Innholdsfortegnelse for May 2020 i Classic American

As I write this, the big auction season in Scottsdale has more or less wrapped up. In America, the whole thing is televised live, but naturally it’s the weekend sales that bring the biggest attention, the biggest audiences and the biggest prices. These days it seems there’s a lot of emphasis on what a classic car or truck is worth and talk of “investment grade” collector cars stateside. If you scan the classifieds over here, you’ll often find the seemingly best examples of a particular model tend to be earmarked for auction. The success of Barrett-Jackson and the big, televised auctions has changed the game in the last 15-20 years, which means that often the best cars get quickly snapped up and allocated for the auction block. Yet the classic…

As the ‘Summer of Love’ in 1967 was fading, Chrysler Corporation was preparing to introduce a car that would place ‘Mopar muscle’ in the annals of automotive history. The car was the Plymouth Road Runner. Based on the intermediate Belvedere platform, the Road Runner was introduced for the 1968 model year to complement the GTX, which had been introduced for 1967 to emulate, and compete with, the Pontiac GTO. The GTX, however, was not the sales success that Plymouth Division had hoped for. With its big 440 cubic inch V8, the GTX was a quick and capable car, and with a plush interior and comprehensive options list, it was every bit as competitive an offering as the GTO. Performance-wise, the GTX was more than capable of giving any GTO a…

For a great many years, books on both Packard and the Russian motor industry recorded that, under a supposed wartime deal between President Roosevelt and Stalin, the ‘redundant’ body dies for prewar Packard Senior models – by now replaced by new ‘Clipper styling’ – were donated to the Russians, by then on the same side in the Second World War. Not surprisingly, this ‘fact’ would be repeated regularly in subsequent articles in magazines and other books, especially on Packard cars, writes John Bath. In fairness, the American car and truck industry was enormously helpful to the nascent Russian automobile industry in the Thirties and in some cases body dies for both cars and trucks (but not Packards) were shipped from the US to Russia, as revealed in Cars for Comrades…

Olympia, London February 20-23 Classic American has reported on this event more or less since its inception several years back. This year marked the first time this event was held at Olympia, after the organisers moved it from the ExCeL exhibition venue in London’s docklands. Ostensibly the move was made because of Olympia’s larger venue, although one suspects it may have been more to do with cost. One of the show’s unique selling points at ExCeL was ‘The Avenue’, a strip of road that bisected the hall which allowed cars to be driven up and down and add that dimension so missing at most static shows: movement and sound. It’s one thing to see a car sat, silent and motionless, totally different to see it in motion and hear its…

Vendor: Peter Hind, Hatfield, Hertfordshire Telephone: 01707 268863 Price: £32,999 The Ford Thunderbird, launched in 1955 with the first-generation model, was an instant success story and seriously outsold its GM rival the Corvette. It’s also one of those cars that metamorphosed over the years, became much larger, heavier too, but ultimately endured a great many changes, yet still remained very popular, even though the final incarnations were a great deal different to the first-generation cars. This month’s Drive-Buy car is a 1957 Ford Thunderbird, or more colloquially referred to as the T-bird. It’s the last of the first-generation models, but still retains the original ’55 model’s purity of lines and styling. This particular car was imported circa 2015, its last owner was Betty Stoodley from New York and it was…

Ford’s hot new SUV which resuscitates the much-loved and much-missed nameplate, Bronco, has been seen out and about as Ford released teaser images of the 4x4. Ford has promised that the Bronco won’t be some sort of soft-roading car-based, ‘me too’ SUV like so many on the market today, but will be a proper ranger-based 4x4, with solid front and rear axles and body-on-frame construction. There are suggestions it will be available with a removable roll cage and could use an aluminium body, as the panels come from the same stamping plant as the F-150. Pundits suggest that it may be powered by Ford’s 2.3-litre, four-cylinder EcoBoost motor, that it should be good for 270bhp and 310ft-lb of torque and will be built at Ford’s Michigan plant.…

US president Donald Trump wants automakers to work with healthcare providers to build ventilators in some of their shut-down automotive factories. Recently, President Trump spoke out against automakers, as he called upon them to produce ventilators that are needed for critically ill patients fighting Covid-19 around the country. Trump suggested that he could invoke the Defense Protection Act (used during wartime to shift production from domestic goods to weapons, tanks and aircraft, as during the Second World War), to force the automakers to move more quickly. The president has been urged by many Democrats to invoke the act, which would give him the power to expand industrial production of key materials or products for national security. Trump called on GM to “immediately open their stupidly abandoned Lordstown plant in Ohio,…

It blurred the line between custom car and concept queen, and took seven years to complete. The DiDia 150 was among the wildest of road cars to emerge from Detroit during an era where Motown wasn’t exactly renowned for its subtlety. The car was the brainchild of a man who was variously a bus driver, machinist and self-styled fashion designer. Andrew Di Dia was a young man in a hurry, keen to leave his mark, and he was already restyling cars for fun when he collaborated with his neighbour, Chrysler designer Edward V Francoise, on his dream car. That was in 1953… Scroll forward to 1957, and Di Dia (his surname was two words, the car’s name only one) met future superstar Bobby Darin at a concert. The two got…

“The garage door came up, I saw that sloping tail and I thought ‘that’ll do for me!’” It’s not the best starting point to drive a hard bargain, but we’ve all been there. You go to look at a car with your sensible head on, prepared to ask all the right questions and walk away if you don’t get the right answers. And then you see it in the flesh and it’s even better than it looked in the pictures, and all reason goes out of the window. Sometimes this leads to disaster, but fate can land you with a wonderful result too, like this 1951 Pontiac Eight that Barry Dunwoodie fell for. “I saw it advertised in Classic American and it was local-ish to where I live in Dorset,…

Sometimes you look at a car and it just stands out. Such a car is Andy Green’s 1976 Mercury Marquis coupe. The colour is brilliant and it’s in such superb condition that I found myself wondering if it was a recent restoration. “The first owner bought it in South Dakota and had it for about 30 years,” explains Andy, “but I don’t know much about its history beyond that. I’ve tried writing to him but heard nothing back. I’m sure it’s been repainted, but I suspect the rest is original.” Andy recently paid for a vehicle history report, but didn’t learn anything beyond that the car was retitled in Florida in 2015. “I bought the Mercury from MJC Classics in November 2018, a Florida-based dealer who only buys low-mileage cars;…

LOCATED in rural Oregon, Wildcat Auto Wrecking is the only all-Mopar wrecking yard in the North West, and claims to be one of the largest in the universe. And with more than 800 classic Chrysler, Plymouth, Dodge and DeSoto cars and trucks, I don’t doubt the claim. This month I’m going to show you my pick of the restoration projects, and in the next instalment we’ll take a closer look at some of the parts cars that grabbed my attention. 1. Could you give a home to a 1979 two-door Plymouth Volare Duster? This one, which apparently still runs, is available for a very reasonable $1200. 2. Here’s another one that was running when it first arrived at Wildcat. It’s a 1961 Dodge Lancer 770, and it wouldn’t take much…

American cars have been thin on the ground at recent auctions held by Historics at Brooklands. Such was not the case on March 7 when they returned to Royal Ascot Racecourse in Berkshire for their annual sale at this prestigious venue. No less than 16 American cars were consigned, 17 if you include the 1940 International Harvester tractor. Furthermore, despite the looming threat of Covid-19, bidders seemed enthusiastic, as the majority of models found new homes. With such a plethora of desirable cars, we’ll start alphabetically. There were two Cadillacs on offer. A baseline 1965 Calais in a regal dark blue, originating from Toronto and in reasonable condition, was estimated at between £9000 and £12,000. It sold, but at a bargain £6792, including buyer’s commission. The second Caddy, a fully…

It’s normally around this time of year, as we head into the better weather of spring and summer, that most American classic convertibles are released from their winter hibernation and head out for the events, cruises and gatherings that enable us to connect with fellow enthusiasts, as we drop the top and enjoy fresh air driving. Sadly, that’s not going to be the case for many of us this year, but nevertheless, I have chosen this month to focus on an icon of the classic American car hobby: the 1959 Ford Thunderbird convertible. Turning the clock back to 1973, I, like many thousands, flocked to the cinema to experience the feature film American Graffiti, produced by Francis Ford Coppola and directed by the legendary George Lucas. The film dealt with…

At grand military parades in the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War, authoritarian leaders were driven around huge squares in huge cars, often convertibles, in great style. These parade cars were large and impressive looking, so ideal for such occasions. The propaganda pictures that reached the West convinced many people that the mysterious car in question was an old Packard... But nothing could have been further from the truth. As you will see, this car, the ZIS 110, was developed and manufactured in the Soviet Union, using the 1942 Packard as a model. To restore and develop the vast country after the October revolution in 1917, a proper network of roads and a reliable fleet of lorries and military vehicles were needed. Private cars were not seen as important. And…

Camaro, Corvette and the front-drive Eldorado PART 2 As with any of the previous Motor Shows at Earl’s Court during the Sixties, visitors entering the 1966 show by the main Warwick Road entrance would be subject to an immediate shot of American-style glitz and glamour as Pontiac and Oldsmobile stands 135 and 134 showed their latest offerings. There were many more new models on offer for 1967, with American left-hand-drive outnumbering the right-hand-drive Canadian versions for the first time since the late Fifties, especially in the GM camp. As new models became available so the importance of a right-hand-drive car became less important; buyers just wanted an authentic American car, so American-built left-hand-drive models proliferated. Steve Miles’ photographs capture the unique atmosphere of the London Motor Shows, not just the…

It all began for me, here in the UK, when I was a boy – my mum and dad loved swing music, rock and roll and dancing, and I can’t think of a time when I wouldn’t see them jiving if they got half a chance. I was born in 1966 and by eight, and after seeing Jailhouse Rock on the TV, I was buying Elvis Presley records myself and asking my mum to make me clothes ‘like Elvis wore’ or which I’d seen those ‘Teddy boys’ at the fairgrounds wearing. As I grew older, I realised that girls were more interesting than football and moved into Teendom. Naturally I found resonance in period films depicting teenage angst and frustration, such as Rebel Without a Cause, The Wild One, Rock…