Vintage Cars

[59Lark]

I felt inspired by you gents so I looked up on the net, Duesenberg in bc, and I found the story , his name was capt JOHN DART and it took him 52yrs to restore that car and he drove it less than 15 miles after the restoration, there are pictures in the news story if someone is curious, but I saw it and touched it as a lad, 59lark.

 

[GHT]

Last night, while we still had good light, I saw, on the opposite carriageway, heading towards me, a late 1920's Bentley Sports Tourer. This driver wasn't out for a cruise, he was going at some very serious speed. What a sight, what a treat. Not a scene that I could take a picture of but the car looked just like this:

 

[BobHufford]

End of the line?

http://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/news...ifts-to-all-suv-lineup/ar-BB16gCF6?ocid=ientp

My closest brush with the model was in 1977 when I drove a new one from a dealership in St. Louis to one in Springfield, MO. I was stylin' ... for a short time.

 

[Fading Fast]

End of the line?

http://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/news...ifts-to-all-suv-lineup/ar-BB16gCF6?ocid=ientp

My closest brush with the model was in 1977 when I drove a new one from a dealership in St. Louis to one in Springfield, MO. I was stylin' ... for a short time.

It was an older model, but I remember that car as a kid as that was the car that William Conrad drove as a PI in his TV show "Cannon" in the '70s. I think he had a phone in it, which back then, seemed very cool.

Surprisingly, I could only find a few pics of him with his car from the show:

 

[GHT]

When you live off track and you don't have four wheel drive, you learn to improvise:

 

[BobHufford]

When you live off track and you don't have four wheel drive, you learn to improvise:

Boy ... I'd be stylin' on the farm with that rig! It took a 4WD-tractor to get my 4WD truck out of a hole the other day.

To keep more in the spirit of this thread I was seriously thinking of buying one of these the other day (the one I was looking at was red/white).

If it got stuck in the mud as bad as my pickup was I don't have a tractor big enough to pull it out ... yet.

 

[GHT]

Getting a classic out of the mud really isn't my idea of a fun day. Prior to my hip replacement, my missus and I used to go to a festival called The Goodwood Revival. The last time we went the rain just poured down, my poor MG got bogged down. The image that this picture shows looks like a puncture, look closely, it's actually mud.

When we finally got home I called the garage that services and takes good care of the old car and asked if they knew of a steam clean specialist. Richard, the proprietor, said that he would hire a steamer and do it himself. He got the car up on the hydraulic ramp and steam cleaned every crevice, every nook and cranny, then he re-under sealed it. When I went to collect the car, the concrete yard outside his workshop, along with his workshop floor, were absolutely immaculate. Richard explained that the steamer couldn't be hired by the hour, he had to pay for a day's hire, so while he had it, he made good use of it. The complete clean up cost was quite reasonable but I am loathe to ever let the car get so muddy again.

 

[GHT]

Seeing Bob's 4WD truck all mud plastered made me forget what I came here for. Out and about today I saw a car like mine, well not exactly like mine, the one I saw is called a tourer, that's sales speak for an open top, or soft top, fold down roof. I was unable to photograph it but a text to another owner led me to a website where I came across a photo of it.

 

[Cornelius]

Came across this Craigslist ad today, for a 1942 "Blackout Deluxe" [no chrome] Studebaker used by Civil Defense.

(mods, feel free to move this post to any Studebaker-specific threads, of which I imagine there must be a few)

 

[EngProf]

Came across this Craigslist ad today, for a 1942 "Blackout Deluxe" [no chrome] Studebaker used by Civil Defense.

(mods, feel free to move this post to any Studebaker-specific threads, of which I imagine there must be a few)
View attachment 261818

Just for curiosity - how much did they want for that?
I have no place for it, but it sure would be fun to have (or to wish about).

 

[BobHufford]

Was scanning a bunch of slides from my folks and ran across these pics. The white Willys (1951) was my first car in 1976. The maroon Willys belonged to my Dad's boss (in 1965 at their lake cabin).

 

[Cornelius]

Just for curiosity - how much did they want for that?
I have no place for it, but it sure would be fun to have (or to wish about).

There's a link to the ad in my post, but the seller wants $19,500. Comes with "MANY extra parts including a running engine and trans," along with original service manual & keys, etc.

 

[GHT]

My car's battery is housed inside a box that's screwed to the bulkhead/firewall. There is a space above the battery where a complete toolkit sits. In an age when a computer generated diagnosis is the way fault finding is located, it's easy to forget that most motorists, back in the day, couldn't afford the garage prices and learned to fix it themselves.

Below is the toolkit that was supplied with the car, as was common back then. The one tool that was so very useful was the starting handle, sometimes called, the cranking handle. You can turn the engine slowly by hand, lining up the timing marks, allowing you to achieve exact tappet settings, points and being able to bring a piston up to top dead centre. (TDC) Try that with a modern car.

 

[Studebaker Driver]

I don't know if anyone is interested in the Stanley sedan or not, really. It is not a car with a huge following, there are only a comparatively few people who are into steam cars.

And there are two vintage car threads, one for parts and discussion and this one, "Vintage Cars".

Well, even if I'm the only one reading it, I wanted to at least record my thoughts of the car. The Stanley Motor Carriage Company had been founded by identical twins FE and FO Stanley. For a time the cars they built enjoyed popularity and a great reputation for speed on the road. But after the introduction of the electric self-starter by Cadillac in 1911, the Stanleys' fortunes turned. Sales declined and money became short. FE Stanley was killed in a crash while driving a car of his own make in late July, 1918. The company had been taken over by FE's sons-in-law, Edward Hallett and Prescott Warren. By 1920, the company was in serious trouble and by 1923, they were in bankruptcy.

The sedan was built at this point in Stanley history. It was the 41st car built in 1923, a year in which they produced only 181 cars of all body styles, comprising roadsters, 5-passenger and 7-passenger tourings, coupes, sedans, limousines and commercial bodies (hearses, flower cars, delivery cars, etc.).

Bodies for the known surviving cars of the era were made by The Brewster Company, Springfield Coach Works, Rauch & Lang (Raulang) and Currier & Cameron of Amesbury, Mass.

The car I was able to get is car number 23453, the body builder was Currier & Cameron, sometimes as Currier, Cameron & Company.

The body is aluminum skin over hardwood frame, the aluminum was not formed in stamping dies, each panel was beat out on maple bucks with rawhide mallets or rolled on an English wheel. The evidence of their creation is clearly visible on the panels to this day. The rolling lines left by the English wheels are faint but undeniable. The ripples left by the hand-working using hammers can easily be seen a few feet away from the car. Other cars of the era, including even the cheap ugly-duckling Model T Ford, had near-flawless body panels, all identical from the heavy stamping dies that created them.

The onesie - twosie production of each body type Stanley produced did not warrant the expense of stamping dies, so they were made the old-fashioned, expensive, imperfect method of hand craftsmanship.

I haven't taken any new photos of the car since it arrived 6 days ago, but I have spent some time with it and it has some real oddities (aside from being steam powered). It is laughably tall. There is no earthly reason for it to be *this* tall. It will not fit in a standard garage; it would hit either the door or the header of the door opening. The door handles turn the wrong way. When you take the door handle of a regular car of the era, it turns toward the front of the car. So if the driver were to approach is door at the front left side of the car, he would reach the handle with his left hand, turn it counter-clockwise about 45 degrees and expect the door to release and swing open. Well, this car doesn't. All of the door handles turn backwards to convention.

EVERYTHING on the car is stupidly heavy. Even the bracket that supports the taillight is huge. It would easily support my weight if I stood on it. There is no reason for it to be this ridiculously thick and heavy. And that is only one example; multiply that by 100 other items on the car. There is no sign of weight-saving anywhere and this is at the time of two-wheel brakes. All of the forward inertia of this extra adipose mass has to be stopped at every stop sign or light. It has to be restarted after every stop. It has to be hauled to the summit of every hill and held back during every descent.

But it is the zenith of Stanley steam car development. The chassis had been redesigned by Erik Delling, a well respected automotive designer who had created the newest version of Mercer chassis and he had a long career designing racecars.

Nearly every part of the car had been stroked by Delling and significantly improved.

But it was still steam.

Don't misunderstand... I loved steam trains and have wanted a steam car since I was old enough to learn there were cars that ran, like a locomotive, on steam. There is almost no inconvenience to great to willingly tolerate for the sake of steam. Each car has its own distinctive personality. Some are quite loveable old ladies, others are less so. Each one has its unique care and feeding technique when firing it up from cold. Some are eager to get going and are ready to get under way in a surprisingly few minutes. Others are sleepyheads that need extra everything before they can be coaxed to the road. I'm eager to learn the personality of this sedan.

 

[GHT]

That's truly fascinating. The first time I came across the Stanley Steamer was on a UK TV program called: James May's, Cars of the People. James May was talking his TV audience through the progression of traction power, driving each vehicle that he was talking about. When he came to The Stanley, he remarked how quickly they can go, our screen then cut to Jay Leno's garage, showing us his amazing collection and then back to the car that May was driving.

Convinced that a clip of that show was on YouTube, I searched & searched but failed to find the scene with The Stanley. However, I did come across a most unexpected surprise. Some fellow has built himself a steam powered Land Rover and here it is.

The clip is about 14 minutes long, be prepared for a presenter who likes the sound of his own voice, there's not much else for the first six minutes, but then the fun begins.

 

[Studebaker Driver]

GHT -
That was pretty enjoyable, thanks for posting it!

Even though it isn't flattering, this You Tube of Jay Leno firing and driving his 1922 Stanley Model 735 4-passenger brougham gives perspective of the Stanley car of the day.

The history of Leno's brougham is known since the day it was delivered new from the factory to the first buyer (Clinton Atkinson). Until recently the car was an unrestored original, but it has had at least a cosmetic face lift in more recent decades. It isn't a muscle car by any stretch, it is polite and sedate and is every bit the car the Stanley Motor Carriage Company said it would be. It is, in a word, a creampuff.

 

[GHT]

Next weekend the popular seaside town of Pool, in Dorset, stage their annual, Poole Goes Vintage event. The front page of 2022 Poole Goes Vintage, has my MG in the company of suitably attired young ladies. It's an old photo, but the quip from the photographer always brings a smile: The car is the best model there, he said.
https://www.pooletourism.com/whats-on/poole-goes-vintage-p2596753

 

[GHT]

We went to "Classics on the Quay," in the historic town of Christchurch today. There by invitation following a text message to the effect, too many modern classics. It was a message sent to as many owners of old style, that's those with exterior headlights, as was on their records.

What a treat awaited us, there, also by invitation was an absolute beauty all the way from Pennsylvania, domiciled for the last fifteen years here in the UK. Tina is getting a close up view. She was just as impressed as me.

 

[Studebaker Driver]

I'm surprised to see it has been nearly a year since I last posted here. It has been an eventful year, though.

I had been renting a commercial warehouse from a friend - at a greatly reduced rate - but as times changed he sold the cavernous space he used for himself told me he now needed the space I had my cars in. His sale would take a year to consummate and during that time I was able to build a garage in the back yard.

The warehouse is situated across the street from an enormous effluvia-generating garbage transfer station so everything smelled like a dump. Right next door is a concrete recycling plant that crushes asphalt and concrete into gravel and coarse sand and seemingly all of this airborne grit came to rest on the cars.

I finally got my permit to occupy the new garage, so the cars were cleared to move in time for the July 4th weekend. So out of the warehouse came the dusty cars and into their new dust-proof space.

 

[Studebaker Driver]

If you're not into early cars, such stuff doesn't matter but, if you are, then things like tires become an item of special interest.

The thing is, early cars have distinctive tires, they are big and they are skinny and getting tires to fit obsolete wheels is more of a challenge now than it has been since the 1960s. Like many commodities, there have been buyouts and takeovers of tire makers and unfortunately greed has been the motivator. The result it tires that a few years ago sold for $250 (still expensive) are now sold for $800 - $900/each. Some sizes have been discontinued as have many styles. As buyouts crushed the supply, manufacturing was moved to Vietnam, where all tires are made in the same factory from the same rubber formulation. Tires that enjoyed a deserved reputation as long-wearing are now made of soft, flabby rubber, lasting only a few thousand miles.

Sourcing new tires for an old car is nothing to be undertaken lightly and after suffering the sticker shock of what new tires would cost for the Stanley sedan, I was determined to save them.

So I dedicated several days and a couple of jugs of Blechewhite, along with a box of SOS pads and this was my experience...