Innholdsfortegnelse for September 2017 i Hemmings Classic Car

RE: Wheelie Interesting I THINK — MAYBE, JUST MAYBE — THAT THE WHEEL COVER THAT HARRY CARTER inquired about in the August 2017 issue might come from a Chevrolet Nova Concours. Or, at least, that’s what a couple hundred of our readers nearly unanimously wrote/called/mailed us to say. Specifically, according to Karen Jones of 101 Wheels in Ventura, California, the wheel cover comes off a 1976 Nova Concours with 14-inch wheels. She notes that 1977-’79 Concours wheel covers had different center cap designs. She also provided both a Chevrolet part number (00369009) and a Hollander part number (3079). About all we don’t know about it is whose car it bounced off of. Oh, wait, Jon Charles said it’s from his great-grandmother’s car: “dark blue with a light blue interior…” RE:…

1947 Chrysler Town & Country 708-246-1543 • WWW.ROUTE66MODELCARSTORE.COM  • $179 Scaling down a wood-bodied automobile is challenging, as the smaller it gets, the more difficult that woodgrain is to realistically represent. The model makers at England’s Brooklin Models have pulled this trick off beautifully with their 1:43-scale 1947 Chrysler Windsor Town & Country sedan (item BML 14). The hefty white metal keepsake features believably grained body panels along with a fabulous wood-look roof rack; its Maroon Metallic paint is deep and glossy, and this car’s many bright metal details underscore the realism. This Town & Country is part of a limited run of just 400 pieces, so if you’re a fan and want one for your shelf, you’ll need to act fast. “1957” 513-722-9608 • WWW.DAVIDSNYDERCARART.COM  • $100, PLUS $15 SHIPPING It’s…

Bold. Dazzling. Eye-catching. And oh-so conspicuous. This 1956 Hudson Hornet Custom is all that and more. Way more. From every angle, it astonishes your senses with a style that is as unique as any automobile to roll out of an American car factory during the heyday of the 1950s. This is decorative Detroit at its very best. While admiring this sensational-looking automobile, one would be hard pressed to think that Hudson was on the brink of closing down. After all, just look at all the incredible details that the Hudson stylists embellished the exterior with, while an up-close inspection will reveal an outstanding level of workmanship and quality of materials that surpassed that of the Big Three. Engineering advancements surpassed that of Ford and General Motors, as well. Below the…

If you’re automotively inclined from a young age, you know how influential the cars of your youth can be. When you’ve grown up with a special car in your family, it means a lot to you. When that special car is something as historic as a sporting, open-top 1926 Franklin, when it’s a link to your parents and a group of like-minded enthusiasts, and has been in your life for the entirety of your memory, then it becomes an irreplaceable treasure. And that’s what this month’s Drive-able Dream feature car is to Ken Gypson. His father, Kenneth, found this Series 11A Sport Runabout in May 1951, on a farm in Addison, Vermont, where it was being used as a chicken coop. He paid $50 for the Franklin, and drove it…

It pays to know your subject matter. Just ask Tom White, founder of Whitehall Auto Restorations, in Hopkinton, Massachusetts. Although he and his family of employees have been restoring all manner of collector cars for more than 40 years (see Specialist Profile in HCC #131), Tom has gained a deep appreciation for rare Mopars of the late Fifties and early Sixties, and has studied everything from build numbers to design nuances. The knowledge paid dividends in the early Nineties when one of Tom’s sons, Larry, came back from a flea market in Amherst, New Hampshire, with news of a car he had seen for sale. Tom recalls: “They came across what the seller said was a 1957 De Soto convertible. Larry looked it over, eventually opened the hood, spotted a…

FROM 1972 TO 1974, I WAS THE stock boy for a parts department at the largest Ford dealership in New Jersey. I was working my way through college, paying for my tuition, books, car insurance, and car repairs, all on $2.49 per hour. That meant I worked Monday through Saturday putting away parts (44 years later I still remember FOMOCO and MotorCraft part numbers), sweeping down all the mechanic bays, squeegeeing the shop floor, and washing cars on Saturday; so, I was there pretty much all of the time, and saw a lot of funny things go on. One day, I was talking to the parts manager when we both turned towards the shop to see a new 1973 Thunderbird rolling out backward, with the mechanic’s legs waving up and…

Model A National Tour THIS YEAR’S MAFCA NATIONAL TOUR IS SLATED TO TAKE PLACE IN CALIFORNIA THIS September 24-29. Due to the recent landslide along the Pacific Coast Highway, an alternate route has been planned. The tour will be hosted by the Bakersfield Chapter and begins at the Estrella Warbird Air Museum in Paso Robles. The route will work its way north over the five days, and stops will include the Hearst Castle, Monterey Bay Aquarium, Half Moon Bay, and Grey Whale Cove. At the end, in San Francisco, there will be a chartered boat tour sailing under the Golden Gate Bridge and around Alcatraz Island. Information and hotel accommodations are available at www.mafca.com. Stainless Steel Donation ONE OF THE SIX ORIGINAL STAINLESS STEEL 1936 Ford Model 68 DeLuxe Tudor…

Auburn Spring Results AUCTIONS AMERICA’S SPRING AUBURN SALE TOOK PLACE MAY 11-13, WITH NEARLY $10.2 million in sales and 83 percent of the lots finding new homes. The three-day auction had nearly 350 cars cross the block, with a 1941 Packard One-Eighty Convertible Victoria by Darrin being the top-selling American Classic at $360,000. There were several other interesting cars, including this 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air Townsman station wagon. It was powered by a 283-cu.in. V-8, and had a column-shift automatic and front and rear bench seating. It sold at a reasonable $11,825. Two other ’57 Bel Airs also went to new owners, a ’57 Nomad wagon for $38,500, and a dual-quad convertible for $89,100. A full rundown of the sale is available at www.auctionsamerica.com. Look for the fall Auburn show,…

When the Buick, Oldsmobile, and Pontiac Y-body “senior compacts” graduated to midsize status for the 1964 model year, the resulting A-body platforms were comparatively conventional with regard to engineering. Gone were the Buick-developed aluminum 215-cu.in. V-8, Oldsmobile’s cylinder heads and turbocharger for the 215, and Pontiac’s half-a-V-8 four-cylinder engine, flexible driveshaft in a torque tube, rear-mounted transaxle and independent rear suspension. Retired, too, was the unitized construction on a 112-inch wheelbase that they all shared. Instead, for the A-bodies, each division employed a six-cylinder engine and smaller V-8 that adhered to GM’s 330 cubic-inch limit for the new intermediate models. Buick increased its 198-cu.in. iron V-6 to 225 cubic inches and developed a new 300-cu.in. V-8 that featured an iron block and aluminum cylinder heads and intake manifold. Modern exterior…

Dave McIntosh and I met at Sophie’s Boarding House, having arrived at the same time, on our first day at Art Center School (“ACS,” now Pasadena’s Art Center College of Design) in Los Angeles, California. We came from different backgrounds — he was the son of a successful oil man from Kentucky, while I grew up in a Bronx, New York, walk-up apartment — but we both thought almost exclusively about cars, and immediately became close friends. We soon met a former ACS student who’d built a fiberglass sports car on a Buick chassis.That inspired Dave and me to do better — we’d build our own dream cars, one for each of us. We started out with sketches. Dave had design ideas pouring from his head to his fingers. While…

Chevrolet’s Camaro and the mid-year-introduced Pontiac Firebird melded long-hood/ short-deck contemporary exterior styling, a cockpit-inspired interior and an innovative unit-body/subframe design with conventional drivetrain and suspension layouts to create formidable foes to Ford’s sporty, four-place, Mustang and upscale Mercury Cougar. With pricing and performance competitive, the sales race was on for 1967. GM’s F-body Camaro and Firebird were playing catch-up, however, since Ford was first to market with the Mustang in April 1964, despite the fact that GM stylists had been contemplating cars for the same niche as far back as the late 1950s. A GM concept developed by Irv Rybicki, then Chevrolet studio chief for Bill Mitchell, GM vice president styling, reached the clay model stage in the early 1960s. A fiberglass-bodied show car, the Chevy II-based Super Nova,…

1967 IMPERIAL THE CROWN FOUR-DOOR HARDTOP An expensive prestige automobile should adjust to you. Not vice versa. The new Imperial is a highly versatile automobile — as witness, this new Crown Four-Door Hardtop. At first, the front seat of Imperial’s four-door hardtops appears to be a wide sectional sofa. But, at your command, it becomes individually adjustable twin armchairs (power if you prefer). The passenger seat reclines. Your climate is adjustable with a touch of your finger. From the driver’s console, you control vents, windows, window locks, and locks for the doors. If you wish, you may have music … exactly to your taste. Each Imperial FM/AM or AM radio includes a rear speaker, floor tuning switch and power antenna. You select your station with but a touch of your…

One of the top definitions of “hash” is “a confused muddle,” which is probably what was on the mind of contemporary wonks when they dubbed the new, Nash-derived Hudsons of 1955 by that moniker, a contraction of Hudson and Nash. More charitably, a hash can be defined as a “new mixture of old material,” which is probably apt when looking at American Motors’ reworking of Hudson and Nash engineering into a new Hudson line—which would also turn out to be the storied marque’s final line. Hudson had bet the farm on the compact craze of the early 1950s, kicked off by then-competitor Nash’s 1950 Rambler. Rather than retool from the 1947-vintage “step-down” platform to a new full-size car, Hudson management elected to produce a compact called the Jet. Although the…

SPECIFICATIONS PROS & CONS + Numerous options + One-family owned + Appealing Buick styling – Value not as high as the GS – Not as quick as the 340 – No air conditioning WHAT TO PAY LOW $4,000 – $5,000 AVERAGE $8,000 – $10,000 HIGH $13,000 – $15,000 CLUB CORNER BUICK CLUB OF AMERICA P.O. Box 360775 Columbus, Ohio 43236 614-472-3939 www.buickclub.org Dues: $50/year Membership: 8,000 ANTIQUE AUTOMOBILE CLUB OF AMERICA 501 W. Governor Road P.O. Box 417 Hershey, Pennsylvania 17033 717-534-1910 www.aaca.org Dues: $35/year Membership: 60,000…

What if all cars were owned by collectors, and everyone went out of his way to make sure his car always got the best care? Our hobby sure would be a lot different. Then again, none of us would get very far on days it rained or snowed. We think we can answer part of that “what if” question by looking at the 1966 Ford Mustang hardtop on these pages. Never repainted, its engine never rebuilt, this pony car proved good enough to win first place in the Preservation Class at the 2016 Hemmings Motors News Concours. In 2006, it scored First Place Unrestored Gold at the Mustang Nationals. Current owner Ted Sacawa, of Rotterdam, New York, chalks up this Mustang’s remarkably unmolested character to the four owners who came…

CARS AFTER WORLD WAR II WERE like puppies. They would start off cute, then keep growing and growing until you couldn’t afford to feed them anymore. This month’s featured underdog started as a two-seat sports car, then gained two more seats, which resulted in a nice sales bump. By the mid-1960s, it started to grow again, and eventually gained two extra doors — suicide-style — in a generation known as the “Glamour Birds.” By the time the biggest generation arrived for the 1972 model year, the Thunderbird was firmly planted in the field of large personal luxury cars, borrowing much from the Lincoln Mark IV, including a similar body that was big on bulk, but somewhat limited for its size in passenger and trunk space. The 1972-’76 Thunderbirds are among…

SINCE STEAM POWERED CARS disappeared in the 1920s, how could it be that that last steam car trip across America took place in 1962? And how could that “steamer” be a 1954 Buick? Many amazing events take place quite by accident, and this was one of them. I attended a Christian College in South Carolina in the early 1960s. Since we lived out west, in Idaho, we had to drive almost clear across the country. In the fall of 1961, we did that in my neighbor’s blue 1954 Buick Super. Although seven years old, the car was in excellent shape. Travel in it was kind of like being on a yacht, because of its large, comfortable interior and soft road manners. Other college kids from the area rode along with…