with an ATE brake booster clamps Australian PBR four-pot callipers with 325 by 32mm vented Wilwood rotors in front, 305mm by 25mm in rear. It uses Mazda rack and pinion steering, with an original-looking steering wheel behind some period-looking instruments specially manufactured by Smiths of England, and Lucas switches that are assembled in-house and placed in the original SC layout. Hand-made seats upholstered in German specification automotive leather flank a hand-crafted chrome shifter which controls a five-speed Tremec which, in turn, feeds a Ford 8.8 LSD.

Outboard of that are the authentic 15-inch original style one-piece aluminium knock-off, pin-drive Halibrand-style wheels, manufactured like everything else, in-house at Port Elizabeth. Between those bulging wheel arches are genuinely menacing side-mounted exhausts which have a bite worse than their truly thunderous bark if you touch them with your ankle when stepping out of the door.

The whole car is precision crafted, completely factory assembled and looks like an exact replica should, aesthetically and dimensionally correct, but made in glass fibre. Not that you would know it. All the edges are rolled over and reinforced, so the eye never falls on a glass strand or a sharp edge.

However, you can have hand-beaten aluminium off the original bucks if you want.

The Port Elizabeth plant is one of the most self-sufficient automotive manufacturing facilities in the world. Almost all manufacture and design is done in house at Superformance, few donor or previously designed parts are fitted to the car. From the ground up, components are designed specifically for the Superformance vehicle, making it sure-footed and reliable, but just as exciting as the great roadsters of the ’60s.

Is enough enough?

Bruce’s MkIII is just a little different to other Superformance cars in that he has chosen a 7538cc, 433kW (460ci, 580bhp) big-block built in New Zealand to produce 620Nm of gut-busting torque. ‘That ought to be enough’, I thought as I rumbled off, carefully letting out the meaty clutch. Well, I can tell you that in a car that feels like an automotive Jack Nicholson, this is as good as it gets. Wild, scary, explosive, obsessive and menacing in every way and truly, truly fun at any speed. In fairness its handling is not scary, indeed it is very good when you treat the throttle sensibly, but the potential? Well — if you are thinking of burying the throttle, pick a wide open space and take a big spade.

Its cruises superbly. Now I know how those Harley-Davidson riders feel with a mountain of torque from an engine that will fire every lamp post if you want it to. It’s probably the closest thing to a Buell-Harley-Davidson on four wheels, but faster. From 750rpm it will pull in fifth until the horizon rushes up to meet you. Bruce has offered me another go in his MkIII sometime in the future — can a kid have too much ice cream?

Superformanace Daytona Coupe – Specifications

Engines    Ford V8, pushrod ohv
Capacity    5752cc (351ci)
Max power    268kW (360bhp)
Max torque    400Nm
Suspension    ¨Front independent unequal length A-arms with adjustable coil-over telescopic shock absorbers¨Rear independent unequal length A-arms, fabricated hub carriers and coil-over shock absorbers
Steering    Rack and pinion
Brakes    ¨Front dual piston PBR callipers. 325x32mm vented rotors¨Rear dual piston PBR callipers and 305x25mm vented rotors
Wheels    ¨Front 18x8in cast alloy¨Rear 18x10in cast alloy
Tyres    ¨Front 255/45 R18 Rear 285/50 R18
Dimensions
Length / Width    4445mm/1869mm
Height / Weight    1250mm/1320kg
Wheelbase    2367mm
Track F/R    1435mm/1481mm
Weight Distr.    F/R — 46.8/53.2
Performance
Max speed    322kph
0-100kph    4.2 secs
Price    A$128,000

Superformance Mk III – Specifications

Engines    Ford V8 big-block, pushrod ohv
Capacity    7538cc (460ci)
Max power    433kW (580bhp)
Max torque    620Nm
Transmission    Tremec T56 five-speed
Suspension    ¨Front independent unequal length A-arms with adjustable coil-over telescopic shock absorbers¨Rear independent unequal length A-arms, fabricated hub carriers and coil-over shock absorbers
Steering    Rack and pinion
Brakes    Ventilated discs, four-pot callipers
Wheels    ¨Front 15x8J Rear 5x10J
Tyres    ¨Front 255/60 R15 Rear  275/60 R15
Dimensions
Length / Width    3861mm/1753mm
Height / Weight    1219mm/1270kg
Wheelbase    2286mm
Track F/R    1372mm/1448mm
Performance
Max speed    As fast as you dare
0-100kph    3.8 secs
Price    A$120,000

Words: Tim Nevison Photos: Jared Clark

Penn checks out a surprisingly useable antique car, considering it is very nearly a century old

Bob Ballentyne is so steeped in collectible cars that he’s long since ceased being easily impressed. Indeed, rather like any hot-blooded man at a beauty contest, he’s in love with every example indiscriminately. Nevertheless, Bob expressed all kinds of awe when he described Kit Maxwell’s new toy to me — an enormous example of 1913 horseless carriage, a milestone on the evolutionary progress from horse-drawn cart to 2008 Ferrari.

To me it’s a milestone because, when you examine the mechanicals (including its big gutsy motor), there are so many indicators of the future. Indicators that also show how much progress has been made in a very few years.

I was continually impressed by the car’s finish and the attention to detail. Every aspect has been designed and engineered in a manner typical of the attention to quality so characteristic of those early years of the 20th Century.

“I don’t think the original car can have been used much, The pedals aren’t worn, the side curtains are original and in excellent order, but most significantly the mechanicals are very tight.” Kit’s thankful about the starter motor that Maxwell fitted.

The three-speed gearbox is mounted just forward of the back axle, fed by a torque tube and in turn connected by a very short driveshaft — for a short time I thought that I was looking at a transaxle, like an Alfetta GTV.

Solid old girl

Despite wood-spoked wheels and split rims the car is surprisingly easy to push because the metre-diameter wheels have a very small footprint — the Maxwell’s 36-inch by 4.5-inch tyres have a very small contact on the ground. Then consider that brakes are fitted only to the rear, with the handbrake and foot brake (one contracting and one expanding) sharing the same brake drum. You soon realise that thinking ahead is a good way to drive this solid old girl, which weighs 1500kg.

Power comes from a physically huge motor; 6.0 litres of monobloc with the exhaust manifold cast into the block. It’s in excellent order and complete with a water pump, choke and a summer start-up system — the updraught carburettor is water jacketted and feeds between the cylinders, so the mixture is preheated as it enters the manifold. There’s also a generator controlled by a clutch that prevents overcharging. The car is well thought out, showing how far American designers had progressed.

Walter E Flanders, Maxwell’s founder, designed and engineered this car. However, not many of these sixes were built. By far the greatest number of Maxwells — well over 100,000 — were four-cylinder cars. As a result, our featured Maxwell is rare; one of only two known survivors.

It’s an original and complete car, professionally restored in 1980 in the USA where it won first prize at a national show, and was then put in a museum and never used.

Through the internet, Kit discovered the museum was selling off its collection and, having a weakness for horseless carriages, he left an absentee bid (well below published expectations) after arranging from someone to check the vehicle. At the time the US dollar was weak and this made a huge difference to the final price, with Kit’s bid eventually securing the Maxwell.

What really impressed me was the perfection of the whole vehicle, it looks like new old stock in every facet; not like a ‘restored’ car. Indeed, there are so many interesting features to this car that I’ve not been able to do it justice, simply for lack of space.

On the road

These old girls are a very different experience. You sit high up, well above almost everything else on the road. This sensation is accentuated paradoxically by the smooth surface of modern roads, which compensates for the reality of the Maxwell’s unsophisticated suspension. The car seems to progress on rails until you come to a corner, when the cart springs give you a roll this way then that way. You become very conscious that you have returned to the dawn of motoring. The three-to-one ratio and the metre-diameter wheels give this car very long legs. This passenger felt under-employed, but the driver is happy because he’s busy with foot and hand brake, non synchro three-speed ’box and a choice of hand throttle or foot accelerator, so he hasn’t time for nervous reflection.

However, Kit has several of these sorts of cars, knows what he’s doing and does it for pleasure. He takes no notice of nervous old buggers like me.

That said, the Maxwell is classically American — big, strong and well-made, with loads of unsubtle torque propelling you along the road at whatever speed is allowed. You know that if a modern got in the way the Maxwell would make short work of it.

On the firewall the cabling is beautifully laid out, and the plug leads are all secured to a wooden dock that prevents cross-firing and keeps the leads firmly in place.
Instead of a petrol pump you pressurise the tank with a hand pump beside the driver, and then a small valve on the camshaft maintains that pressure in service.

The instruments include a very inaccurate speedometer, an oil gauge showing the oil flow, an ammeter, the petrol tank pressure, a lights switch and a large main ignition switch. There’s also an exhaust cut-out pedal that gives a satisfying bellow when opened.This is a very satisfyingly and useable antique — a truly vintage car.

Various ancestors

From the beginning, Americans were hugely enthusiastic about horseless carriages, so there was a proliferation of makers offering them. The USA is a major continent offering extremes of roading, urbanisation and climate. Additionally, its citizens seemed to have a willingness to relocate on the drop of a hat, so this new form of personalised transport came at just the right time.

By 1913 more than a decade of experience had seen a surge of development in the engineering involved. Although the Europeans, especially the Germans and the French, were the inventors and developers of the horseless carriage, it was the Americans who adopted the idea with huge enthusiasm and got into serious production and, consequently, serious selling.

Europe was at a very different stage of civilisation and people were not nearly so mobile; the horse and cart was still the vehicle of choice amongst the hairy masses and, of course, there was that matter of disposable income.

Major figures such as Ford, Chrysler, Hudson, Packard and Studebaker are known worldwide, and they are but a few of the brilliant men who founded and drove the American automobile colossus.

Walter E Flanders is less well-known. Born in 1871 in Rutland, Flanders was the son of a country doctor. At the age of 15 he left school to pursue a career in the mechanical trades. He worked with sewing machines during an apprenticeship at Singer, then worked at general machining with Thomas S Walburn in Cleveland.

It was here that an order came from Henry Ford for a thousand crankshafts. The order was not only filled, but filled on time — a rarity in those days. This convinced Ford that Flanders was just the man to have on the team he was assembling to move his company into quantity manufacture of automobiles.

Flanders was a very big man and a genius at factory organisation. He was also a great partying man, something which grated on the rather joyless Ford, so eventually Flanders went off as part of EMF (he was the F). Later still he owned the lot and built Maxwells. It’s quite a story. Americans of those days were very interesting characters, especially compared to the present crop.
In 1911, the top five automobile manufacturers and their production figures were:

1. Ford, 69,762
2. Studebaker-EMF, 26,827
3. Willys-Overland, 18,745
4. Maxwell, 16,000
5. Buick, 13,389

Maxwell was a significant player, which makes the low survival rate very surprising.

In 1923 Maxwell became Chrysler, and it was only in recent decades that the original Maxwell factory used by Chrysler for many years was shut down.

Words & Photos: Penn McKay

Tim Chadwick meets a former truck driver ¨and jewellery shop owner who collects chainsaws, and travels around in a classic CA Bedford

When I was a boy, CA Bedford vans were everywhere. Plumbers, electricians, milkmen, delivery drivers — they all motored around town during summer months in CA vans with the sliding doors wide open, and with grey drill shorts or overcoats flapping in the breeze. You could see the driver working the gearshift or using the pedals. They would lean out and wave at people, or gesticulate and call out. This was the closest you could get in the ’60s to open air motoring if you weren’t one of the few who owned a convertible sports car.

It’s not surprising that the CA Bedford was so common as they were one of the most successful vans of all time, lasting in production for 17 years with 370,000 produced.

Ahead of their time

The first CA Bedfords appeared in the early ’50s, and were ahead of their time as semi-forward control units compared with vans which had remained based on pre-war designs.

Early CA vans had a split front windscreen and a low wide-grin style of grille. Later, during the ’60s, the MkII appeared; recognisable by its simplified grate grille and wide, single pane front windscreen. Powered by the Vauxhall Victor in-line four-cylinder engine of 1595cc, the MkII CA Bedford remained in production until 1968.

I hadn’t seen a roadworthy CA Bedford, let alone a good one, for several years until one day a red blur whizzed by in Taranaki, the door wide open and an elderly gent leaning over the wheel going about his business like a tradesman in a time warp!

It turned out that this was one of the last CA Bedfords sold in New Zealand and is now owned and operated by Noel Petrie, a former truck driver, watchmaker, jewellery shop owner and Rhododendron Society president.

What’s more, this interesting fellow also collects old Canadian Pioneer chainsaws. He has the whole set of Pioneer models produced, and regularly gets out in his CA Bedford to carve up macrocarpa for firewood, loading the timber into the trusty CA.

Three miles on the clock

Bedfords have always been a part of Noel’s life. Before retraining as a watchmaker, the younger Noel drove Bedford trucks — along with De Soto and Mercedes models — for Bill Sangster and Len Angus, two pioneering Taranaki trucking company owners. TK, S and OLB model Bedfords were Noel’s usual trucking mounts, but when it came to private day-to-day jobs Noel had his own MkI split-screen CA van. In 1968, just before the CA vans were due to be replaced by a new model, Noel spied a bright red MkII at Johnson Motors in Stratford with only 4.8km (three miles) on the clock.

He just had to upgrade to the new version of a van that he was well acquainted with, and of which he had become a fan due to its reliability and no-fuss work ability. Over the years Noel has travelled many miles in the CA, and in 2008 it turns 40 years of age and is also due to turn over its first 100,000 miles (160,930km).

During this time, the CA van has never let Noel down or caused him any problem. Regular servicing — including healthy doses of Fisholene from the local panel-beater — have seen Noel motor rust-free and reliably right around the Coromandel Peninsula, across to the Hawkes Bay and on several trips to both Auckland and Wellington. Despite the van’s age, and Noel is almost an octogenarian himself, he is soon to drive the van down to the South Island with a mattress in the rear, for a spot of camping.

The day I visited Noel to photograph the CA Bedford I also received a potted history of Pioneer chainsaws from Peterborough in Ontario, Canada, and learned of the different colour schemes for the different saws from the ‘chocolate top’ to the ‘all-yellow’ model. We just had to line the chainsaws up in the sun and take stock of them. I’d always equated chainsaws with childhood go-kart engines, but here was a man concerned with preserving faithful old chainsaws in original working condition just as any classic car enthusiast might with their set of Borgwards, Bradfords or¦ Bedfords.

Cutting Edge

Although Noel is at the ‘cutting edge’, as it were, in the art of chainsaw maintenance, I was dying for a ride in the CA Bedford — with the door wide open!

I slid the passenger’s door right back and climbed in to a very Spartan cab area. The first thing that I noticed was the almost complete lack of useful passenger foot room. I had always thought that Fordsons were the only light commercial vehicles to cause the passenger to tuck their feet up, but here in the CA Bedford I was arranging one foot into a small footwell and the other against the door jamb.

I hooked the sliding door onto the factory-provided canvas strap to avoid having my arm lopped off in the case of an emergency stop. Then I sat back in a small supportive vinyl seat to enjoy Noel’s Bedford tales, and experience original Bedford air conditioning at first hand on a hot summer’s afternoon.

The Vauxhall-based engine hummed away beneath a bulky boxed area under the front window-sill dash. Access to the engine can be gained either from under the tiny bonnet out front, or by undoing a set of wing nuts on the interior box section.

Noel hasn’t lost the sense of joy from driving his Bedford van, and swung the big steering wheel with ease through a few tight corners. “One thing I do like about this van,” he said as we drove, “is that you can see the very front of it so easily from inside that it makes parking really easy.”

The large wide windscreen of the MkII version was also a bonus for good vision, according to Noel, who gave me a brief comparative analysis with his earlier MkI CA. Parking in the countryside near Stratford, Noel swung open the back doors to show me how good the access was, and also told me of his camping tales and nights spent on a simple mattress in the rear. This lead to discussions about the British built Dormobile pop-top camper vans based on the CA Bedford.

Mr Whippy

Early ice cream vendors also put the CA to use when the Mr Whippy franchise arrived in New Zealand during the ’60s. During the CA model’s lifetime several versions of the van appeared, including a mini-bus used by some rural schools, a long wheelbase van, and later a diesel option instead of the Victor petrol unit.

Local electrical power boards — which preceded companies like Vector, Genesis and Meridian — used CA vans for their trouble-shooting crews, and the NZ Post Office also used them. Lesney made a cute Matchbox toy of the CA Bedford in the livery of a British newspaper.

The list of CA Bedfords grew as we spoke, because the CA Bedford really was such an iconic commercial vehicle in the 1950-80 period. However, as with many of the very common old vehicles, which are neither sporty nor heart-stopping in looks, few seem to have been saved. Many CA vans were perhaps simply so good that they served until their last gasp, and were not worth the cost of restoring.

Luckily, as in the case of Noel Petrie’s privately owned odd-jobber, a few do survive. Thanks to Noel I got to fulfil one of my own small wishes, to experience open-air travel in a CA van with the sliding door hitched back, just as I saw grown men do when I was a child.

Thank you Noel for an interesting afternoon, and the full CA experience.

Quirky CA Bedford facts

¢ ¨Novelist Anthony Burgess, who wrote the controversial novel A Clockwork Orange, used to travel around Europe in a CA van-based Dormobile camper. He apparently described the CA van and its Dormobile accoutrements as a “marvel of British design.”

¢ ¨Len Fairclough, one of the rogues on Coronation Street during the ’60s, was ‘written out’ (killed) when his CA Bedford van crushed him beneath it during a dodgy roadside repair effort. The moral — always use a jack and axle stands when working under your vehicle, not a stack of bricks.

¢ ¨An early British B-grade horror film starring Christopher Lee, Circus Of Fear (1967), featured a CA Bedford used as a robbery getaway vehicle, its driver eventually ditching it in a lake!

¢ ¨The CA Bedford has a cult following in its native Britain. To find out more you can start at www.eclipse.co.uk/swvans/, where you’ll meet classic campers, award winners and a whole treasure trove of restored CA Bedfords.

Words and Photos: Tim Chadwick

Mark Webster looks over a Valiant that makes him long for his Rambler

Henry West doesn’t tell a typical story of classic car ownership — he doesn’t seem to have petrol in his blood, as some do, and he didn’t have a relative with one of these models that he so admired when he was growing up.

He just saw it for sale in 2000 and bought it. “It’s the first classic I’ve had. I just saw it and had to have it.”

In 1966 this Chrysler Valiant Safari VC wagon was sold new in Invercargill, where it stayed 33 years, the original owner looking after it with garaging and six-monthly services. When it finally changed hands, a young mechanic from Warkworth flew down, bought it and drove it back North. At this point it had just 106,217km (66,000 miles) on the clock and was in very good condition.

The mechanic put a few things right, replaced the window seals and fitted new carpets, but had too much on his plate. A year after the long trip from Invercargill, the Valiant became Henry’s.

“It was extremely well looked after until I got it — I’ve just used it as a work vehicle most of the time as a camera assistant in the film industry.”

You might recognise the car from the Tip Top bread TV ad in which an excitable British tourist, driving the country in this distinctive vehicle, appears at various tourist destinations raving about how fresh his bread still is. It has made guest appearances in another couple of ads as well.

The car

When most New Zealanders think of Valiants they picture Chargers, but the marque has a lot more to it. The car first appeared in the US as Chrysler’s ‘compact’ (that’s ‘big’ by NZ standards), built at Dodge factories but soon marketed as a Plymouth (1961), maybe to avoid confusion with Dodge’s compact Dart. Everyone was making compacts by this stage — AMC with the American, Ford with the Falcon, GM with the rather too radical rear-engined Corvair, Studebaker with the Lark and so on.

The earliest Valiant, despite its length, was swanky and curvy with a somewhat extreme rearwards and down-sloping boot with a ‘spare tyre outline’ in chrome trim. The car was immediately available in station wagon versions in the US called Suburbans, built for six or nine passengers (with two or three seats respectively). A more performance oriented two-door coupe version was introduced on the Valiant platform, and this was the antecedent of the later Australasian Charger.

Chrysler Australia introduced the Valiant and put it into local production at Tonsley Park and, as Ford Australia did with the US Falcon, ran it through a ‘ruggedising’ development process to make it more suitable for Australian conditions.

By 1963, Valiants from Chrysler’s plant at Tonsley Park, Australia, were arriving in New Zealand. The first model was the AP5, which looked more like the original US Valiant. These are lovely, and rare as hell now. At first, as ex-Invercargill Todd dealer George Murdoch recalled in a 2000 interview, Valiants arrived CBU (completely built up) at the Auckland wharfs. Dealers used to fly to Auckland, collect them from the wharf, and drive them back to their dealerships.

Later in 1963, the Australian-sourced Chrysler Valiant entered local production in the Todd plant near Wellington, and the cars were soon outselling Ford Falcons here. The first model in local production was the AP5 model in Valiant ($2596), upmarket Regal ($3090) and station-wagon ($2796) forms — the wagons carried Safari badges.

Todd usually assembled the sedan versions, but imported some other body styles — including a few wagons — complete.

In 1965 the AP5 was replaced by the AP6, mostly distinguishable by a new front grille composed of three horizontally-divided sections (August 1965-1966). Then Chrysler embraced the slab-sided, razor-edge look we usually associate with the mid-’60s. The VC model debuted this for Chrysler in Australasia, a car with vertical taillights, and with the same six-cylinder 3687cc (225 cubic-inch) engine. Locally-assembled cars had sixes, but you could get an imported Regal with a V8 if you had the money. Transmissions were three-speed whether manual or automatic.

It’s hard to tell if Henry’s car was built here — actually, it appears from the engine bay that it was built in Australia and imported CBU, despite having a six-cylinder engine.

In 1966, the year our featured car was sold new, the New Zealand-Australia Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed to promote trade between the two countries — in effect, the more local content there was in the New Zealand assembled vehicles, the more special CBU models the companies could import, usually at a ratio of three to every 100 cars locally put together. That was  how models different to the standard sedans appeared on our market. The Valiant station wagon was dearer than the Falcon and Holden equivalent, but to be fair it was better specced and had a better standard of fittings. To my eye, it looked more stylish, too.

The VC was replaced by the VE (as many motoring journos have noted before, Chrysler wisely skipped a VD model) in 1968. The VE differed with a recessed bonnet, half-moon taillights and four horizontal bars for a grille. Late in 1971, the performance Valiant Charger coupe was released in New Zealand, and even assembled at Todd’s Petone factory.

Petrol prices

Chrysler Valiants were doing great business for Todd Motors, but there was trouble on the horizon: the oil shocks. From 1972, Valiants paid the price — Denford McDonald, a retired former director of Mitsubishi Motors NZ and a man who had started way back as a trainee engineer at Todd Motors, told me in 2000, “In the first oil shock, we went from 45 per cent of our volume at Todd Park in Valiants to, within three months, 10 per cent. Oil prices, petrol prices and the extra tax whacked onto them all added to that.”

However, by 1973, loyal customers were swapping their big Chrysler Valiants for more fuel-efficient Mitsubishi Lancers, Sigmas and Magnas. Valiant Chargers were assembled here until 1976; 1979 was the last year for New Zealand assembly of Valiants. The last assembled models were the CL Hemi 6 auto sedan and the CL V8 Regal sedan (but Todd continued to import built-up cars until Australian Valiant production ceased in 1981).

Storage

Henry tries to keep the mileage down — the Valiant now has 110,000 miles on the clock (177,025km), while Henry’s longest trip has been to Ruapehu. “I just love driving it on the open road, though.”

As a three-speed manual with a large six cylinder engine, the car is geared typically for Australian wagons of the era. It has a short range in first and a large range in second and third. “On the open road, I only have to change down to second if it’s an especially steep hill. Otherwise it just takes them in its stride.”

The car — probably thanks to its servicing history — has been pretty sound, requiring little maintenance beyond regular checks. But the front suspension had to be replaced about six months ago. “I couldn’t believe the difference. The whole ride changed. It feels much more positive.” His only real dread is breaking one of the rear side windows; curved by the tailgate, they’re rare and will be hard to find.

As he’s about to depart off for an overseas trip, the wagon is headed for a nice dry storage locker until his return. Then Henry plans to give it some love and attention. “I want to deal to any small traces of rust, repaint it and do the interior.”

Words and Photos, Mark Webster

Like many blokes, Richard Hadfield has eclectic tastes when it comes to collectibles.

Words & Photos Penn McKay

Parked in Richard’s barn, alongside his huge Rolls-Royce, is a cute 1910 Hupmobile. It’s a truly antique horseless carriage, exemplifying motoring at its simplest. It’s also a lovely contrast to the Rolls — only a decade or so younger than the Hupmobile, but a century ahead in sophistication. Recently, I’ve been pondering on the complexities of modern cars — complexities that we often don’t need, and many of these gizmos will quickly become unfixable.

Hups became quite successful, and by 1913 the company was selling 12,000 a year

Consequently, the sheer simplicity of the Hupmobile is hugely refreshing. The two side-by-side seats are built in, and you increase or decrease the angle of the bend in your knees in order to accommodate the distance between where your bum is and where the pedals are. No electrics here. On the dashboard are a speedometer (an extra) and a no other gauges. Then a manual throttle. That’s about it for technology, there’s not even an advance and retard. The choke is manually applied when you crank it from the front — ah yes, that’s an approach I don’t want to revert to, starter motors are essential to us pennsioners.

Projects Do Take Time

Richard spent five years rebuilding a basket-case into this delightful old girl. He told me he liked the idea of horseless carriage rallying — and it’s true that the people involved in it are very interesting. Additionally, it’s fun to dress up in gear appropriate to the period of your car. In this latter event it’s easy for me, because I have all my clothes from every decade — I hate throwing anything away.

Having a collection of c1910 Hupmobile bits and access to lots more, Richard found the choice of marque pretty well settled. It was made simpler because Hupmobile was only making one model, and 1909 was the developmental year whilst 1910 onwards became the production year(s), so anything and everything Hupmobile around that period fitted this car. Like all such vintage restorations, this one separated the boys from the men. Richard knew where there was a set of Hupmobile guards (cycle-type) so Len Woodgate hand-crafted a duplicate set and, similarly, the bonnet. Len’s also a master of wood framing, not that he got much chance to demonstrate that skill on this minimalist body.

Optional Extras

Optional extras for this car included the windscreen, the lights and the hood. Richard suggests that these cars weren’t serious transport, and were possibly a sort of sporting-come-recreational vehicle. Without these ‘extras’ they were termed ‘raceabouts.’ Richard did not originally have a windscreen — neither did he have the folding top and irons. So these were all ‘extras’ which were borrowed and duplicated.

Head and side lights in those days weren’t much more than decorative, and consequently you can understand why Richard doesn’t entertain any ideas of night runs. Maybe they were more about telling others where you were than about showing the way ahead. However, as sculptured brass items they always justify their inclusion. The original wooden artillery wheels were a disaster, and had to be remade by a specialist — Vern Jensen of Feilding, who has quietly built up a business supplying wooden wheels to the world. The original petrol tank included another concession to good sense — a petrol pump, needed when the car is on a steepish slope as since the tank is a bit low the gravity feed is seriously lacking. It’s seldom used but is there when needed, being operated by a small switch under the seat.

Engineering

I was very taken with the motor. A cast iron tube with four large holes along the top is the crankcase. Two pairs of cast cylinders incorporating the non-detachable heads sit on top. A crankshaft runs the length of the tube, and on the side inside a long slot there is a camshaft carrier fitted. This latter is interesting; the camshaft is positioned in it by packing it so that the bearing caps are evenly distanced from all sides of the journals. The molten white metal is then poured around the two spaces. Naturally it’s untidy, but that doesn’t matter — the big thing is to have a suitable clearance, and to be able to get oil into it. The process of grinding in is accelerated, I’m told, by using a little valve grinding paste at the final stages, so we have white metal bearings tailor-made for each motor. The same of course for the big ends and the mains, but they were hand scraped in the traditional method — almost a lost art today.

You wouldn’t want to make a seriously long trip, but a Sunday rural drive is very pleasant

There is a side tank on the nearside of the cylinder blocks, and it is an oil feeder to the big-ends through needle valves. The feed is directly controlled by the foot and hand throttle linkage, so the flow is metered to the engine speed. I assume that the camshaft journals and lobes are oiled by the general turmoil in the crankcase as the big-ends froth up the oil in the sump. Lubrication is crude to say the least, even though we’re only talking about 1800rpm.

The original brakes — rear only as is typical of the period — were originally mere token items. John Parker is a brilliant brakes man, who possibly knows the part number for every brake component known to man. The existing Hupmobile brake drums were eight-inchers — so Escort MkI shoes and ancillaries were chosen, as they fit inside these original dimensions. That gave hydraulic brakes on the rear wheels — and so unobtrusively that you’d actually have to hunt for them to notice. More importantly, they’ll lock the rear wheels solidly at any speed this car can go.

On the Road

Richard hadn’t touch the old girl for several months, but a tickle up with the float chamber after the petrol tap had been opened, followed by a gentle application of the choke wire (handy to the crank handle not in the cabin), plus the throttle adjusted at the steering column, had the motor ready, and fire promptly it did! It’s a steady, healthy albeit subdued sound that backgrounds a different way of travelling. You wouldn’t want to make a seriously long trip, but a Sunday rural drive is very pleasant, and you’re actually out there in the heart of nature.
This provides a great driving experience — you can’t compare these with other cars, it’s unique

Hupmobile (1909 — 1940)

The company’s philosophy was to build a car in the working man’s price range. That idea, along with a strong commitment to quality and workmanship, produced many years of dependable, tough and durable machines, and they built over 500,000 cars. The Hupp Motor Car Company of Detroit, Michigan, started building its Model 20 Runabout in 1909. The prototype was presented at the 1909 Detroit Motor Show with great success. Production began with 500 cars built and sold the first year. Yearly production increased, and a new location on Jefferson Avenue was needed to accommodate more body styles of cars being built — the runabout, torpedo, touring and enclosed sedan.

Hupmobile ran these alone for a couple of years before it added another model with a larger motor, the Hup 32 model. Hups became quite successful, and by 1913 the company was selling 12,000 a year, even though the cars were in competition with the Ford Model T. Throughout the ’20s Hupmobile continued to flourish, then the 1932 depression hit it hard. The name came from the original partners, Bobby and Louis Hupp, although Bobby was gone by 1911. The firm continued to build an increasingly refined version of its original car until 1925, when it put out a 3.2-litre six-cylinder version.

In 1925, Hupmobile offered America’s first low-priced straight-eight, and it included hydraulic brakes. Sound engineering was always a feature of the marque, and it continued through the ’30s with both a 4.0-litre six and a 5.0-litre eight. By 1940 Hupmobile was ready to call it a day, and went into other manufacturing with its factories and skilled workforce.

Bugatti Pedal Car

Designed and built in South American by Pur-Sang of Argentina, this baby Type 52 has to be the ultimate Christmas present for the kid who has everything.

Those of you who recognise their Bugattis might think that this is a scaled model of say a type 35, but it is in fact a full-scale replica of a Type 52 Bugatti. The Type 52 was built for Roland, the second son of Ettore Bugatti, and shown at the 1927 Milan Auto Show. Designed for a child between six and eight years of age, the Type 52 had a top speed of around 25kph from its 12V accumulator, was just under two metres long and weighed 68kg. Like all good models, the wheels were faithful scaled reproductions of the real thing and had specially made pneumatic tyres. Type 52s were obviously very expensive and built for the aristocracy.

Pur Sang

In a recent issue of NZCC we featured Pur Sang of Argentina, which makes gorgeous full-scale replicas of the type 35 Bugatti. They are now building type 52s and one was recently imported into New Zealand by Devereux Ltd.

Designed for a child between six and eight years of age, the Type 52 had a top speed of around 25kph from its 12V accumulator

We road tested one of these cars and can attest to its performance. Alas, being full-sized, none of our normal road-testers can fit into this Bugatti, so we enlisted the assistance of the publisher’s No2 son, Freddy Vincent. Freddy was going to provide a full report, but has been engaged on some urgent X-BOX testing and hasn’t had time, although we managed to elicit from him that it was ‘cool’ and ‘wicked’.
It has one forward gear and one reverse, and simply lifting off the throttle will stop the car, although a hand operated brake outside the cockpit provides good retardation.
We established that it is a good thing to have plenty of room to use the Pur Sang Bugatti Type 52 as it has enough performance to draw a sweat on a grown-up’s brow if there are full size cars around to negotiate.

Pur Sang has also made an incredibly faithful half-scale Aston Martin DBR1, which, like the Bugatti, is a work of art. The Argentinean craftsmen at Pur Sang go to incredible lengths to replicate the real thing, most of which will be lost on the drivers, but will be a source of immense pleasure to their parents.
You will need a substantial sum to indulge your youngster in either the Bugatti or Aston Martin, but email info@devereax.co.nz for more information.

A Little Chummy Named Lo-Litre

Chris looks at a hand-made pedal car

Lo Litre is unique — a hand-made pedal car replica of the 1928 Austin Seven Chummy tourer taking its name from the low capacity 750cc motor of the full-size car. The owner/builder talks happily about his little Chummy on a no names, no pack drill understanding. “It’s definitely a one-off. I won’t be doing another,” he says.
When asked why he built Lo-Litre, his answer is a jest. “I’m not allowed any more full size vintage cars, so I went for a shrunken one instead.” Building began at the end of 2000 and took up 18 months of spare-time work, which he says was often an hour snatched here and there. Scrap metal, Velcro and items he purchased at a swap meet went into the construction.

Lo Litre is just over 1m long, 48cm wide and weighs approx 13kg. The maroon painted aluminium body and black mudguards closely match those of the actual Austin Seven that inspired the pedal car. Hinges from a piano lid are fitted to the opening bonnet and the driver’s door opens by turning a bonnet vent handle from a pre-war Austin 10.

The pedal car has a mock engine with a removable dipstick and its spark plugs are made from nuts, bolts and bits of brass. There’s a carburettor and magnetos, as found in the real car — the last Seven model exported to the Southern Hemisphere with a magneto engine — and a brass sleeve crank handle turns the engine’s fan blades.

Authentic look

The motor meter on the radiator was made from a brass screw, melted down and shaped, with the meter’s hands coming from an old watch. Some mesh that looked right went into the radiator grille, while an Austin club lapel badge became the name badge on the radiator. A member of the owner’s family created the rest of the pedal car’s authentic-looking Austin labelling by hand The only other help he received was from a friend with better welding skills.

A dummy spare tyre sits at the rear. The wheel has a vinyl cover to look the part because another matching wheel was unavailable. Lo Litre’s four wheels came from a Pedigree pram, the white tyres receiving a coat of black paint for their new role. A chain drive was fitted to make it easier for the short legs of young children to turn those big wheels.

Seats are upholstered in black vinyl and have fluted backs with plain squabs resembling as closely as possible those found on the full-size car. The seats in Austin Seven tourers were built this way because rain would get into the flutes giving the driver and passengers wet backsides. Lo-Litre’s fold-down hood is made from the same black vinyl as the seats and the spare tyre cover.

Two size D torch batteries power the headlights and taillight. The headlights were once Lucas sidelights, a standard fitting for Austin cars, while the taillight is modified from a bicycle. Structural steel, bent and shaped, forms the steering wheel, while the hand throttle and the ignition lever on the steering wheel are moveable. The dashboard has an amp meter and speedometer.

An adjustable rear vision mirror is mounted in the centre of the windscreen, while the antique-sounding horn on the right side was once a battery-operated horn from another pedal car. The owner describes the view from the Perspex windscreen as the same as looking through a real one — only scaled down.
As this story went to press, Lo Litre awaited its first test drive.

Words: Peter ‘PC’ Callen
Photos: Quinn Hamill

With all the hoopla that surrounded the first Mustangs it is often forgotten that it was Plymouth, with a pre-emptive strike, which introduced the motoring world to the ‘pony car’, and not Ford¦

In 1964 the fi rst Barracuda rolled off the assembly line, a full two weeks before the Mustang, but its roots actually go a little further back. Timing has, unfortunately, never been a Plymouth strong point. Back in the mid-’50s the new Plymouths were pipped at the post by Ford and Chevrolet, with their shiny new 1955 models. The Chevy was glowing in the showrooms by October 28, 1954, the covers came off the Ford on November 12, but Plymouth fans had to sit and wait until November 17 to feast their eyes on their new rides. Despite the third place positioning, though, the Plymouth line-up for that year did well, setting some new sales records, and some say this was the result of a carefully planned sales ploy to snare undecided buyers.

Whether that is true or not there was a definite thorn in Plymouth’s side — the Ford Thunderbird. Why? Well, Plymouth had put together a two-seat sports car called the Belmont, aimed directly at the Ford Thunderbird and Chevrolet’s Corvette.

Sadly the bigwigs decided this car looked too old, and it was dumped before 1955. It is believed that the poor sales figures for the ’53 and ’54 Corvette had spooked the decision makers into ruling out the Belmont, but when the T’bird figures came in there would have been boot leather flying in the direction of some nether regions for sure, possibly much of the action being self inflicted. It is possible (or more accurately probable) that things could have been reversed — with the Belmont as a thorn in Ford’s side — had it been given the chance, but ironically procrastination leapt to the forefront.

That notwithstanding, Plymouths continued to sell well. The vehicles were also popular with fleet buyers, such as taxi operators and the police, with figures of over 100,000 miles of trouble-free operation now being commonplace among Plymouth owners and operators.

The right recipe

All sorts of new recipes were tried in the auto industry’s kitchens during the late ’50s, and Chrysler’s fry-cooks were right in amongst it. These people were always up for the challenge when it came to doing something different, even if the ‘shiny-pants’ weren’t. Maybe still smarting from the Belmont misadventure, Chrysler decided it would introduce a vehicle to take on the increasingly popular small imports. Chrysler president Tex Colbert and Plymouth general manager Harry Cheseborough got together with a special car committee, and started Project A901. No fewer than 200 engineers worked on this top-secret project at the Midland Avenue plant in Detroit, and the secrecy was such that many thought the engineers were working on a US Government project. Some 20 prototypes were created, using around 57 different engines. The result was the Valiant project, formerly dubbed ‘Falcon’, but we know who procured the rights to that name, don’t we?

The Valiant finally hit the streets with its now-famous slant-six engine in 1960, the first year that Chrysler offered unibody construction. This method of construction resulted in a more rigid vehicle with fewer rattles, and it wasn’t long before other auto manufacturers followed suit.

Another industry fi rst for the Valiant was the use of an alternator- fed electrical system. Then, in April 1964, a sub-series of the Valiant — officially dubbed the Valiant Barracuda — burst onto the scene with its unusual styling and absolutely vast rear windscreen, often referred to as ‘the fish tank.’

This was to be the start of an interesting decade for the Barracuda, which reportedly had a superior build quality to its soon-to-be-introduced competitor.

The two-door vehicle, sold through Chrysler/Plymouth and Plymouth/DeSoto dealers, was based on the Valiant but used a different upper portion with a fastback appearance. It was this area which was draped with the aforementioned acreage of glass and itsy-bitsy trunk lid. To add yet another mention of that rear screen, it is reportedly the largest single piece of glass ever to be installed on a mass-produced automobile, and the model is often referred to as a glass-back, but more exciting things would happen to the Barracuda as time went by.

Performance enhancement

The following year, 1965, the Formula S option was added to the line-up, and sales grew from 23,000-odd units to more than 64,000. Even so, and with a 175kW, 4474cc (235bhp, 273ci) V8 engine the Barracuda wasn’t quite a performance car in the eyes of the masses. Indeed, the advertising material and general emphasis focused on the vehicle’s convenience factors and overall design rather than its performance. Again, this didn’t help sales figures in the performance-minded North America of the time.

While 1966 produced little in the way of improvements on the Barracuda, the 1967 model year saw the vehicle come into its own as a pony car. The slant-six was dropped from the engine listings, and the 6276cc (383ci) unit — which debuted in ’62 — was offered, along with a notchback model and a convertible. The following year, ’68, saw the 4474cc motor dropped and, oddly, the slant-six re-introduced; obviously there was a market for it somewhere. So now there was a choice of three V8 engines (4474cc, 5211cc and 6276cc or 273, 318 and 383ci) and the corporation even slotted a Hemi into a few Barracudas to perk things up on the drag racing scene. Things were progressing nicely, but then Plymouth got serious.

The overall performance image needed to be enhanced, for sure, but the overall performance package wasn’t quite what we’d look for today. The performance of the 1969 Barracuda was lacking a little under the hood, even though the 6276cc unit had undergone a tickle-up to bring 246kW (330bhp) on tap. The cosmetic package based on the Formula S option, and now dubbed ’Cuda, was introduced in limited numbers that same year, but if you had a larger wad of cash you could get the 7210cc (440ci) engine slotted in and reap the rewards that 291kW and 650Nm (390hp and 480lb/ft) of torque can give you. Drive that monster out onto a quarter-mile track near your hometown and you’d be eyeballing a time slip with 14-something-seconds written on it, straight off the showroom fl oor! The 7210cc engine came with high compression pistons, improved and crack-tested connecting rods, a better crankshaft, a timing chain, an improved vibration damper, better camshaft, valve springs and induction.

All that was rather marvellous, but then came the ‘new and improved’ third generation ’Cuda in 1970.

Challengers and Hemis

The new Dodge Challenger had what was labelled the ‘E’ body, and the new ’Cuda shared the platform, but the wheelbase was set at a fi gure some 51mm shorter than that of the Dodge; 2769mm for the ‘Cuda versus 2821mm for the Challenger. On the outside the overall fi gures also varied, with 4787mm and 4923mm respectively. Within that shorter wheelbase came fi ve different V8 options; the 5572cc, 6276cc, the improved 7210cc and 7210cc six-pack (340, 383, improved 440 and 440ci six-pack) and occasionally the almighty Hemi. The 7210cc and Hemi cars came with a much tougher undercarriage, so that as much of the power that these two top-notch engines produced was actually transmitted to the asphalt to help get the 1687kg car rolling into action.

The ‘E’ body cars (’Cudas and Challengers) were built to do battle with the likes of the Camaro and the Mustang, and at that did very well, but there were areas which might have been better. Some have criticised the braking and handling of the bigger-specced ’Cudas, and perhaps there is justification for that; the tyres of the time, the brakes and the suspension (as heavy duty as it may have been) all had trouble coping with the sheer power of these cars.

However, they were really supposed to be straightline cars. Criticisms of the vehicles didn’t stop people getting a full-throttle adrenaline blast from them. I have a vivid recollection of Jesse James (of West Coast Choppers fame) being interviewed by a Sixty Minutes front person some time ago. When referring to one of his outrageous choppers, she had the temerity to ask the man, a direct descendant of the original outlaw Jesse James, “what’s so good about it?” He, like everyone else who has seen any of his bikes, rolled his eyes, focused on the woman with a piercing look and rightfully replied with a grimace on his face, as if she were the village idiot (which is not far from the mark), “Just look at it!” I was inclined to agree with all aspects of Jesse’s retort, and have used excerpts from that interview in general conversation.

Another dumb question to be asked was, “Why do your motorcycles need to do 225kph?” More eye-rolling preceded the reply of; “What if I’m late?”

Sometimes things like handling and brakes can take a back seat to style, brute force and aesthetic bliss, can they not? You just have to be aware of the idiosyncrasies of the animal you are trying to tame. There is also the fun that can be had; like feeding sharks I suppose, there’s that element of danger involved, but I’d say being in charge of a well-tuned ’Cuda would likely be far safer, whether there’s a cage or no cage for either excursion. You can always lift your foot from the accelerator pedal in a ’Cuda, but once a shark has you it’s likely you’re going to discover there is such a thing as a free lunch; and it’s you.

Big boy’s toy

Being self-employed rarely affords the luxury of a free lunch, though; ask anyone who has been, or still is, earning a living in such a way. There are no handouts, nobody to come to your rescue if things go pear-shaped; it’s all down to you. However, if you work hard and are good at what you do then there are rewards to be had. More importantly, there are toys to be had, and some pretty cool toys at that.

Lovers of tough Mopar toys know that quality doesn’t come cheap, but when you are talking about some of the most impressive automobiles (albeit produced in limited numbers) ever built, then the reality that hits home is, money is not the issue. Finding a good example is the issue.

As is so often the case, a lover of a particular vehicle has had to wait until positioned soundly enough in life to make a commitment to making a dream come true. “I’ve always wanted one” is not a unique comment, but one I hear often. I’ve even said it myself (mostly to myself), and made something of a dream come true in my own little world. It’s parked in a secure garage right now. It’s a fair thing to want and obtain worldly goods, provided your primary commitments are already met. Why not treat yourself? You’ve worked hard; have some fun.

Have some fast, high-power fun. Allen Lindsay, a self-employed builder, thought he’d have some Mopar fun.

Mopar guru

Like that task of being self employed and having a family to support, fi nding a good example of the car Allen “always wanted” was never going to be easy, but the end result would undoubtedly prove to be satisfying. The search went on for around 12 months, mostly on the internet. I jumped onto the ’net myself and thought, this guy must have been pulling his hair out!

Tidy 1970 440 six-pack ’Cudas don’t grow on trees; let alone examples such as the one featured. Here we go again with the difference between lucky and fortunate; if you are walking the street and accidentally spot a shiny dollar, then you’re lucky.

Allen’s search wasn’t a one-man operation, though. He had employed the services of Mopar guru (and I don’t use the word ‘guru’ lightly) Grant May. You can point Grant at a Mopar and, like the world’s greatest water diviner (only more reliably), Grant will point out any good or bad aspects of the machine. To have him on your side will ensure that any investment you are making in Mopar muscle, and indeed in Mopar/motoring history, is a safe and sound investment. Grant looked at a few examples of the breed for Allen and remained in constant contact, a virtue that is just one part of this man’s makeup. Grant, in all his much-appreciated fussiness, was on the hunt for a car with original panels, and as his search continued it was actually Allen who spotted a 440 six-pack car in New York.

A tense moment came when Allen discovered that the advertisement for the car was actually 12 months old, and it had been sold some time beforehand. However, there was another one offered for sale by the same guy in New York, and what made things even better was that it hadn’t yet been advertised, and was reportedly a stunner. Grant May was immediately contacted to get to New York and inspect the car, which he did. It didn’t take long to determine that the 10-year restoration had been done right, and it had been done to a good, solid and genuine vehicle.

Grant did the deal for Allen and shipped the car back to Los Angeles, where it sat for nine months; a gestation period that saw Grant fi nish a few things at his LA business concern, May Automotive. The triple Holley carbs weren’t quite up to par, but Grant knows a retired gent in the area who worked for Holley back in the ’70s. The retiree worked his magic, so that now the carbs can work theirs.

Some improved driveability comes about from the fact that only the centre of the three Holley carburettors takes care of the fuel-air ingestion, allowing the skulking beast to come alive and cruise the streets in search of prey relatively sedately. However, when you mash that go pedal, all three carbs come in like gangbusters, feeding the engine with around 1050cfm of gasoline- laden air (‘gangbusters’ is Allen’s word, not mine).

The original seat belts were also given the once-over; a company that goes by the name of Snake Oyl specialises in such matters, and the belts are now up to scratch. Then it was time to arrange the final shipping to New Zealand, and an ecstatic Allen Lindsay. The car arrived unscathed.

Matching numbers

The Plymouth was restored in the ’90s, a decade more famous for leaky homes than Plymouth muscle car restorations but, perhaps, that’s a good thing. You wouldn’t want word of such a vehicle being on offer to make its way to the ears of the wrong people. This is a historically important, matching numbers muscle car; absolutely correct, with all the original, factory steel panels in place, in pristine condition, and it’s one of the more powerful, sought-after models.

The car is utterly authentic, and is on the Chrysler register as being such, so it needs to be looked after. The 440 ’Cudas weren’t made in vast numbers either, with 902 four-speeds and 853 autos with the famed 727 TorqueFlite, which is how Allen’s car came from the LA factory. Vitamin C in colour, this ’Cuda could certainly build one’s resistance to any imported virus. The colour is one of 20 that were on offer that year, seven of them in the high impact range. Others were Lime Light, In Violet, Tor Red, Lemon Twist, Moulin Rouge and Sassy Grass (the latter makes me think perhaps some of the subject matter was consumed by those who chose the colour).

While a Vitamin C ’Cuda is not something you’d drive to work every day, you might turn some heads if you did so. Heads will most certainly turn, though, at any gathering of even partially knowledgeable auto buffs when a shaker-equipped ’Cuda rolls up.

I had spotted Allen’s ’Cuda at the Father’s Day Drags last September, knowing full well that you don’t often see ‘shaker scoop’ ’Cudas anywhere, let alone at a Kiwi drag strip. Allen confessed to having had another sought-after muscle car in his life, but the 6489cc (396ci) 1968 Camaro has since been moved on. You can only drive one car at a time, after all, and why not make it a vehicle from one of the fi nest moments in Plymouth’s, and undoubtedly even muscle car, history? Mopar muscle car history is something Allen knows a bit about, he has a fair stack of books pertaining to all things Mopar. There’d be no point in trying to sell this man a clone! He loves the breed and loves to drive them too.

Power, charisma and style

From the moment the big 440 Wedge engine is rotated by the starter you know that you’re in for a treat. Selecting a ratio is via the factory Slap-stik shifter, a device that allows you to select low, then nail the loud pedal, slap the shifter to select second, and again when you’re going for top.

Just like an after market ratchet shifter, only this is factory fitted. To help absorb some of the shock to the rear there are torsion boxes at the front end of the rear (leaf) springs, but the practically indestructible Dana 60 differential takes such abuse in its stride. You’d have to get pretty savage to break one of these. Allen’s example has 4.10:1 gears in it too, so the time to arrive at the 60-foot mark won’t amount to much.

Apart from any dollar value that might be attached to a car like this, there is an aura which such machines exude. You don’t often get the opportunity to share airspace with a vehicle that has such power, charisma, style and integrity all rolled into one. I’m not complaining, though.

1980 PLYMOUTH ’CUDA

Engine Cast-iron V8
Capacity 7210cc (440ci)
Suspension Torsion bar/leaf springs
Valves ohv
Max power 291kW (390bhp
Max torque 650Nm (480lb/ft)
Transmission Three-speed TorqueFlite automatic
C/R 10.5:1
Differential Dana 60
Ratio 4.10:1
Brakes Disc/drum

DIMENSIONS

Length 4787mm
Weight 1687kg
Wheelbase 2769mm

PERFORMANCE

Standing 1/4 14.4 (or better)