NEW ZEALAND'S FOREMOST HISTORIC MOTORING MAGAZINE

/. . ,

Thanhs to Dick Tay/or for forwarding ItS these photographs owned by juliejamieson, The !JllOWS featurej~die '.\ grandpm'enrs \V'alter and Mar)' Sem'le,Waiter is the gentleman in the "convertible" photographed in from of the hedgeof their family home in Tweed Sr, Oaman l. M r Taylor wrires that Walrer wasthe first man to import Ford cars into New Zealand bur unfortunately losteverything in the Depression , More infomwrion is sought abow rhe motorcycleand child on it , possibly Mr Searle's ,\lJn Trevor.

A lull lestof branch add resses and con tact details can be found on the VCCNl web site ill www.vcc.o rg.nz

ARCHIVISTBett y Wallace03 332 4261

ACTING SPEED STEWARDDon Broome0 3 3326452frdbroome@paradise.net,nz

BEADEDWHEELS CHAIRMANKevin Clarkson0 3 385 9821ernail : kevinc@ihug.co.nz

REGISTRAR

Rod Brayshaw

07 5494250

Greg Terrill

078464355.

emai1 : terrill@xtra.co.nz

Gary Beaum ont

0341 S 9169

email: gjsmbeau@es.co.nz

SECRETARYI TREASURERJohn Coomber03 348 0062email: coomber@xtra.co.nz

MANAGEMENT COMMlnEEBob Ballantyne094444066

PRESIDENTLeigh Craythorne03 3429110email: craythornes@actrix.co.nz

CLUB CAPTAiN NORTHERN REGIONRob Knigh t

management committeeAll administration matters should be addressed to CLUB CAPTAIN SOUTHERN REGIONthe NATIONAL OFFICE in the first instance see Diane Rossopposite page for details, 03 308 2356

TheVintage Car Clubof New Zealand Ine email: randross@xtra.co.nzMANAGEMENT COMMlnEEPlease note this information changes annually- the se details are valid until Aug ust 2004

17 Book Reviews

Hog Heaven

Balcairn Trial Diary

Presidential Award

Motorcycling Manifestations

50 Year Awards

Nort h Otago Motorcycle Rally

AGM Report

Whatever Became of the Mayoral Daimler?

John L Goddard Trophy

Southern Lakes Tour by Veteran Car

Skyline GT 40th

28

Recent recipient of a \lCCNZ 50 year membership award, Bill Clmh,is pictllred here wilh John Palmer in Bill's 4'/1 litre Bentley.

The phow was taken durinl( a mid 1950s \lCC event in NorthCanrerburv. \'(le presume the phowgrapherdid mrviw !

25

5 President's Message

6 National Office News

6 VCC Events

7 Mailbag

10 The Way We Were

37 Marketp lace

43 Swap Meets & Rallies

46 Idle Torque

54 Obit uary

24

24

27

35

26

COLUMNS

22

32

30

21

13 Evolution of the Aero-Engined Car

16 A Pile of Nothing

18 Behind the Wheel - Cadillac-Allard 1951

FEATURES

COVER

Scan Thmnson ral<cs us fen' a spin in a1951 American mcinl( classic, 'Jal(e 18.

Eoin YOWll( reports on rhe ac tion fromthis yem.'.\ Balcai rn Trial, 'Jal(e 28.

Issue 270 October/November 2004

The Vintage CarClub ofNew Zealand (Inc.)National Office

Phone 643 366 446 1 Fax 64 3 3660273Email admin@Vcc.org.nz

Postal AddressP 0 Box 2546, Christ church, New Zealand .

Address

12 Aberdeen St, Chrlstchurch, New Zealand.

Web sit e

www .vcc.o rg. nz

Beaded Wheel, is the voice of The Vintage CarClu b of New Zealand (Inc.) and its 35 branc hescovering the leng th and bread th of the

country. The effo rts of ou r mem bers con tinuefostering and ever widening the interest in th issegment of our country's history, and providerallying points for the constan tly incr easing bandof enthus iasts. It is to thes e peo ple, wh oappreciate the fascination of age, theind ivid uality and the func tio nal elegance of

vehicl es from a bygone e ra, tha t this magazine isdedicated.

Beaded Wheels- It is a very apt and well-known

title however readers may wonder at the origin

of the name . By way of explanatio n beaded edge

w heels use beaded edge tyres that are kept in

place by reinforced rubber beads, which fit into

the roiled edges of the whee l rim . This style 01wh eel was a distinct ive feature of early motoring

being used on early bicycles, many pre-1924 cars

and most mo torbikes un til 192 7. The VCCNZ

adopted the title Beaded Wheels for thei r

quarterly club magazine in Ma rch 1955 which

was the successor to the mon thly Cuff Sheet.

Copyright Information

The contents are copy right. Articles may berep rodu ced provided that refer ence is mad e

Beaded WheelsPublisherTHE VINTAGE CAR CLUB OF NZ (INC)The Historic Vehicle Autho rity of New Zealand

ISSN 0113-7506 Vol L11 No. 270

Ed itorial CommitteeKevin Clarkson (Chairman), Judith Baln,Rosa/ie Brown , John Coornber, Ma rk Dawber,

Marilyn McK inlay, Ch ris Stevens, Robin Wells,Lind say Wogan .

Materialfor PublicationReports of restor ations, events, road test s,historical and technical articles ete should beforwarded to PO Box 13140, Christchu rch,

typ ed or neatly print ed, double space on oneside of pape r only. Emaii of text only acceptable,

do not email pictures/ graphi cs. No paym ent ismade to con tributors. The opi nions orstatements exp ressed in letters or articles inBeaded Wheelsare the author's own views anddo not necessarily express the policy or views ofThe Vintage Car Club of NZ (Inc).

E-mailbeadedwheels@Vcc .org .nz

AdvertisingAddressClassified and Display Advert ising to :

P 0 Box 13140, Chr istchurch.Phone 64 3 332 3531, Fax 64 3 332 382 7Rate schedule available on requ est.

Back IssuesAvailabl e on request to P O Box 13140,Christchu rch.

Correspondence I:> Editorial ContributionsPO Box 13140, Christchu rch.

SubscriptionsBeaded Wheels subscribers change of address toP O Box 2546, Christchurch.

Phone 6433 323531 , Fax 643 3323827Annual subscription (6 issues) BO .OO inc GST

Australian subscription (6 issues) NZS4SOther countries (6 issues) NZS65.

ProductionTypeset ting & design by RG80 esign

Printed by Spectrum Prin t Ltd, Christchu rch.

Closing Date for December/January IssueEditorial Copy 24 October 200 4Advert isements 10 November 2004

At Vera we're well known for our Vintage and Classic Car

insurance. But we can also insure all bjour other valuable assets.

As a VCC member bjou are also eligible for special rates for bjour

home, contents, private motor vehicles, boat and travel.

Voted Insurer of the Year for the third bjear running, weVe been

supporting the Vintage Car Club for over 30 bjears and will be

there as sponsor for the 2008 VCC Diamond Jubilee Rallbj. Vera

also makes a donation to bjour local VCC branch everbjtime a

poliCbj is written or renewed . Call us now on 0800 505 905 for

a special VCC obligation free quote.

vero~!

Flathead & CustomlineSpecialist

great effort and co n tribut ion made to theC lub where that effort is not othe rwise

recogni sed by one of th e C lub's perpetua l

troph ies or awards. [u lie's dedication and

profe ssiona lism is recogni sed by us all and

it was quite fitting that the first presenta­

tion sho uld he made to her. Thank you

[ul ie for your ongo ing co mmitme nt to th e

C lub.

T he Executive Meeting was also heldin Taupe over th e week end . A t this

meeting (held twice a year) the Execu tive

(e lected Bran ch C ha irme n , Branch

Del egates and members of the

Management Committ ee ) d iscuss an d

govern th e affairs of the C lub. During the

meeting , So uth land Branch was given

permi ssion to run a National Moped Rally

at Labour Week end 2005. T here is

grow ing int erest in th is sec t ion of th e

C lub's act ivities and many mem bers willbe looking forward to thi s event. Of course

Vehicle Identity Cards will he compulsoryfor this Nation al Rally and an addit ion is

to he made to the Veh icle Ident ity Card

App licati on form to includ e a PC - PowerCycle .

It was also moved at the meeting that it

become mand atory that the blue vehicle

identity st icker be placed on windscreens

or an appropria te place on a vehicle

without a windscreen, for entrant s at

National Rall ies. Did you know that clear

ove rlay st ickers for use with the

windscreen st ickers, which may he used on

the inside of your wind screen , are now

availa ble! These are now sen t out

aut omat ica lly wit h all Vehicle Iden ti ty

Cards and an yon e wishin g to obta in one

for an ex ist ing st icker sho uld co ntact

National O ffice. T hese are provid ed at no

ex tra cost.

A memorandum has been forwarde d to

all Branches, notify ing memb ers th at Don

Broo me has been appo in ted Act ing

Nat iona l Speed Steward (for one year

on ly) unti l nom ination s are called before

the 2005 Annu al Ge nera l Meeting. Don

was th e Nati on al Speed Steward precedi ng

Frank de Latour and we thank him for

raking on th is important task.Leigh Cra),thome

•••• • ••

Our C lub IS made up of many

mem bers wh o vo luntar ilv give

their tun e to ensure th at we are

able to make full use of our hi stor ic

vehicles. Members from al l ove r the

co unt ry make themselves ava ilable to take

up office, serving on the various commit­

tees that make up the backb one of their

branches , Memb ers also work tirelessly in

branch libraries, spare parts departments,grounds, catering for th e "inner man" and

the ot he r many tasks th at a club th at caters

for peop le, as well as vehicles, require s.

O ther members sit on our C lub's Dat ing

Co mmittee , Beaded Wheels Ed ito rial

Committee and Manag ement Co mmittee ­

all mak ing th ei r ind ividual expe rt ise

ava ilable for the good of the C lub.

Of course the re are many un sun g

he roes in our membersh ip, among them

are Banks Pen insula members Pat and Bob

Scott. Many mem bers would not be aware

that Pat and Bob have spent coun tless

hours ove r man y years, ta llying votes and

ballot pape rs hefore our C lub's An nual

Ge neral Meet ings. Th is is a task that they

willingly undertook. They have retired

thi s year from this very necessary responsi­

bility and I thank th em since rely for the ir

valuab le input into their C lub.

Taupo Branch hosted the C lub 's

Annual Gene ral Meeting th is year. The

majority of C ha irmen and Delegates were

accommodated at th e \X!airak e i Resort

where the meetings and Saturday even ing

function were held. Thank you Taup o

Branch for your hospitali ty ove r th eweekend .

During the meeting I had much

pleasure in presenting the John L Godda rd

Troph y to Martin Fern er (Welli ng ton

Branch) . His nom inati on came under two

categories - th e resto rat ion of his 1912Mine rva Type BB sleeve valve Tourer and

a memorab le motoring journey - the 90­

year re-en actme nt of the 191.3 Au strian

A lpine Tour in th is wond erful veh icle .

Co ngratulat ions Martin.

A lso at the meet ing 1 was delighted to

present th e first Presidentia l Award to

Ju lie Ca irns , th e C lub's Administrat ion

Manager. T h is award is not limited to

***

IV", fir<! ,,,,hUshed in 1973. Allhack i.Hlte.~ are Cl rdilllhle. Allt'ehiclcs f~{I[ured art.' restored er inf/riJ,.,rill£ll condition. Erenrs, HOtrTi,'s and Auslralian nwwrin~

Hi.m)T) are £l sl>edah)'.6 ISSUES (ONE YEAR)

Ausr $63.00 Air M.i112 ISSUES (TWOYEARS)

AlI'[ $123.00 Air M.i1

**

RESTORED CARSMagazine Australia

SHOWROOMOld Mill Building, 2 Hyde Street,

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Fax 07 549 2000Spe cialising In new and reb uilt e a r ly

Ford VB Parts & A c c e sso ries .Hours 9 -5 Weekday s

CAST IRONWELDINGPowder Spray Process,

Cylinder Heads, Manifolds ,Cooling Fins, Castings ,Mech anical Repairs &

Rebuilds

THOMAS ROWEMOTORING ENGINEER Ltd

No. 6 R.D.Palmerston NorthPhone 06 324-8707

PISTONS, VALVES, HEAD GASKETSTIMING GEARS, MORSE CHAINS

ENGINE BEARINGSGEORGE CALDER LIMITED

307 HOON HAY ROAD, CHRISTCHURCHPI-I IY, "R ",7,) I"AY (1, " R " ,fR')

flankC<lrll- Vi,a - M'btc rCard availableEDDIE FORD PUflLlCAT IONS I'l L

29 LYONS ST, NEWSTEA D vie 1462 AUSTRALIA.Ph 61354 7622 12 Fax61 l 54762592

VINTAGE &CLASSICENGINE PARTS

For all mem bers please find enclosed acopy of the AG M Min utes. Dur ing th esam e weekend the Exec ut ive Meet ing was

held . A copy of these M in ut es has beend ist rib ut ed to your Branch sho uld you wishto read them.

Branch Office Details and Calendarof Events

Fo r a ll members please find enclos ed a

copy o f th e bra nch office det a ils andca lendar of events. Keep th ese somewheresafe as it has a ll th e co n tac t de tail s of th eManagem e nt C o m m ittee a nd bra nc he splus the even ts for th e bran ches,

Correct Phone Number for VeroInsurance

VC C me m bers please be aware - toco nt ac t Vero regarding your insuru nccsyou must pho ne 0800 50 5 905.

A specia l sche me ope rates for VCCmembe rs ou t of the Vera Cons ume rInsuran ce Specia lists Auc kla nd office andon ly this office is ab le to pro vide you withthe disco unt ed rat es VCC members areentitled to.

Please do not tr y to co ntact loca l Verooffices or branch es as while 99 % of th et ime th ey will prov ide you wi th theA uck land 0800 nu mber to ca ll, it ispossible thar some t imes you may rece iveincorr ec t in form at ion.

As advert ised (see page 4) , for anyinformation regard ing insurance for yourVin tage or classic veh icl e a long wit hhouse , co n te n ts , car, boat and t ravelinsura nce ca ll 0800 505 905.

A brief run down from the recentExecutive and Annual GeneralMeeting

Exec utive Meeting - Your Branch hasbee n sent a full co py of the Mi nutes. (TheExec utive co ns ists o f e ve ry Bra nc hC ha irman , one add it iona l delega te of eachBranc h and th e Managem en t Comm ittee )

• If your veh icle has a VC C ID Card, ithas become mandato ry tha t th e bluest icke r be o n wind screens or appro­pri at e place of a vehicle without awind screen .

• Subsc ript ions from lst Apr il 2005 willincrease by $2 .00 per person .

• T he W a itemata Branch is host ing thenext Exec utiv e Meeting on th e 12thMarc h 200 5.

• The N a t iona l C o m me rc ia l Ra llyhosted by the A uckl and Branch hasbeen cancelled .

• T he Nat io na l Rall y Rules (Sec tion 2 1)of th e Bran ch Manu," were for mall yadopted .

Annual General Meeting - A copy ofthe Minutes are enclosed formembers• The Not ice of Moti on vot ed on failed .• A suggestion that th e AG M be held at

main trun k locations was not suppor ted .

• The John L G odd urd Tr op h y waspresen ted to Mart in Fcrncr.

• The proposed Executive S tructure wasdiscussed h ighli gh ti ng that the sugges­tion woul d not save money but wouldimp rove co mm un ica t io n betwee nMan agement, the Executive and th egene ra l membe rshi p. Any cha nge tothe Exec ut ive S t ruc ture requires aCons t itut iona l change and th erefore aNot ice of Motion .

• Le igh ad vi sed tha t with Frank deLau tour's un t imely passing, she soughttheir agreem ent to let the posit ion lievacant for the co ming year un til th enext notice is give n to a ll member s,ca lling for no minations for the officesof Preside nt and Ma nage me ntComm itt ee mem bers, before th e 2005

A n n ual G enera l Me eting of th e C lub.The posi t ion of N ationa l S peed

S te ward is a very im port an t o ne , "nomi nat io n requ ires much though tand en t itlemen t of nominat ion sho uldbe given to all members. As per theC lub 's C ons t itut ion, th e Manageme n tComm itt ee wish to be able to make anap po in tme n t to un dertake th e duties ofth e Speed Steward for o ne year o n lyun t il nominat ion s can be ca lled for theposition in the usual manner.

A t the M anagemen t Comm itt eemeeting fo llow ing the AGM, it was agreedthn r former Speed Steward Don Broornetakes on the posit ion . Do n co nfirmed hi swillingne ss to be ava ilab le.

Please refer to the M in utes for a morefull report of di scussions und ertaken .

OCTOBER2 Manawatu2-3 Otago3 Waikato8-10 Canterbury10 Bay of Plenty16 Manawatu16-1 7 Canterbury22-25 Hawke'sBay23 Auckland23-24 Marlborough23-25 South Canterbury23-25 Eastem Bay ofPlenty24 Waitemata

NOVEMBER6 Far North6 Otago

Swap MeetDunvegan Motorcycle Rally29th Post Vintage RallySwap MeetSwap meetVeteran RallyGirder Fork Motorcycle RallySafari RallyHunua 100RallyRally & SwapMeetMount Cook Rally30th Anniversary TourPebblebrook Hillclimb

Far North TourTaieri Tour

12-14 South Canterbury13 Rotorua14 Waitemata21 Waikato26-28 Auckland

DECEMBER4-5 North Shore

JANUARY8 Far North Branch

FEBRUARY11-19 Waikato29 Otago

20th Safari RallySulphur City RallyChelsea Walsh HillclimbSwap MeetMotorcycle Rally & Swap Meet

Swap Meet

Autojumble & Car and Motorcycle Show

19th NationalMotorcycle Rally & TourDunedin-Brighton Veteran Rally

mail ag

'Dates of annual events willbe added as tIley become known.

Thiscolumn hasbeen introduced to inform ourmany memberswho traveloverseas. Aselection of significant one-off and major annual events have beengarnered from avariety of sources asaguide. Inany case, readers are urged tocheck the date of any event withorganisers before making plans to attend.Readers are invited to submit new and updated information.

Peking To Paris- A re-enactment of the original 1907 event ­early veteransContact: Daniel Ward, ph/fax 0207 464 5881email daniel.ward@threadneedle.co.ukPeking To Paris - 100th Anniversary Run pre-1970? carsorganised byEnduro Rally.Contact: Ph 44 I 1235851291, fax 44 I 1235851292,email mai/@enduroral/y.com, web www.pekingparis.com Dear Sir

l rhink ir is an appropr iate rime for the VCCN Z to reconsiderirs policy on Vehicle Identity Ce rt ificates (VIC s) , Ler me pose thi squest ion to th ose who endorse their use in our club: A re th eydoing more harm th an good!

Ir ha s been cluh policy for some t ime now rhat all ent ran ts inna tion al rallie s must ha ve a VIC or th eir applicat ions will berejected . T h is policy has a lready ca used (a nd I use this word inten­tionally rath er than co n tributed to) rhe cancel lat ion of Au ck landBranc h's 2005 Nationa l Commercia l Rally.

Commercial memb ers arc nor numerous. The ra lly has in pastyears been success ful but has relied on for ent ran ts, guests, visitors,rin g-ins, ca ll them what you will, who are not , and choos e not to

be , members of the VCCN Z. The Co mmercial Sec t ion has recog­nised th at ir cannor recru ir sufficient of such people to keep their

The editorial committee reserve the right to publish, edit or refuse publication of any itemsubmitted as comment. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do notnecessarily express the policy or viewsof theVintage Car Club of New Zealand (Inc.) or thepublishers.

Dear Sir,I wou ld like to enter th e Vero Ral ly 2006 and am asking if the re

is a memb er who wou ld he prepared to loan a car for my wife andmyself so th at we can attend.

We would like to en te r one of th e routes sta rt ing in th e northof th e So uth Island .

I am a memb er of the \Vesrern Au stralian Vetera n Ca r C luhand have bee n ac tive in th e c lub for 40 years. I own and dr ive a19 10 2 C vl Humber, 1926 9/2 0 Humber and a 1925 l 4h p Bean .

My wife and 1 attended th e Royal & SunAlliance Ral ly inHamilton and were very impressed with the ra lly. We wou ld liketo experien ce some ra llying in the So uth island, hen ce my requestfor assistance.

A lex Se lley5 Tuckey Place, Golden Bay 6 174\Vesrern Au stralia.Eunail: alexkaye@iprimu s.com .auPh 08 953 7 3409 .

Dear SirI just rece n tly ca me

across th is old ph oto,whi ch is per son allydel igh tfu l for me,sho wing my Mum andDad wh en justen gaged (l th ink - seethe glitte r of th atrin g!) which wouldmake ir about 1928.(I love th e c lassv skid­lids - to ~ay nothing of rhe wonderfu l backdropl)

As a lover of o ld motorbikes and cars (and still an ac t ive bikie),I wonder if you or your respecti ve faithful readers h ip might be ab leto ldcnrifv rhe o ld sickle? 1 think 1 ca n just make out th e faintremains of the famous Indi an head-dress mot if on th e petro l rank.Ca n you please help me wirh a cor rec tion and/or more derails ?

Rud Ward40A Pirr St reet , Wel lington N .Z.Ph : 04 499 7407 Mobil e: 021 1260564

USA

ENGlAND

ENGlAND

ENGlAND

FRANCE

ENGlAND

AU STRALIA

AUSTRAUA

AUSTRALIA

AUSTRAUA

AUSTRAliA

ENGlAND

AUSTRAlIA

ENGlAND

VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA

Bendigo Swap Meet - Victoria

Bendigo Swap Meet - Victoria

Bendigo Swap Meet - Victoria

Bendigo Swap Meet'- Victoria

Bendigo Swap Meet - Victoria

London To Brighton'Bendigo Swap Meet

OurNorthern Heritage Tour 2005 - VCCA (Tasmania)Contact John Biggelar, 44New Eccelstone Rd,Riverside,Launceston, Tas. 7250. Ph 03 6327 3462 TASMANIA, AUSTRALIA

Ballarat Swap Meet' VICTORIA, AU STRALIA

Austin 100 year celebrationsEngland.Contact: Peter Fry (NZ) 04-905-3938 orWill Ho/mes (NZ) 06­304-9397Le Mans Classic'Silverstone Races'VSCC Prescott' HillClimbContact: Ph 01608 644 777Shelsley Festival' Hill ClimbContact: Ph 01886 812211Pebble Beach' CALIFORNIA, USA

TerrificToowoomba 2005 National Veteran Car Tourbased at Toowoomba, Qld.Contact: Bruce Wright, 5 Carson Drive, Bunya Downs, Qld.4055. Ph 07 33518828 AUSTRALIA

Beaulieu Autojumble' ENGlAND

Contact: Ph 01590 614654Great Dorset Steam Fair' ENGlAND

Goodwood Revival'historic racing ENGlAND

Contact: Ph 01243 555055 Tickets sold inadvance, nogate salesVSCC Donnington'RacesContact: Ph 01608 64777Fall Meet (ACAA)'Hershey Swap Meet near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.London To Brighton Run'Bendigo Swap Meet - Victoria

November 17- 18

NovemberNov 12-13

to beadvised

2006November 18-19

October

AugustSeptember 1-8

2008November 15-16

September

SeptemberSeptember

2009November 14-15

September

2007June 1O-July 31

2005March 12-14

August

(March ?)???

2004NovemberNovember 13-14

lulyJulyAugust

.2010November 13-14

mailbag

main an n ua l ge t toge the r vi able . Theresult ! No rally.

My own interest lies in motorcycl es. Inman y parts of the co un t ry ther e areregional classic clubs ca te ring to much th esame type of pe opl e as th e VC CNZ. ManyVC CNZ motorcycle eve nt s rely on th esuppo rt of members of the classic clubs andwe in turn are welc om ed by th em at th eire ve nts but th ey do not put VI C typerestr ict ions on us. In the ne xt few monthswe will be ab le to co mpa re the attrac t ive ­ne ss of both in th at th e classic clubs willhold th eir an n ua l ra lly at Kar api ro inOctober a nd ar e e xpec t ing ove r 300motorcycles and th e VC CNZ th eir s in

Cambridge next Februar y.The obvious an swer is to allow members

of ot he r clubs to enter, hut without th ene ed for a VIe. I understand th at this isth e poli cy for overseas en tran ts. Why notour nei ghbours! Perhap s the VC C N Zcou ld gat he r more members this way.

It has been sa id th at one of th e reason sfor th e VI C sc he me has been tostre ng the n our re lat io ns with Govern me ntdepartments so that our opinions are heardin th e formulation of po licy <1I1d I have noprobl em there.

Ple ase let us re-think the vie. Pleaseco ns ide r th e frin ge members, not just theca r driving frat ernity. Please let us askourse lves how th e VIC scheme ma y lose

th e c1uh members. We have establish ed arelationship with G ov ernment as th e pre­e m ine n t old vehicl e club. Let's ke epourselves pre-eminent.

Paul Whitehead

Reply to Paul Whitehead fromVCCNZ National President

Three weeks befor e Paul wrote thisletter, th e C lub held its Executive Meetingwh ere th e ca nce lla t ion of the N ati onalComme rcia l Rally was discussed. The hostbran ch reported th at ninety letters hadbeen cir cul ated to past ent ran ts of th eN orth Island National Commerc ial Rall y.The resulting responses and suppor t wereso minimal they decided th at th e rall ywould not be viabl e . The requirement of aVehicle Identity Card was not given as thereason for the ca nce llat ion . Members willbe awa re th at a N ati onal event takes anenor mo us amo unt o f voluntar y hours ofplanning a nd organisin g. It behoves all ofus to sho w suppor t and interest in eventsin ord er tha t the organisers are confidentth at th ey are go ing to be feasibl e.

Overseas entrants (who mu st bemembe rs of an y Vete ra n, Vin tage, Class ic,Antique or o ne mak e club or registerreco gni sed by the VCC) in" L. : ._ .. 11T_ _._.~. :._ .. 1 c 1 :_ .•

2005 ) will requ ire a VC C Vehicle Identi ty

Card or an Authenticity S ta teme n t m a

cos t of $35 . (T he A uthe nt ici ty Sta te me nt

also assists th em with putt ing their ve h icle

on th e road in New Zealand .)

Fringe member s! Ther e is no suc h

category in our Club and I doubt th at th e

majority of members would suppo rt one .

Why should our members wh o willingly

give hours of voluntary input into making

our C lub eve n ts successfu l do so for non ­

members!

Is a success ful event o ne that draws the

most entrants (including non-members) !

Is this th e reason wh y th e C lub organises

Natio na l a nd International events! Do

member s tak e part in N ational and

Internati on al even ts to make up numbers?

N ational ev en ts are orga n ised for

finan cial C lub members - if non-members

tak e pa rt, wh ere is th e incenti ve to be a

finan cial VC C member !

The vce Vehicle Identity Cm! was

vot ed to becom e mandatory for National

and lnternarional Ralli es by th e Executive

co mprising e lec te d Branch C ha irme n ,

Delegates and Managemen t C omm itt ee . I

can on ly think of positives for the card - I

ch allenge members to th ink ot he rwise!

l.eigh C rayrhorne

Dear Sir,I was mo st interest ed in Sc ott

Thomsen 's Evtvpe- SL art icle as we had a

similar cho ice for twel ve years. O urs was in

fac t tw o road srers. The mo sr asked

questi on was; if you had to choose, wh ich

one would you keep? When the day cam e,

in the end it was not difficult . After alm ost

thirty years the E-type is st i11 here and th e

Mere has go ne to a new hom e. A motoring

co rres po nde nt summed it up thus-the E­

type is a spor ts car and th e Merc is a

convertible, if a rather nice one. Perhaps it

was th e rather outlandish look of the E­

type that appealed, but some ho w I ne ver

get tir ed of it.

I a lso not e the cont roversy over th e

thirty year rule. When I joined the VC C

42 years ago, th ere was obj ecti on to letting

into the C lub 1930s North American ca rs.

I bought a Model A road ster and was

promptly to ld it wasn't a Vintage ca r as

people st ill used them to go to work. At a

recent rall y, the organiser sa id "\X1hat's

that thing (Ev rype) doi ng here, it's not a

Vintage car". I replied "we ll it's 40 yea rs

old , so it must be" .

I guess the difference of opinion will

alwavs be with us, but surely there's room

for all.

Dear SirRe the 1938 Hudson 8 of th e late Mr

Kevin Dun of Duned in , Beaded WheelsMailbag issues 26 5, 268 and 269 . I work edfor M r Dun at his 27 Pitt S tree t house inDunedin, as an electrician in the ea rlysixt ies, wh ere he lived with hi s siste r. Aprie st, Father Tom Feel ey, recommendedme to him. So hi s co n nect ion with th eCatho lic C h urc h sounds correc t. GregMcK enzi e 's spe ll ing of Dun n is incorrect.The 1963 electo ra l roll shows hi s name asDun. Ronald Sruarr Kevin , retiredco mpany dir ector. G reg also ca lls the car aRailr on. All th ose I have spoke n to arece rtai n it is clearly badgcd as Hud son and ,yes [ am well aware th at Railtons werebuilt on Hudson cha ssis in England, so amnot looking for an argumen t . My fatherm id me years ago that Mr Dun hadmarri ed a daughter of th e Fleming familyth at owne d the Crea rnotu factory at G ore .She died ea rly in life it see ms, hen ce hisinterest in th e C rea mota fact ory. He tri edto interest me to attend to auto electricalrepair s on th e Hud son. I direct ed him to

an auto electrical spec ia list, Kevin Carte r,but it appears he took it to W ooff &Sa lveso n , the Lucas people , where acurrent comm ittee member of th e O tagoBranch, George Martin , work ed on it fromtime to time . He rem embers it had Luc assema phore ind icat ors set well back behindth e do or s lik e so me Ril eys. l.enG rimwood , a well known mo to ring andMG en th usiast , who work ed with PercvLupp, hu sband of Svbil I.upp of Jaguarfam e, rem embers th e car well. He feel s th efire repair s in C h ristc h urch were done by[ohnson's (spelling unknown) . Lcn alsotold me Mr Dun owne d Regent Gowns inDuedin . Mr Dun was always imm acul at e inhi s dress and manner, o fte n wore kidgloves wh en driving. Len backs up a storytold by my father, that du e to hi s style ofdre ss and soft looks, Mr Dun was pickedon at the Town Hall dan ce, th e acc cuserwas knocked to th e floor, as Kevin hadtrained as a boxer and kept himsel f fit inea rlier days.

I inspect ed th e ca r at the last SI East erRa lly where it was on show. Bot h GeorgeMartin and myself agree th at it looked justlike it was in th e sixt ies, well kept andor iginal looking, with well used but soundleather. The last time I work ed for Mr Dunhe had disp osed of the Hudson, fed upwith finding people prepared to work on it.He replaced it with a Roll s-Royce and aMini . Mr Dun was recovering from astroke or heart attack under hi s siste r's ca rea t th is time. It is st ill a striking ca r. That itwas an Earl s Court or Olympia Sho w cardoes not surprise. I have never doubted itW;]" Fn "lish hnc!i tYI.

Dear SirI am in the fina l stages of research for a

book about C apta in Brian C hadwick andthe OH Dra gonfly ZK-AFB. O n 12February 196 2 C hadwick and four tou ristpassengers (incl uding a honeymoo ncouple) wen t missing in the Dra gonfly on ascen ic flight from Chrisrchurch to Mil fordSound . Despite N ew Zealand's largest everaerial search nothing was found.

A s wel l as bei ng a pilot and aircraftengineer C haJ wick was also a car ent hu­siast. He o wned a number of interest ingveh icles which we re ove rha uled a ndrestored from his home in RockinghorseRoad N ew Brighto n C h ristch urch . Hebou gh t and sold many A ust ins and a lsohad an ea rly bullnose Mor ris (1954 plate80 .743) , a rare Vau xha ll with a coac hb uiltbody (p late 58 .890 ) , a Lloyd and a newTriu mp h Hera ld coupe.

In terest ingly C had wick was a lso thea uthor of a 194 7 Briti sh P itm an boo k,Modern A uto Cycles - their care andmaintenance.

C an any Beaded Wheels readers help mewith any info rmu t ion about C hadwick andh is ca rs? Plea se contact me via em ail:rjw@ecw.org.nz or 09 5'>'> 9400.

Rev Richard WaughAviation Hi storian , Auck land

Dear SirYour cor respo ndent O reg McKenzi e in

Beaded Wheels 269 ra ises some interestingpo ints in his le tt er from Q ueensland . I canonce remember having a heat ed d iscussionwith a n ow departed membe r abo ut th eaccept ability of <1 Jaguar XK 120 in th eclu b. T he subjec t car is now 53 years o ldand th ankfull y now in the club . I guessMcKenzie 's argume n t is reallv ahour us and

mai bag

o ur car s cont in uall y ge t t ing o lder ­somet h ing we should all co ns ider.

O n a ligh ter note, me th ink s McKenziehas been out in the Q ueensland sun toolong as his memory has become blurred .

The Kev in Dun car was a Hudson an dthe coac hb uilt bod y was once dam aged byfire wh ilst in Dunedi n . C la rks MotorAu c tion rooms were o n the corner ofPo lice Stree t a nd Princes S treet Sou th,which makes the m a few doors up (notdown) fro m Angus Mo tor s. I canremember Angus Motor s used to display amagn ificent A llison Ae ro en gine in the irPrinces Street Showroom .

o Fosse

Dear Sir1 have a 1938 Dod ge 0 8 wh ich requires

a rep lacement gear-b ox and has a case ofwandering.

Regard ing the gear box, 1 have heard ace rtain Ni ssan five speed ca n be fitt edeasily! I h ave yet to set eye s o n thisco n version . Ideas an yone ?

Wa ndering! I have spent five yearstrying to rec t ify th is and in the end it com esclown to $ 1,700 worth of five RF Go odrichS ilvertown's th at are causing the prob lem.Do 1 switch tu radials? If so what fits a 16"rim 4 '/, inch es wide? O r do 1go to IS" rimsa littl e wider tu maint ain rolling d iameter.Please phone me 06 388 066 1.

Roger Ffewkes510 2 Man gaone RoadRD 3 Ta ihape

Dear SirIn response to your pict ure puzzle on

page two of Beaded Wheels No 269, thisphoto was a lso shown in Beaded Wheelspage two No 217 De c 95 [an 96. T hi sphoto and ano ther th at appeared in BeadedVI/hee/.l No 218 Feb/March 1996 are ta kenin front of th e hom e of Mr Joh n and MrsAgn es Re id of Eldcrs lie N orth Otago. TheElderslie Esta te far med a successfulThorough bred Stud whose sta llion N igh tRaid sired Phar Lap in 1925.

The car in th e ph oto is a 1906 Dermi sowned by th e Hudson fami ly of Duned in(Cad bur y Fry H udso n). Sea ted in th e carare Mr Arrhur H udson bac k left , and M rDick Hudson front left . The rear righthand passenger is Mr A lf O rego ry whoman aged the Hud son famil y horse stud .This being the reaso n for th e visit toElderslie and the pho to .

T he Elderslie Hom estead was burn t toth e ground o n I I November 1957 . TheDen~is Com pa ny manufactu red mainl ytru cks but a limited number of cars weresupp lied for dealersh ip use.

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Dear SirAu stin C entenary tou r to Birmingh am ,

En gland 2005.Mike a nd Brenda Marshall are o rga n­

ising a tour to Birmingham in Jul y 2005 to

mark 100 years o f Austins. If a nyo ne would

like to join please phone 06 323 1305(evenings) . An iti ner ar y and co sts will besupp lied. After ce leb rat io ns peo ple will be

able to do their o wn th in g a nd ret urn

home at their co nven ience .

Mike and Bre nda Marshal!51 S he rwill s-,Feilding

Dear SirM y letter in the June/]uly 2004 issue

ha s prov ide d good results as to the identity

o f the motorcycle a nd sidecar in th e pho to

a nd the present whereabo uts o f the

Sunbeam 90 motorcycle .

The hike is a M at chless, the front forks

being the m ain identity feature . The

present owner of the Su nbeam 90 h as been

in co n tac t with me a nd I hav e se n t him

further information a bo u t th e hik e 's

h ist ory. A ve ry sa t isfac tory result a nd

than k you to all wh o repli ed .

Bil l G ra n t

Dear SirAt lon g last I ha ve rec eived th e in for ­

mat ion regard ing the lin e up of cars in

front of the Pahi atua Post office ho tel (Page2 Beaded W!heeLdune/Jul)' 2004). The H otel

was ac tua lly burnt down in Jul y 197 8 .

The gmup includes from right to left

S gt Major Allan, (County C le rk ) Mr

Moore, \Vj Husband, H arr y McSherry, Mr

G ilbe rt , O scar Hughes, Berni e Wills,

Candy C rewe, and RB Ross.

U n for tuna tel y th e make of ca rs we re

no t me n t ioned , but ac cord ing to Bern ie

Wil/s (age 9 2 of Pahiatu a ) a nd so n of

Bernie Wills in th e gro up ph o to th ey are ,

Model T For ds, O ve rla nd, and a Delaunav­Bell evil/e.

A s a matter of interest Be rn ie W ills S n

was proprietor o f AARD Mo to r Co in

Pah iat ua ,

S now and Gladvs G reaves

Dear SirI have offered to write the hi story o f th e

first fift y yea rs of the Canterbury Branch ,

a nd ha ve pe rmi ssion from the bra nc h to

proceed .

Doe s any member (past o r present) of

the C a n terbury Branch have know ledge

that would help me in this ta sk. If a nyo ne

has knowledge of past eve nts and could

provide details, I would really apprec iate it .

The Branch minutes and newslette rs

ha ve a sad lack of detail so any help to add

flesh to th e bones would be appreci ated .

Anothe r request is for pho to s o f th e ve ry

ea rly days i.c. the fi rst c lub roo rns a t

C o lwyn St, the sta rt of things at Mcl.eansIsland . If photos a re supp lied with names

and addresses, plu s dates and details o f the

events photographed, th e images will be

returned when I have fin ished wirh rhcm,I know that this is a lar ge und er tak ing

but wi th the help o f a ll members, I a m sure

we ca n produce a hoo k that will be a cr ed it

to the Branch and the club as a who le

Colin G Rac

28 C runbrook Av enue

Christchurch 8005Ph 03 358 3099 fax m35 8 J09 4

THE WAYWE WERE

As recorded by Grant Hitchings

Earlier this year, our VCC archivist Betty

Wallace supplied me with the October

November and December issues of the

Nelson Branch newsletter Crankcase and

suggested I might enjoy reading a

particular series of articles appearing in

them written by an elderly Branch

member Roger Harding in 2003.

The recordings that follow are of what

he termed his

"obsession with the motor car."

Like Betty, I too fo und them inter­csti ng a nd we both agre ed th at Roge rwo uld be a goo d subject fo r The W ay

We Werc .W he n on ho liday in N e lson I telephon ed

Roge r to arrange a meeti ng, hu t at th e t imehe was conv alesc ing after surgery, ha vin ghad a pace-m aker implant and he asked tha tmy visit be postponed. I was sadde nedrcccnrly when I learned that he had passedaway at the age of 79 . From a N elso nBranch member I learnt th at Roger was along t ime member of th e VCC a ndalthou gh not a committee person he wasa lways heavil y involved in Branch act ivi­t ies.

Posse ssing an incisi ve mind a nd aunivers ity d egree in me cha n icalenginee ring he joined th e motor asse mblyind ustr y a nd was in charge of se t t ing upthe Nel son M otor A ssem bl y plantemploy ing so me 400 wor kers. U nder hi sdirection the plant o ut- pe rformed a ll o th ersim ilar plants in N ew Zeal and a t that time.

H is weekends were spent farming 700sh ee p o n hi s 65 acre property at W ai roaG o rge near Br ighrwar cr in the N e lso npro vin ce . H e reti red in 198 5.

Roger had a great se ns e o f humourwh ich was espec ia lly e viden t duringco nva lesce nce a fte r hi s o pe rat io n wh en heused it to ma ke the visitors feel at ease . H ea lso had a wid e range of interests - Vintagecars h aving to compere for hi s attentionwith suc h things as ad va nced m at h e ­mat ics, phy sics , space travel , n ati ve pl an ts,lit erature a nd the a rts .

It was th e Buick made vehicles thatsee med to fascinate Roge r a nd h e ownedman y in hi s time . Hi s fav ourites wer e a191 9 6 cy linde r roudster which wa s agro und up restoration with most partsbe ing manu factured by him in hi sworksh op, a nd a 1916 Tourer pre viou slyo wned hy Ron Roycrofr. Evid entl y he wasso me th ing o f a n e xpe rt wi th machines,espec ia lly the metal lathe , and kept most

dat a in h is memory, ve ry rarel y needing toco nsult a reference manu al.

Roger's brother S rephen (Budd y) wasour Nat ional Preside n t in 1952/ 53 . I heardthat Roger 's wife M illv was a lwa yssupport ive of Roger's int eres t in th e o ldveh icl e mov em e nt and afte r S rephen 'sdeat h they bot h took an act ive in terest inhis ch ild ren . Roger freq uen tly bor rowedStephen 's Bentley to rall y and par ticip atein hill -cl imb co mpet itio ns.

It was a lso interest ing to learn rharRoger was a close friend of the late S ir LenSouthward and in fact when Len jo ine dthe wor kfor ce he was appre nt ice d toRoger's father. Lat er, as pa rt of h is work,Roger was regu larl y ca lled o n to visit theU ni ted Kin gdom and o nce, wh en overth ere, he was asked hy S ir Lcn to visit andvet a Vin ta ge ae rop lane th a t he wasco nside ring purchasing. H is opin ion musthav e been respected by S ir Lcu as it waspu rchased and the machi ne is now part ofthe So uthward C ollect ion .

Betty and I thou ght that inst ead ofpreparing rhe usua l art icle for this issue of13 cculcd Wlhccb we wou ld ut ilise Rog er'sco n tribut io ns to Crankcase.

The Motor Car Obsession"You can' t have a mot or bike . T here are

just too man y cars on the roads th ese days"says the o ld man . I thought th is was rat hermean co ns ide ring he had sur vivedunscat hed ridi ng hi s 7/9 Hnrlcy and cha irsince the early 1920s. "But you ca n havean o ld ca r whe n the t ime comes."

I had learn t to dr ive on Ra umat i Beachin a 19 22 O verla nd in the late 1930s soanothe r Mod el 9 1 had to be a good start .T hey were not too hard to find - perhapsno bod y els e wan ted them a nd in du eco urse I di sco vccd a 19 24 Bluebird atC hancy's C orne r for £8 . It was defini tely

an advanc e on the ea rlier car hav ing co iligni t ion and rear fuel tank instead of amagneto and fircwall gravity ta nk thatsimmered th e contents in a hot eng ine bayas you dro ve .

The learn ing curve co n t inued its riseunt il com pletel y worn-ou t tyres forced asa le. But not before I had d isco vered howto rebu ild a di ffer ent ial, replace a noisygearbox with one that turned out evenworse and th e fut ilit y of gett ing both rea rwheel brakes to work to th e sat isfac t ion ofthe \XfO F man without sett ing the rearwheels on fire.

An acqua in tance had a £5 192 3 Buickth at was so much of an improveme n t onthe O ve rla nd it was o bvious no o therrep lace me nt wou ld do. A 19 24 Ca nad ianSpec ia l 4 cvl ca me up for sale and £1 2 latertoo k its place in the backvard . T he Buickwas gett ing close to its use-by date but itst i11 went and with its four wheel brakescou ld he stop ped with a degr ee of ce rtainty.

It was, how e ver , acco mpa n ied by astro ng sme ll of kerosen e and an elusiverattle from rhe engine wh ich was latert raced to a bad lv scor ed ca m foll ow ergu ide . The \923-244 cylinder engines had

If one had looked at the oil gauge

this disaster may have been averted

,111 auxi liary four lohed cam and followerdesigned to min imize timing dri ve to rquevariat ions and ensuing gear rattle hut asthe lubricat ing oi l viscosity had fa lle n to

an a ll t ime low from oil d ilut ion, thefo llowe r damage was ine vi ta ble . Bil lGa mb le's wreck ing yard in Ho rario Streetsupplied another follower assembly for 5s.and on fitt ing, the engine rega ine d itsformer sile nt run ning. Ba ld ty res once

aga in bro ugh t th ings to a close and theBuick went to a S h irley Road de aler whoco llected o ld ca rs for access to pet ro lco upons which found a ready market int he days of fuel ra tio n ing. Allocat iondescended to a low of four gall ons pe rmonth at one stage .

Undrill's garage at Gerald ine producedthe ne xt Buick, a no ther 1924 4 cylinderto urer with quite good tyres from the irla rge horde of t rade -ins. W hil e ErnieU nd rill ran a most success ful C hev ro letagency, he did not have quite th e sameluck sel ling his trades and the coll ec tionhe had sto red in sheds aro un d thetow nship would have kept the local VCCcrowd happ y for a long time had th ey beenava ilable tod ay.

T he Buick was in fa irly origina l sha peand apart from a big leak in th e radi ato r(wh ich Ernie insisted woul d rake up but ofcourse it didn 't ) nec essitat ing a protract edtow most of th e way back to C hristchurchbehind the firm 's 1936 produ cer-gas fueledFord VS, it needed littl e atten t ion. Q ui te alarge mileage was co ve red withoutproblems before se lling it in favo ur of a1926 6 cylinde r Maste r ser ies to ure r whichof co urse complet e ly out-perfo rmed the 4cylinde r bu t at the expense of heavier fuelco nsumption.

O n th e 6, th e rear tyres were ha lf wornMoto rways 600 x 2 1 retreads and th e Av onDuo t reads fro n ts, wh ile smooth , We reha lfway bet ween th e first and the seco ndtreads with enou gh rubber left for man ymi les. T he Buick did a big mi leage withon ly one ho ld up when the generator fronthearin g se ized lock ing the rear wh eel sth rough the t iming d rive which wen t to

pro ve th e t iming gea rs we re mad e oftough er stuff th an one would have ant ici­pated. T he car was usuall y in de ma nd onSa turda ys for hostel footba ll ma tc hescarrying th e 15 in th e acco mmoda t ion

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section and the keg in front betwee n the chassis rails. Some fairlysmart d isemb arking was the order if th e law appeared to be takingtoo keen an interest in proceedings.

A 1925 Standard 6 Tourer was d iscove red which appeared to bein not qu ite so disreputable Cl state as the Maste r 6, so it wasdecided it was time for a cha nge. T his new car had been stored forseve ral years during the war coa ted with linseed oil which hadhardened and took J ays of ha rd labour to remove but looked verysmart when the job was do ne. It was somethi ng of a d isappoint­ment in th at it did not perform as well as the bigger car anddefin ite ly fell from favour whe n a loud crunching noise from therea r heralded a differential problem of sign ificance. 1925 Standard6 d iff parts are pecu liar to th at ca r and no one in town hadany th ing on the shelves, so Sydenha rn Wre cki ng took ove r in adea l that 1 came out of no t too disadvanta ged . Next was a 1926Maste r 6 sedan tha t was fairly sound in th e body, but mecha nicalcondit ion a littl e suspect as it turned out when on a trip south adreaded knocking sound arose from th e engine compar tment. O ndropp ing th e sump it was found that one big end had run andinspection showed that this had been due to loss of oil pressurewhen the relief valve spring had broken and the two pieces hadwound in toget her. If one had looked at the oi l gauge this disastermay have been avert ed but if th e oil gauge light had been workingone could have seen the gauge. Enthusiasm for th e sedan wanedand a search was mounted for a replacemen t but as some of th elocal Buicks had by now been used up, anothe r proved hard to

find. Eventually the owner of th e prev ious Master 6 tourer wasapproached and tha t ca r brought back and once again placed intoarduous service . Severa l interestin g tr ips were made includingLake Sumne r and a Lees Valley circu it were all survived more bygood luck th an good man agement.

To becontinued

Here at Beaded Wheels we are always on the lookout for a goodarticle for a future issue and we are now actively seeking morecontributions.To encourage you toput pen topaper two lucky authors per issue willwin acoveted limited edition Beaded Wheels cap.We can accept articles in handwriting, typed or done on a computer(any common word-processing program is okay) and they can beposted to:Beaded Wheels, P 0 Box 13140, Christchurch or e-mail beaded­wheels@vcLorg.nz .High resolution digital photos are acceptable if taken using a fourmega pixel digital camera set at a high resolution. Please contactme if you wish todiscuss an idea for an article.

Xevin ClarksonChauman Beaded Wheels Editorial Committee

hm 03 38S 9821, wk 029236 3796~. . .. \'0'" •• me/numb" ., 'lllja9.djemail kevln.c1arksonihug.(o.nz

The lucky winners of Ihe Beaded Wheels caps for this issue are GeoffMorris (Nelson) and Jack Hindess (Taupo) Congratulations and thanksfor your contribution. Don't forget we are always looking lor goodarticles.

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Otaihanga Road(off State Highway 1)

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email: southward@kapitLco.nz

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also Dunlop racing tyres .

Ka)'e Don's Silver Bullet sportedtwin Sunbeam engines aheadof thedriver and used ice tanks fOT cooling.This vehicle racedat Da)'ton Beachin 1930 where it achieved 183mph.

Part 3 of our series from

BILL SHIELLS heralds in the

era of The Big Guns!

Prior to 1927 the L.SR had heen set with car chassis modifiedto acc ept early aviation engines of 300AOO hp with littleattempt to lower air resistance other th an to reduce frontal

area and att ach simple wind-cheating fairings. Changes wereliterally in the wind, howe ver, wirh aero engines such as th eNapier Lion now producing double the power ava ilable only eightyears before, and equalling the output of two wartime Sunbeams asused by Seugrave in 1927. Although this did not make the multi ­engined car obsolete ov ern ight it did mak e possible sma ller, lighterand hopefully less complicated machines, with th e potential,given a new approach to aerodynamics, to a llow much hi gherspeeds . Carnpbell and Seagrave, ,1S favoured drivers, were thereforeable to rake full adv antage of the most powerful British aeroengines in existence .

A very spec ial new rwin -cngincd challenger appeared fromSunbea m in 1930 and although th eor eti cally formidable, theS ilver Bullet turned out to be Coarulcn's swan -song rather than atango as in 1927. Designed especi ally for the car each 24 litr e V 12was vaguely described as ,giving 2000 hp. Ultimately intended to

power large aircraft the engine nev er appeared in that role. Theover square engines with twin ohc and four vertical valves percylinder were supercharged using 14" centrifugal blowers andinstalled in tandem ahead of the driv er. Two drive shafts, similar tothe Golden Arrow, allow ed a low driving positi on. Ice tanks insteadof radiators cooled the engines and with its slim long hody the carwas well named. Kave Don, the well known Sunbeam driver, gotnowhere with the car on the rough sands of Davtona Beach,reaching onl y 183 mpli and after many attempts, and numeroustechnical and other problems the challenge was abandoned . Aswith many large companies in the late 1920s and early 1930s,

Sunbeam's mark et was in decline and little funds were available forthis once great firm to develop special competition cars.

Having succeeded five times from 1924, C ampbell had nowhec om e obsessed with recovering the record and gave Bluebird itsbiggest re-design from th e hare chassis up under the direction ofReid Railton. A new Schneider Trophy N apier Lion, now super­charged to 1450 hp , with KLG tran smission and offse t drive shaftwas enclosed in a much lower body and larger stabilising fin. Aftera return to a rough Davtona Beach in 1931 the delightedCampbell reached 246 mph, more than four miles a minute, andvery close to the magic 250 mph, Just how important theseachievements were rat ed in Britain at that time, became evidentwhen first Seagrave and then Carnpbell received knighthoods inappreciation of their efforts.

Tragically, Sir Henry Seagrave was killed in June 193 1 at LakeWindermere in his speedboat Mis.5 EnR[and, after brea k ingAmerican Gar Wood's world record , with an average of98.7 111ph.The 38' boat was desi gned around two Roll s-Rovce 'R' typeengines developing a total of over 4000 hp. Developed for the1931 Schneider Trophy, this .3 6 litre engine had produced 2800 hpon th e test bed hut, in th e interests of reliabilitv, this was reducedto 2.300 hp for the Cup-winning Supermarinc 56. A 2600 hpsprint version was used in the S6 for setting a world record of407.5 mph. It was not until the late stag es of WWIl that th e 27litre Merlin equ alled this output in service hut a r8cing Merlinproduced over 2000 hp in 1937.

Determined to achieve 300 mph, Campbell repla ced the Napierwith a Rolls-Rovce 'R' type rated at 2500 hp, and raised his ownrecord ro 272.4 mph. During these runs the rev counter recorded3750 rpm equivalen t to 3.30 mph by Railton's calculations, so itwas obvious that considerable power was lost in wheel spin. For

the next attempt on the 300mph mark in 1935, Railtonused an independent drive tu

each rear ax le and twin rearwheels, a new body hugged theengine contours closely. A fullwidth low nose incorporated awide horizontal a ir-int ake slotwhich, with a driver controlledsh utter, could be clo sed uff to

improve streamlining whenentering the measured mile.The car was now 28' long andwith lead ballas t weighed fivetons, whi ch required built -in

The Railwll -MobilSpecial outsideThmnpson & Til)'lrm workshop at

jacks for wheel ch an ges at each end of th e run . In view of thegrea ter weight and near 300 rnph spee ds, a supplement ary vacuumoperated air brake was devised, hinged behind the rear wheels andpro trudi ng upwards in to th e air st ream. Daytona Beach conditionswere bad but Bluebird recorded 276.8 mph after a he ct ic run .Clearly the beach had become impractical and C amphell lookedelsewh ere including Ninet y Mil e Beach in Ne w Zea land whichoffered an 18 mile dead stra igh t stre tch of hard sand. This beachwould he used by a new Australian contender, Norman Wi zardSmith, whose car was sim ilar in man y respects to the Golde nArrow and powered hy an other Sc h ne ide r Trophy Napier Lion of1450 hp . Smith's attempt failed but he did, however, break th e 5and 10 mile records.

C arnpbc ll decided that th e long trip to Ne w Zealand wouldinvolve excessive cost s so he acc epted an invitation by theAmerican s, to run the car at Bonneville Salt Flat s in Utah. O n thefirst run one of th e Bluebird's front tyres burst at over 300 rnph asCarnpbcll was coming out of the measured mile bur he man agedsomeho w to hold th e car afte r it veered off the course. The returnrun was uneventful and th e average recorded was 30 1 mph. A fterthi s, his final LSR achi evement , Sir Malcolm was co nte nt andturned to the water speed record.

For seven yea rs Briti sh built cars had held the record and noforeign cha llenge r had appeared until 19.35. The Ca liforn ianproject to build a 30 ' car, with two flat four engines and four wheeldrive , fin all y did nor materi ali se and S ir Malcolm's recordremained intact un til 1937.

In that year th ere app eared, as one writ er put it , a monster toout-mo nste r all mon sters, Ca pta in G eurge Evsron 's seven tonThunderbolt equipped with eigh t wheel s, two 2500 hp Rolls­Royc e 'R' engines, all ind ependent suspen sion and disc brak esfront and rea r. This new ca r was built in only seve n months.When Thunderb olt was ta ken to Bonncville, Eysron was onfamiliur ground after earli er long distance record attacks with RR­engine d Speed of the Wind . Delayed by co urse and mech ani calproblems, Eysron finall y set a new record of 3 12 mph but he wasnot sat isfied as he knew th e car was design ed for much more.

Man y modifi ca tion s were put in hand afte r thi s first ex perienceincluding co il instead of leaf springs, servo assisted brakes andbody sha pe improvements with a slid ing perspex coc kpit co ver ason fighting ai rcrnfr. In Au gust 1938, Eyston raised the record ro asubstant ial 345.9 mph. During thi s record attempt anothe r ca rappeare d on the Sa lt Lake. The very experienced Reid Ruiltonhad been working on a radical new cm since 1935 for John Cohb.The Raiiton Specia l as it was known set exciting new standards ofappearance and technical innovat ion. T he project was an exampleof applied sc ience in searc h of speed . Ruilt on defied tradition hybuilding th e ca r as small and light as possible with a near perfectae rodyna mic body and four wheel drive . Previously, in 1933, hehad used N apier Lion power for John Cobb when he designed th eN apier Railt on to at tack 24 hour and other record s at Brooklands,Montlhcrv in Fran ce and U tah . For the land speed record he cho setwo IU-vcar old supercharged Napiers totalling 2500 hp @ 3600rpm similar to th ose used for the ea rlier Bluebirds. The en gin eswere hung on eac h side of a flat Z-shaped girder chassis, the rear­most eng ine dri vin g the front wheels and th e fore -most drivingthe rear pa ir. Two transmission brakes were wat er-cooled andwishbone and co il suspension was used at th e front and co ils at therear with 5'6" front track and 3'6" rear allowing a beautiful tear ­drop shaped bodv form with th e coc kpit situate d at the ex tremefront of th e car. A t just ov er three tons th e Railron weighed und erhalf th at of Thunderbolt. Three weeks after Evston's run . Cobbrecorded 350.2 mph and the following day Eyston replied with357.5 mph afte r installing ice tank cooling and cleaning up th ebody. Unfortunatel y Evston's great ca r was destroyed by fire in1947 whil e in storage in N ew Zea land afte r di splay at th e( \ 'n rpn nj ,_, 1 b vh ,hitl"n {l( 1c)40 'n tc) ~Q An rh "",, pvp n t rh p .;:p.r ,-",.." l

~

./ -

These cop twu plwwgwphs show che Gen nan T 80 of / Si3H which had a3 ,000 hp Daimler betv ; engine and was designed to crave/ lit nearly 500 mph.The vehicle never contested the LSR .

T3luehird and Sir Malcolm Camphell hla,ing a crail «crosx che sands of SaltLal<e tu uve;' 300 m/)11.

J{olls-Royce designed che R cype V12 in response W (1)1 Air Ministry request fora lTlore JJowerflJI Schneider Tro/Jh )' engine. At che time R-J{ m(l)wgingdirectorBasilj ohmon cllOughr che com/)(j)1Y had (l heLLer ji,cw-e in bllilding qllaliry' Ulrs,hur history shows HenT)' Royee deseJ"ves eredi! for wl<ing che op/)orwnic)' toproduce it racing en6~'ne - which led co che lacer lvlerlin and Griffon.

World War, Cohb returned to Bonnevillc withou t an air brake andregained the record at 369 .7 mph.

By thi s time Mercedes Rem had co mp leted a formidabl echallen ger in the form of a two and a half ton six-wheeledmachine with a 44 litre 3000 hp Daiml er Rem aero eng ine, withthe intention of achi eving 450 mph but th e outbrea k of warprevented th e record attempt.

Two years afte r th e war a refurbi shedRailton now named The Railton MobilSpecial went back to Bonne ville and Cobblift ed th e record to .394 mph , havingreach ed 40 3 rnph one way. f or 16 yearsth is reco rd stood and, like th e four-minutemile, 400 rnph seemed un attainable.

Sir Malcolrn Ca mpbell's son, Dona ld,had broken 200 mph with Vickers jet poweron wate r and in 1956 co nst ructe d a newBlueb ird bu ilt mound a Bristo l S idde leyProte us free turbine of 5000 hp driving th efour wheels th rou gh two fixed ruti ogearboxes. There were three independ en tbrak ing systems and a mass of co mplicatedelectronic instrumentation . A devasta tin gcrash at .360 mph du ring trials at Utahalmost destroyed th e car, but incrediblyC arn pbell survived. Regaining consc ious-

ness he asked "Ho w long before repairsco uld be completed?" Overhea ring th is, animpressed S ir A lfred O wen arranged for anew car to be built from the remains . Thenew car had a modifi ed oxyge n systemcon sidered to be respon sible for Ca rnpbell'sloss of control prior to th e crash. A ta il finwas a lso add ed befor e weather andtechn ical problems delayed what was to betwo clean run s, Blueb ird ave raging 403.1rnph, the targe t W,lS ach ieved.

A year before, in 196.3 , Cra igBreed love, with the Spirit of Am erica, athree wheeled pure jet propelled vehicleaveraged 407.45 mp h at U tah but thi s wasnot an offic ial record as th e Spirit wastechnically a motorcycle powered by jetth rust. He cou ld, however, claim to be thefastes t man on earth, now to be a separate

class from the wheel dri ven LSR hold er.From 1964 to th e present day the bat tle

for the fastest man on ear th co nt inues, therecord being currently held by English manRichard Nob le's 1997 Thrust SSC whi chwas driven by Andy G ree n who reached76.3.035 mph acco mpanied by the appro ­priate sonic booms. The wheel driv en LSRha s been much harder to break . S ince BobSummers recorded 409.27 mph in 1965 nosuccessful challenge has mntcri allscd othe rthan an unc onfirmed 409.98 mph by A lTeague in 1991. Summers' car Golde n rodturned th e wheel of hi story full ci rcle byhavin g four auto mot ive C h rvsler Hern i V8eng ines installed tota llin g .3000 hp , fina llynailing the lid on the classic aviationpiston engine as an LSR power source .

To be continued.

New Zealand

Federation of Motoring Clubs

repor t fro m VCC rep

Andrew McClintock

I put my name torward and have been accepted by the man age­ment to rep resent the Vintage C ar C lub at The Federation ofMotoring C lubs. This wi ll he my th ird yea r ,I S your representa­

tive and I am looking forward to repre senting th e vast and variedint erests of Vin tage C ar C lub members for anot her year.

Before th e Federat ion 's AG M the y met with member clubsaround th e co unt ry to ex plain how th e organi zat ion works andwhat th ey ha ve been up to. It becam e clear that the workings ofthe orga n izat ion were not clearly understood by a ll, so for yourbenefit I wil l cla rify it. The Federa t ion was formed n ine years agoto monitor legislati on and by-laws tha t may restri ct the use ofveh icles whose ow ners belon g to memb er clubs. Individua ls cannot join the Federation, on ly clubs can belon g. There are col lectorand one make cluh s cate ring for cars, motor cycles, trucks , mil itaryvehicles, tractors and farm machinery.

A ll LTSA draft rules arc scrut in ized and submissions presentedas an d when requ ired in con sultation with member clubs. Publicliabili ty, OSH and AC C rules are a lso gett ing a lot of attent ion aswell at present. T he W OF rules and requirements are changing allthe t ime .

The fuel syste m will be a WOf item from February next yea r.Your fuel ta nk and fuel lines will be checked for rust or cor rosionand leaks. Your fue! pump will be chec ked for leaks. lr wou ld bepruden t to check neopr en e (rubber ) hoses for cracks and deterio­ration . Make sure th ey have hose clips fitted and are norco ntaminat ed with engine o il. So me types of hoses have neoprenecentres that are fuel and oi l proof with a rubber oute r cas ing thatmay swell with o il contam ination .

It pays to ch eck a ll th e obvious thi ngs yourself before you go foryour WOE A ll rejects are now logged onto the computer. Theprob lem with th is is if th e autho rities chec ked up it wou ld not lookgood for older vehicles. N ewer veh icles are less likely to have asmany borde rline item s simply because th ey are newer, not becausethey are bett er mai ntained. I have to admit over the years I havebee n lax about taking my oid veh icles for a WOE I usually pre­check for obvious fault s, a bulb out or th e horn not work ing ere,but some times I know th e brakes need adjust ing to improve theped al travel, or a borderline tyre, or wiper blades th at are a bit sad,vo u knnw rh " s()rr n ( rhi n " r Ill" "n 1 rhink " I' ll rim ir rhrnlloh (nr

th e test an yway, maybe they won't not ice." I am sure I am not theonly one guilty of thi s. In th e past it was not a probl em but nowyour veh icle becomes a sta t ist ic on the computer if rejected . Let usface it if your tyres, brakes or king pins arc borderline they willneed rep lac ing soone r or later. It may seem expensive but in rcal iryth ere is very lit tle d ifferen ce so don 't pu t off the inevit able repairs.

Mak e it easy for th e veh icle inspec to r. C lean th e hoot out so hecan check the fuel tank and che ck that the spare wheel is secure.C lean out th e inside and make sure th e sea t belts are access ibleand un lock th e doors. Presentati on helps as well. C lean und er theguards, dcgrcase th e engine co mpa rtment , vacuum th e ca rpets,give th e paint a cut and polish and black the tyres, but don 't useth e st icky silico ne type as the inspectors don 't apprecia te it onthei r hands.

I kn ow 1110st of th e abov e are not \VO F item s but belie ve me itdoes make a differ en ce. Back in 1970 I owned ,1 19.3 4 Vauxh a llASX whi ch incid en ta lly I swapped plus $ 150.00 for th e Model Ath at I drive rodav, T he Vauxha ll was ligh t green, the paint hadoxid ised and had a frosted whi rl' look to ir. It also had a met alpanel pop riveted in place where the fabric insert had been in theroof. T his panel had surface rust on ir. We ll I took the ca r to aC hrisrchurch Testing Sta t ion for a warrant . Ir was rejected onbrakes, king pin s, steering box, shackles and headl ight adjustment .The veh icle inspect or ex plaine d all th e faults and told me .thc ca rwas on its last legs and prob ably not worth fixing. I went home,freed up th e brake cab les and adjusted the brakes, steering box andhead ligh ts and greased th e kin g pins and shac kles. I a lso cut andpolished rhe pa int , blacked th e tyres and painted the roof insertwith tyre black . A ll thi s was done on a Saturday morning. W he n Iroo k th e ca r back for 3 rech eck it passed and th e inspec to rco mmented on what an immaculate o ld Vauxh all it was. I havehad similar expe riences with the Model A. T he same testingsta rion (two owners later) rejec ted my Model A because the f1 00rwas rusty. It was and st ill is unrestored. W hen I to ld th e supervisorthe f1 00r is made of wood and the rust is rusty water blown backfrom th e radiator overflow th ey all rolled around th e floor laugh ing.This got me thinking, so we took rhe body off the ch assis, paintedeveryth ing and reassembled her. S ince th en I hav e had no W OFproblems. Previously th ey always found someth ing wron g. Now Ialways groo m my veh icle before th e test. It seems to make a differ ­~e. ~

Afew years ago I heard of a G raha rnPaige sitt ing in a shed behind thelittle Spa Hotel In Taupo, Aft er a

few ph on e ca lls I trac ed it down and askedth e owne r if I co uld look at it. He agreed .

At th e shed th e car was outside u-nder acover. The cover was removed and blowme down, th e car was as rotten as 0

ca bbage. He co uld see the look on my face- what a mess. He admitte d th e shed hadleaked like a sieve ban g in the middl e ofthe ca nvas for th e eigh-teen vears th e ca rhod sat th ere.

"Whm price are you expec t ing!" "It owesme $3 ,000." I m id him I didn 't want it as Ialready had a completely restored Gmha rnPaigc and enough parts for two more. Itha nked the owne r very much and left.

Two week's later Taup o VC C had agarage sa le at th e c lubroo ms, and weredonated a Graha rn Paigc seda n which ifth ey d idn't want was to go to th e crushe r.Taupo VC C did not want a whole cmespecially if it was not going m sell.

Lat e on Friday I had a ca ll from FrankMaxwe ll of Taup o Bran ch - "Do you wantano the r G raha rn Paige to take away!" Iasked "Is it the green cm from th e SpaRoad garage?" "Yep," he repli ed "do youwant it !" "No th anks Frank I've goten ough bit s m sink a sh ip and don't needanothe r ca r anyway." "If you don' t take itit wil l be crushed as he has sold up and ismoving on ." "He ll I can 't let th at happen !I'll be down on Sunday m pick it up."

O n Sunday, I ar rived and th ere was thecr ushe r a lready working on a pil e ofmodern cars. For tunately the operator hadleft the G raha m by a shed just in casesomebo dy did want it. Phew th at was aclose one . We loaded it up and brought ithome to Rororua.

The cm was put in a dry shed eventhough it was beyo nd repair, and I th ough tit was better in my she d th an in th ecrusher. G raha rn just kept me co mpanyand became a talking point to hoot.

I received a leather bound book fromthe US A G ruha m O wne r's club on th e

looking G raharn co n vert ible und er th eheading "A line of Spec ia l Si xes andEights ." They had a streamline four doorco nve rti ble with wind up windows andupright front screen ere, a very striking cm.

I said to my wife Doreen "I am go ingto build this ca r." My prev ious restora ­t ions had bee n com pleted for a few yea rsand th e bug was bit ing to ge t in tosome th ing e lse , th ere was a need forano ther G raha m in our sta ble.

Work BeginsI dismantl ed th e cm and str ipped the

door s ready to cut into convertible doors.The front were easy to a lter as theyretained th e front door pillar for the glassto go up and down. They were fitt ed backon th e scuttle, open ing and closing etc.

The bac k doors were a different story asthe y had to be cha nged from suicide doorsto co nve nt iona l type as, o nce cut to size,the h inges had nowhere to go. From therear guard to th e top was on ly ten inc hesand too weak to support the weigh t. I too kthe steel hinge frames from two front doorsand fitte d th em to th e front of th e bac kdoors as the pattern was the same . No w Ihad conve nt iona l doors with streng th. A llI have to do now is work out when thewindow is up how to stop it falling ontoth e road. I will figure tha t out as I go alongas is th e case with other tricky bits.

The next jobs were repl acin g rust andalso sh ifting th e style lines frOl~1 th e reardoors around th e bac k of the tub as theseda n lines are two inch es highe r and hadto drop the rub line s down to accornmo­dat e the sty le of th e hood when up ordown . This was done by a craftsma n friendof mine who has C reative Autobody inG lenfield A uckland. He cut an d rigged ,hammered and filed, un til you co uld nottell it had been alte red and looked th eparr . O nwards and upwards.

Now th e meta lwork was complete , thewoodwork was nex t. The scut tle had veryfell' bits and that was easy, as were thedoor s. The back tub was a bit difficult, but

woodwork co mplete d. Des Corn well ofTaran aki Branch gave me th e hood bowsand bracket s as they sat on top of the ruband nor down the side like tourer brackets.I very much appreciated thi s as they weresimple to fit and opera te.

The Mi ssing LinkDespite my co llect ion of Grah arn bits, I

did not have th e correc t engi ne andgea rbox for th e co nvert ible and alsoneeded a few minor trims. During a rally inHami lton , I met ano the r Graha m Paigeent h usiast , S tu C lotworthy, and he toldme of a cha p in Tauranga who hadG raha rn engines and part s. I rang and wasinvit ed to co me and have a look. Ne xtweekend, it was ove r to Tauranga, up hisdri ve and into th e shed. Through a doorin to a separate shed and ...

Strewth - thi s guy had piles of every ­thing th ree tim es ove r and eve n anothe rG raha m Paige st ill on wh eel s. Pet eropened th e big door on the shed to let inmore light and said "go for it, have a lookth rough everyth ing." I was in my elementand on cloud nine. Pet er sho t my dream to

pieces. I asked what he wan ted for theeng ine. "Take the lot or nothing at all."Damn, the last thing I nee ded was morespares but re lucta ntly I bough t it a ll. Fiveta ndem tra iler loads - six chass is, fiveeng ines, six diffs and so on an d so on. Boywas I a lucky chap! I have had to buy ashi pping co nta ine r to pur some of it inun til I can sell off about ten tra iler loads.

Back to the carThe chassis was back to new after John

Foot of Hamilton Bran ch straightened andre-rivett ed it . Now to fit the body onto thechass is, fit the scuttle doors and set up th erear tub . Hopefully it sho uld be ready forpa in tin g around the end of the year. Thereis sti ll a lot to do once the bod y is bac k onth e chass is.

A ll small part s an d fittin gs have beenst ripped , rebuilt and th en put awayawait ing assembly. The engine 'and gearbox have nor been touched as yet. T heyare simple to restore and will be rebuilttowards the end of th e restorati on .

I have plenty of wire wheels to choo sefrom and have had six hu bcaps made.Most of rhe ch rorne d parts have beenrepaired and arc waiting new ch rome. Theback is broken now and we should be wellon th e way. I am st ill hopin g to take itsouth m the Diam ond Jubilee rally 2006but tim e will tell . We are looking forwardto th e trip south and meeting a lot ofentrants from the fifty year rally in 1996.

The final update of my co n vert iblewill follo w completion, hopefully intwel ve to fourteen months tim e when Ipick the co lour sche me ere and have it

by Tim Chadwick

Crantham House, Oriental Bay, Wellington,New Zealand-2004 ISBN 1 86934 091 4

Reviewed by Mark Dawber

This is the seventh motoring book byTim Chadwick and continues in the styleof his previous efforts, being essentially acollection of well-captioned photos. Thisone is different from some of his earlierbooks in being presented in a more uprightformat. He has succeeded in covering asmany as possible of the diverse variants oftin-top motor racing that have existed inNew Zealand over the last 50 or so years atboth grass roots amateur and professionallevels. This is illustrated by the front coverwhich features the author competing inone of the first classic racing events alongwith pictures of some of the earliest andlatest saloon racers . A short introductionby the author sets the scene and the rest ofthe book gives a mention (at least) toalmost every make of car that has beencampaigned on the circuits of NewZealand. It was good to find only a verysmall number of errors and 'typos'. Thisbook should not be looked at as a compre­hensive history of the sport in NZ (thereare very few 'facts and figures'), more a

nostalgic look-back at a form of motor­sport which is a favourite with a largepercentage of NZ fans.

by Michae/ Eyre, Chris Heaps andA/on Townsin

lan Alien Publishing Ltd, Horsham, SurreyKT12 4 BC - 2002 ISBN 0860935744

Reviewedby Rob Knight

To mark the occasion of 100 years sincethe first Crossley car, a copy of the abovebook was presented to the Vintage CarClub of NZ by the Crossley Register of NZat the National North Island Rally, 2004 . Iwas privileged to accept the book onbehalf of the VCC and before lodging itwith National Office, I took the opportu­nity to read it. Having done so a review isprobably appropriate.

This is a massive and well presentedwork of 272 pages and hundreds of photos,the content of which has been diligentlyresearched over a long period by the teamof authors who are obviously passionateabout their subject. Perhaps toopassionate, unless one is a fan of buses andthe minute detail involved in the severalchapters which covered Crossley Motors'post-war bus building activities. There wasan almost bewildering variety of combina­tions of Crossley and other bodies onCrossley chassis while at the same timeCrossley bodied rival chassis .

Particularly irksome was the repetition oflarge chunks of text with most of thephotographs, a ploy that was probablydesigned so that the casual dipper would readmuch of the book by reading the captions .

Nevertheless the story of how theCrossley brothers came to be renowned fortheir gas and oil engines, of their philan­thropic works in their heyday, of how theyprogressed into motor vehicles, CrossleyMotors venture into aircraft through Avroand of their dalliance with the dubiousJohn North Willys in a search for a lowprice car to market, all make for fasci­nating reading. Only by selling off assets

and launching into buses in the lean timesof 1930s were Crossley Motors able to savethe company from the WiIlys debacle .

After the deaths of the foundingbrothers and the formation of CrossleyMotors the book follows the fortunes ofthe precocious child in those venturesmentioned above with little more mentionof the solid parent company, CrossleyBrothers. For example Crossley Motorsstruggled to develop and make a reallysatisfactory diesel engine. Why they didn'tdump the troublesome HOE engine thatwas supplied with thousands of buses, orseek help from more experienced enginebuilders such as Crosslev Brothers is, inhindsight, beyond comprehension; particu­larly when bus chassis orders began to dryup as municipal corporations switchedmore and more to the better engines byAEC & Leyland. The HOE engine simplywasn't up to the high standard of thebodies so Crossley Motors was forced tomerge with its rival AEC. It became part ofthe ACV group and was eventually lost inthe Leyland conglomerate. A sad endingfor a once proud company.

Of course the book also covers in detailthe development of the Crossley motor carwhich rivalled Rolls-Royce in the luxurycar market. New Zealand gets a mentionhere and there as a market for cars andtrolley buses, while some individual NewZealand cars are featured.

In other chapters we also learn of howCrossley Motors' entry into commercialvehicles was timed fortuitously to capture alarge part of the market for British militaryvehicles in the Kaiser War and of how thisexperience was put to good use in theHitler War.

As mentioned, the text is supported byhundreds of high quality photographs, mostof which ha-ve probably never beenpublished before. An index and tables ofchassis and engine numbers add to the value.

All in all the book is good reading foranyone interested in the history of motorvehicle companies, is a Crossley fan, or has alove for buses and commercial vehicles.

A division of

Tube Fab Ltd

97 Harman St

PO Box 9188

Addington

Christchurch 2New Zealand

Ph 03 338 1142

Fax 03 338 9280

Lockring Heavyand Light.Available soon.

Beaded edgeWide range30x3 to 895x135Split Rims

Well base Rolled edge.All sizes.

CADILLAC ALLARD 1951Text Scott Thomson Photos Robert Boult Collection, Scatt Thomson

SYDNEY ALLARD WAS AN ALL ROUNDER

Astar in thirties mud trials, Sydney became a postwar British

hill climb champion. He raced touring cars, was first British

finisher at Le Mans, and though never a Formula One driver,

performed with credit in Formula Libre against such

champions as Fangio, Hawthorn and Gonzales. He won the

Monte Carlo rally, and introduced Britain to American style

drag racing - a prettycomplete sport portfolio for one man.

COMPETITION J2

A llard buil t , or a t Ica_~ t co mm issioned, all th e cars him self.The All urd Motor Company Introduced th e J2 II1 1949 asan ourrig h t compet it ion car , in tande m with more

everyday two and four seat er ope n cars, a more co mfortabledropheud coupe and a full 2+2 saloon.

A llard could see no future for the average ent husiast with acompetition car if parts too k an age to source and a fortune toreplace. Allard loved lit res so his staple diet was A mer ican

product ion bits, and sta rring with a Ford VS, they did him proud.Ford prov ided chassis co mpone nts and in Commonwea lth

countr ies usuall y th e eng ine also. It all help ed keep the basic pricebelow th e dreaded £999 where purch ase tax in Brira in doubled.

This was good going for a handbuilt car of undoubted performance

with such features as th e first De Dion rear axle layout in a Briti shprodu cti on ca r.

The J2's race results show a huge A tla n t ic gap . From its debut arSi lverstone , Brit ish J2s struggled aga inst Jaguar, Frazer-Na sh,

immedi ately successful. Early in 1950 Tom Cole ran a Fcrr.ui veryclose at Lon g Island , displaying 'accelerat ion the like of which has

not been seen outs ide the Grand Prix stuff,' according to th e racereport.

O ne differen ce was th e eng ine. C ars deli vered in Britain usuallyhad Ford, de rived engines of 3.9 or 4.4 litres, de veloping, at the

very most, 140 bh p. Ca rs for A me rica were frequently impor tedwitho ut engines. Man y th en recei ved far more pot ent C ad illacsmotors starti ng around 160 hp and C hrys lcrs mor:irs from 195 I.

Hot rod raised mech ani cs hu ng performan ce enhancing goodiesaro und th ese; a cata logue list of sup pliers includ ed Ede lbrock ,Offenha use r, Winfield and Ardun . The C h rvslcr power ed

C unn ingha ms became serious co ntende rs bur th e A llard wasconside rably ligh ter and as late as 195 2 co uld st ill give the 4.1Ferraris a hard tim e.

Rob Boult 's files give inside informati on on th e C arsrens'A llards-dom ina t ing forces on the US West Coast in th e early1950's.

'I installed a '49 Ca d engi ne modifi ed with solid tappets (lat erfin ed with '52 heads) and Detroi t Racing dua l manifold ', recalled

Dav id Fogg of J2 1851. He built <111 the inci dentals - fue l lines,thro ttle lin kages and exhau st systems. Tom C arstc ns' (J2 1850 )

had a '50 Ca d bored out to four inch es (stoc k is 3"/'0") and fitt edwith JE pistons and Winfi eld ca m.

'After our surprise first tim e win ar Pebble Beac h all the engi ne

bea rings were replaced. The mains were in very had condit ion.The totally used up Ford tlathead transm ission supplied by A llardwas co mplete ly replaced, th e new case havin g a top sh ift and

remote shifte r. The bra kes were rebuilt and crac ked drumsreplaced . The h ubs were replaced , th e oute r stub ax les, includingthe keys, had twisted an eight h of an inch,' relates Fogg. A ll thi s

European spor ts ev en ts wer e usual Iy mu ch lon ger. A llardentrants th ere did not have acc ess to th e kn ow -h ow, or th e doll arsto obta in it. Road holding was not up to European standards. The1950 works C ad illac-A llard suffered an eng ine blow up in practiceat Le Mans but fin ished third , limi ted to to p gear. Ap parcn rly a llthe C ad illac eng ines fini sh ed in poor shape because of th e Frenchfuel q uality. Le Man s did not offer even 90 octa ne until 1952 an dbig engi nes used vast quantities of th e dreadful stuff. A later worksJ2X C hryslcr-A llnrd had a ta nk aroun d 40 gallon s. Even Ca rstenscars fitt ed a 35 gallon tank for th eir shorter races. Four miles per(U S) gallon was norm al.

IMPRESSIONSW hether see n kerb side in Frunk ron or in th e dr ivin g mi rrors at

Wig ram, Ro b Boult's CH fills the eye. The gleam ing red paint,glitter ing c hro rned wire wheel s and brutall y frank ro ll bar with fullharness drap ed ov er it all sen d out messages th at thi s is seriousstuff. The 5.4 litre C addy is hurbling away, smooth idle hu t un evenbeat th at has so meth ing to do with the timing. As I try to squeezein th e fl imsy little door, the ex haust puffs further warming up mytro user leg. The view o ver the power bulge in th e long louvredbonnet to th e cycle type mud guard s is impre ssive.

Despit e the present eng ine be ing mo ved six inche s forward inth e frame thi s feels essentiall y a mid -cn uincd ca r. My sp ine isalmos t exac t ly over th e rear axle. It was ca lled th e A llnrd Boypositi on . There 's not a 101' of roo m in th e cockpit. My legs an: notbuil r to A llard length and we ha ve 1'0 take out th e rear seat sq uab.It's all in the interests of we igh t distribution and tract ion from th etrials heritage.

The cm wasn't a lways thi s goo d. In 1979 Rob locat ed it in avery sad sta te and pat ien tly rebuilt imd develop ed it. Restor ati on istoo mild a word . Ray Larscn Lrd attended to the bod y, while BrianMiddlemass, engin eer /curat or of the Q ucc nsrown Motor Museum,deal t with the mccuanicals. A big break ca me on a business visitto A me rica when Rob mad e co n tact with Tom C ursrens who,1lTanged for a period C ad iliac en gine to be sh ipped to NewZeal and plus th e necessary parts to bring it close to th e spec ifica­tion of his famo us cars.

C h assis changes suggested include movin g th e eng ine forward,twin rear radi us rods, special rear ax les and Watts linkage rearsuspension . C ons ide rable bracing was do ne to a chassis whi ch hadmade few co ncessio ns to rigidity beyo nd th e mud tri al or igins. T heoriginal Lockh ced hydraul ics with A lfin a lloy ribb ed brak e drums

behindthew heel

appa ren tly gave ade quate sto pping for thei r day - with less th anhal f th e horses. Rob has discs.

ACTIONThrottle and clu tch pressures are n icel y ba lanc ed and I was

soo n und er way. My first impression was of eno rmous power in top.Then I pushed th e th rottl e down <I bit further and I had twocar burettors -four barrels . The mutter becam e a thunder, theworld ex plode d and th e back hunkcrc d down. Rob th in ks thereare aro und 300 horses and with th e two of us, the who le probabl yweighs not much mor e tha n a ton. St ill in top ,the impression is o fkickin g down two gears in a very power ful au to mat ic.

To put some numbers on this, Rob has dune a sta ndi ng qu ar terin just und er 14 seconds with the car in full touring trim . This isfaster th an th e figures recorded by some of th e South Islan d'sfastest mid -19 50s racing cars, nam ely th e Sta n ton C ropd uster( 14.37) , Spraguc's A lfa ( 14.40), and substant ia lly faster th anFrank Shuter's spec ial wh ich like the A lIard had a C ad illac 5,400cc engine . A stoc k stree t XK 120 might mak e the 18 seco ndbrac ket.

To co pe with this level of performan ce , Ro b hus repla ced th erathe r problemati cal three speed gea rbox with a Moss box :md latemod el gea rs. This gives a ver y n ice cha nge and 1 was just tellingRo b that when I lost conce ntrat ion and missed a cog. Sorry! A nove rdr ive gives insolently low revs (l ,SOO?) ar legal speed.

O n track the J2 strips down to a n aero screen, bu t for road workthe full width windscreen is fitted and side cur ta ins cut coc kp itbuffer. O n th e crisp sum mer morning 1 enjoyed , th e All md is apleasant road express, ride q uite accepta ble on rhe grippy Pircll!road r.ulials, :1 spare being mounted on eac h side . Touring fue lconsumpt ion is aro und 20/22 mpg.

As well as th e full harness, th e navigat or has Cl grab handle, fueland te mp gauges, a Helda to play with and a speedo in miles andkilometres. In an ove rseas e vent Rob has run it well off the dial ­mmm ! T ha t's an indi cated 140 rnph plus, All nrd himself was tim edin an exa mple with streamlined op en bod y at 145.3 at Le Mans.Back to rhc dash with key star t and choke, th e horn button andcent ral mirr or mounted in th e cleavage, amps, a big rev counterright under the dri ver's eye and a co mbined oil tempe rature andpressure gauge. O n th e far right there is a kil l switc h .

Feeling my way roun d the hedged Waka tipu bac k roads withbur sts of stra igh t lin e grunt, it see med like a good idea to find howth e beast liked

it's co rne rs. Do es it undersreer or oversteerI asked ? The answer was 'both ' . Rob hasbent th e A llard and hi msel f on occasionso I took no liberties with th is horny oldca r. For my money we have a basicallyundersteering ca r on t raili ng th rottle , butwith a ll that po wer. .. . My caut ion on a

gravel road works sec t ion d id not suit thelocal sta tion wagon id iot who passed,sho wering us with stones . U nfo rtunatelyhe turned off.

IFS AND BUTSO ne featur e A llards had a ll their own

was the ind ependent fron t suspension. Itwas once explained to me as cutt ing abeam axl e in half and the n joining theend s. The original system retained Fordleaf springs, but for the J2 th is wasc ha nge d by the use of co il springs inco njunc t ion with dire ct acti ng hydr aul icshock absorbers. The Motor launch articleput a brave face on thi ngs, not ing th e IFSwas mech ani call y sturdy with unusuall yfew moving pa rts. It was admitted that thelayout allowed castor angl e to increasesligh tly and ca mbe r angle to decrease asthe springs deflected , but the absence ofwheel tilting during fast co rner ing wasva lua ble - presumab ly on smooth surfaces.

Allard front wheel action is vari ouslydescribed . Rob mention s ' the wild frontwhee l ca mber changes ov e r bumps forwh ich th e ca rs were ren owned' . Driver

Bill Po llack sa id th e C arste ns #14 ca r' loo ked like a bow legged co wboy walkingdown a stree t ' . O ur Dun ed in video,'S tree ts A head ' sho ws anot he r red J2 th enowned by Jack Tut ton. This chara ct eristicis not somet h ing Rob find s desirable and

like most J2 owne rs he has shorte ned th erestra in ing stra ps to limit axle trave l.

Had Rob 's ca r been ava ilab le in presenttr im at the first A rdrnore GP in 1954, Ibe lie ve it would have bee n a strongoutrigh t co ntender. Al as, G eorge Smi thhad already sold it , afte r fight ing th e flexichas sis and skinny c ross ply tyres t ransmit­ti ng less th an hal f it 's present po wer.

Tod ay, Martin Stra in keeps the Boul tAll ard ready to race and it has done so atvirt ua lly every h istoric ve n ue in NewZealand, and A rnaroo Pa rk in Au st ra lia. Ithas class wins in the inau gural Targa andthe A ustra lian Can non Ball Run where itplaced l Zth ov era ll - oldest car in a fieldof 140 . In rall ying it foll ows the exampleo f Goff Imhof who too k a C ad illac-A llardto seco nd place in the French A lpine andfound it nimble eno ugh round the pylonsto win th e RAC rally in 1952. It is almosta lways d riven to race meetings, the owne rsthe n add ing a little lu ggage grid forextende d motori ng hol idays with theird n m f's t i,,, rf'd dinelS::!"r III

... • - r

Allard J2 088 was landed new at Auckland inAugust 1951 forGeorge Smith.Time is against some people and George wasone of them. As avery young man Smith creweda Chandler from Auckland to Wellington inrecord time and shortly afterwards drove aCadillac to second place in the 1922 NZ MotorCup. The Motor Cup series wound up and thedepression was on before he could get his ownracing car, but through the thirties George racedanything withwheels.The return of big time racing saw Smith withprecious import licences to bring in hotbitsfromAmerica . He turned up at the first Ohakeameeting in 1950 with a Ford V8 poweredroadster and almost immediately sold it to FrankShuter. Next George lengthened aspeedway car,installing another hot Ford, making therenowned Gee Cee Ess. With this and his longexperience Smith dominated New Zealandmotor sport in the early fifties - although'terrorised' might be abetter word.Though almost totally successful during the1950/51 summer, the long distance races inFebruary and March brought George againstmodern Jaguars and older imported racingmachines. George was no fool and realised theGee Cee Ess was outclassed in certain importantrespects. He was naturally aware of Allard'ssuccesses during the previous NorthernHemisphere season, particularly in American andon April 5th an urgent order was placed on hisbehalf.

Tony Sheehan, one of his mechanics, found theArdun OHV conversion engine a nightmare towork on. In 1952 Smith won the New Zealandhillclimb championship with the Allard, alsobeing second with the Gee Cee Ess. The Allardwas loaned to Shuter for the big Ohakea(handicap) race in which the heady SouthIslander finished second, making third fastesttime beh ind Smith and Sulman's Maserati.George and the Gee Cee Ess continued theirwinning ways until the 1953 season which sawRon Roycroft driving the Alfa Romeo and theCooper brigade making big gains in reliability.After winning the 1953 Hill Climb Championshipat Muriwai and taking third with theAllard, the12 was sold to RM Bailey in Christchurch and inSeptember 1956 to Frank Shuter. A year later itwas traded to George Palmer and then went intothe typical freefall of an old and orphanedperformance car, having eleven owners in fouryears.Smith tried again, importing another Europeanchassis into which he could slot a performanceenhanced V8. Somehow the Smith magic couldnotbe transferred to the Alfa-Aitken and Georgecontinued to fall back on the earlier Gee Cee Essuntil the end of his racing career in the laterfifties.Allard 12 088 is thus important both as a veryinteresting car in its own rightand also as part ofthe process by which a highly successful drivertried to stay competitive during a key period ofNew Zealand motorsport development.

Text and photos Reg Dear

"...My wife christened it Flossie. Why?

Goodness knows."

good home, we adve rt ised her in the C lub

magazine, and for $750 and a full tank,

so ld her to a bee keepe r in H amilton,

So uth land . So me time later we wer e

visiting Te Ana u so we though t we would

cull ami see how Flossie was. Flossie W ,IS

Not Well ! No one was hom e so we went

round the back and found her in an open

she d. Her worm dri ve diff was lying in th e

du st , her upholste ry torn ou t and her

painrwork a cha lky blue. \Ve were

absolutely devastated and left before the

owne r ami came home or he would have

had a piece of our minds. So me years later, a

friend attended a sho w in Wa naka and

beho ld! T he re was Flossie l Mr G era ld

Rh ode s, who was huild ing a tran sport

museum on th e airfield h,1(1 rescued her from

the beekeeper and restored her at great

expens e. We just had to go down and see

her. During th e restoration th e radiator cap

and the large nut holdin g th e spare wheel

cover on had becu lost , so bein g someth ing

of a machinist I made a new brass and

chromium plated cap, and a new nut for the

cover, hein g the only person who knew

her up I co uldn 't get her down aga in, so I

too k the to p off the pum p and the weigh t

of th e car ca used a fountain of o il to spra yup. The rubber sea ls were perished so I

took the pump to the local Sm iths

Instruments agent to get it recondition ed .

T he y said th ey would have to send it to

England and when I enquired where my

pump was a year lat er, th ey bad lost it. I

found one in a wreck ers yard whi ch had

been on a Ren aulr I think . The lines were

cak ed wit h a chees y substa nce wh ich was

left from th e vegetable o il used in th e

syste m.

After some years we bought a sec t ion at

Wainui for .£600 and I began to haul

building mat eri als over th e hill to build a

bach. Flossic , weighing two to ns and

having on ly 2500ccs did not like th at a bit

especia lly having half a to n of ce ment

loaded on to her flat floor. We decided to

give her some monkey glands and my

friend Ross Palm er ca me round and hon ed

th e bore s and fitt ed C hrvsler pistons, He

made such a good job of it that half wayround th e block she slowed to a halt and

wouldn't move until she had cooled down .

Ross took a little more out of the bores and

we co n tinued our trips to \Vainui, hu t

halfway up the hill and getting puffed she

would begin to kno ck in protestation and

would have to sto p and let her get her

breath back, much to th e annoya nce of

following traffic . T his co uld not go on so

in 1972, we made th e deci sion to sell her,

whi ch I have always regretted , and boughr

a 1967 Daimler VB wh ich, with its three

speed auto mat ic, didn 't like th e hill either

and we ended up with a Se ries Za

Landrover,

While we owne d Flossie we were

co ntacted by Gordo n Some rville wh o

wished to sta rt a Daiml er C lub and webecam e on e of the dozen or so found er

I n 1952 my wife and I ca me to

C hristch urch where I was to take aflying job with N AC for £6 a week. Wc

needed th e deposit on a house so we sold

our new Humber stat ion wagon and

bought a bike to go to work . There was a

huge mound of ea rth on the sec tion which

had to be disposed of and after a co uple of

years we had en ough money to buy a 1929

Ford Model A flatd eck whi ch we used to

cart the ea rth . In 1955 the C hristch urch

C ity Counc il put th e mayoral car up for

tend er. It was a 1937 Daimler EL24, six

cy linde r lim ou sine , complete with

occas iona l sca rs, glass div ision and

interco m. Our savings were £ 500 so I

tendered th e lot an d was successful. I wen t

to th e CCC garage to take possession and

have so me tuit ion on the prcse lecror

gearbox which I had not driven before. My

wife ch riste ne d it "Flossic '' . Why?

G oodness knows.

We had great fun driving abo ut and

watching th e stares from ped estri an s tu

whom my wife would respond with a regalwave of her hand . Flossic had a pred ilec­tion for breaking th e fron t main springs

which ha d been repaired several tim es hI'th e CCC so I wrot e to Daiml er Co at

Derby to ask wh y and th ey sent me a

blueprint of th e springs so th at I could

check th e dimen sion s. The blu eprint

sta ted th at the leav es should be grou nd

and poli shed and when I took it to th e

springmakers in Victor ia St I was met with

an unbeli eving stare .T he spring cli ps were

bolts th rough brass sleeves but wh en I

co llec ted th e spring th ey had rivet red some

I" x'F' to th e bottom leaves, bent the m up

the sides red hot, ove rlapped th em on top

and welded them. The sides of the clip s

were cor rugated on th e inside whe re th eyhad hamm ered them . AAAGH !

Flossie had built in jacks which had not

T he ven ue was Becchworrh , near th e Victor ia-NSW borde r.After consultat ion with the ca lenda r and wallet , Ruth and Idecid ed tha t a week away would he a good idea, as afte r 20

years of owne rsh ip we had yet to see two Prin ce Skylincs at th esame tim e let alone the possihilirv of see ing twenty.

The Skyline na me goes hac k to 1955 with the first 1484cc fourcylinde r model appear ing. Styling was a cross between Americanand European ideas, with th e car a littl e smaller th an a Mk 2 FordCo nsul. But like most cars, it grew over th e next few years,hecoming closer ro the Consul in size. In the ea rly 60s C roydo nMotors of C h ristc hurch too k up the Prince agency, proh ahl y as areplacem en t for Borgwurd who had ceased manufacture. Earlyimports were of the Sky line series with 1900cc 4 cylinder poweruntil 1964 , whe n Prince co mpletely revamped th eir model range.The Skyline beca me a sma ller seda n with 1500cc OHV motor, andth e G loria mode l was int rodu ced with two litres of overh ead camsix, a mot or with more tha n <I hint of Mercedes about it.

The new G lorin was qui ckl y set up for local assembly, and wasto becom e fam iliar on Ne w Zealan d roads. The new Sky line wasanothe r story. I bel ieve on ly one of the 1500cc four s found its wayhere , alt ho ugh th ese were sold in reaso nable num bers in Au st ralia.A year previously, th e first A ll Japan G rand Prix was held atHonda's new Suzuka ci rcuit, and gene rated a hu ge interest inmotor rac ing. The Prince co mpany saw th e sales pote n t ial inracing before loca l cro wds, and dec ided to make a serious effort towin in 1964 .

The ne w S kyline st ill had th e o ld style O HV eng ine , and th etuning pote ntial was limi ted . The new G loria had an eng ine th atwas righ t up to dare, with roo m for development, but th e car wasth ough t to be too heavy. The answer was to put the G lor ia six int oth e Skyline , nor easy as the eng ine bay was far too small. The fixwas simple, saw the car in hal f just forward of th e firewall and add200 mm, which left suffic ient room for th e larger engine onc e th ebattery W <lS moved to th e boot.

T he engine was tuned, with higher co mpress ion , ca m and threetwin cho ke We ber ca rburettors, taking horsepower to 127, not bad

Jaguar sty le d iscs in front, and finned alloy drums at the rear.Int rodu ced as the Prin ce SPOrt 2000, the GT and Sky line badgesensured th e cm would soo n be known as the Skyline GT. The rulesfor th e race c lass required a min imum of 1000 ca rs to be prod uced ,and Prince had to co nvince offic ials th at th e cars were ac tua lly inproduct ion , as they certa in ly did no t have very man y whe n raceday ca me around . Record s show th at rhe race was won by aPorsch e Carrera , with Pr inces taking the next seven places.Skylmes have been raci ng ever since .

Producti on cars were in two basic version s; the CiTA, withsing le twin cho ke ca rburettor, 106 horsepower, and three speedplus ove rdrive gearbox . The GT B had higher co mpr ession , threetwin cho ke Weber carb urettors , a 5 speed gembox, .md a 100 litr egas rank with an oversize filler in th e boor . A limit ed slip differen­t ial was ava ilable as an ex tra. Spec ificat ions varied, and it appea rsthat just about any combinat ion was possible . Badging was notco ns istent eit her, and it is common to find simila r cars withdi fferent labels.

Possib ly a dozen of these cars found their way to New Zealand ,mostly GTA s, but followe rs of motor racing bac k in th e late 60,;co uld not miss th at six cylinde r scream in among th e GT Cort inas,A nglias, and Minis of th e day. In th e yea rs since, at least three carsh ave gone to A ustra lia, a co uple have co me th e othe r way, andtwo or three have bee n written off.

\Vhat's left ! Probabl y two or three on th e road, and several instorage pen di ng or unde r restorati on .

The Prince Skyline GT Register would like to hear elbow any ofthose ot he r cars, to fill some gaps in th eir informati on.

Back to the tr ip.Rut h and [ ar rived in Melb ourne , picked up th e rental and left

the hot el a t 7am to miss the co mmute r traffic and give us a headSta rt navigat ing our way to Lilvdale. \Ve found the Lake ca r parkand sat back to see who would arrive.

By 9 am we had a team, with seven or eight cars, plus suppor tersread y for th e d rive to Beechworth . Mor e Prince Skvlincs than we

\Ve travelled north via Yea to Benalla, then the HurncHi ghway to W angar etta , and the turn o ff to Becchworth, ,1pleasant d rive o n good roads o ve r ge n tl y rolling country g,lininga lt itude a long the way. Becc hwo rth is a sma ll town with a big go ldmin ing hi stor y a nd a real effort ha s been mad e to preser ve the oldtime look a nd feel o f the place. At the e nd of May a ll th e tre eswe re dressed in th ei r best autumn co lours, a very pre tt y sce ne . Theevent was based at La'Trobc at Bcechworth, part of the La'TrobcUniver sit y H otel Training School , which is set in e xt ensiv egrounds ju st above th e town. The car pa rk was a hive of activ ity asa ll the new arrivals go t the once ov er .

The first qu estion was "Is yours a n A or IV" A being th e basemodel a nd R the hi gh performance version.

Saturday was an o ppo rt un ity to ge t th e cars toge th er prop erl y inQ uee n Victoria Park ab out two kil omer c rs from the h ot el. Twentythree car s were lin ed up, including two early 70s models that a rcnor see n in N ew Zeal and . It was interesting to mak e co mparisons .A t lea st four different brake ma st er cyli nd er var iat ions were used ,se ve ra l different dash layouts etc. It see med as th ou gh th e G Tswere produced in sma ll hatc hes , and they used wh at ever wascu rrent o n the sma lle r ca r a t th e time.

Ca rs ar c for driving, not parking and it was time to foll ow theleader for a country cr u ise . A minor t raffic sna rl up a t th e o n lyroundabout in town, a nd so meo ne mi ssed a turn, so it was nowtwo runs. \\ie went to Yackandundah , another neat Iirtlc townwhere not much h as cha nged since th e fift ies. I particularl y likeda n o ld shop front where fad ed signage ad vert ised Memor ials,H earing, Gas deliveri es, Funeral Direct or, and Taxi. Could a lmo stimagine a row of hat s hanging besid e the tel ephone.

After a qui et reconnoi tre and look around checking out thelocal second hand shop we rcgroupcd for the return trip.

Later in the day another sh or t ru n was org a n ized with photoopporrun ircs and so me video foot age . A sign pointing to Milaw aenco urage d us to tak e a demur to try a nd find Brown Bros W in ery.Road s meandered ac ross co un t ry but wer e well sign pos tcd a nd wefound the winerv. Brown Bros h av e been there for se ve ra l ge ne ra­tions and is well se t up fl)r tourists with ta stings offe red anclacce pted . A selection was made but not easil y, and we knew weshould ha ve brought larger suitcases.

D in n e r at LaTrobe in the evening, go od food a nd goodco mpa ny. What mor e co uld you ask ?

O n S unday morning we rook the 70 km drive to \Xiinton,where the Austin Se ve n C lub had their classic mo tor racing day.The Prince Register had sta ked out a n area behind th e grands tandm put their car s o n di splay a nd this ce rta in ly genera te d a lot o finterest. A walk aro und the pits ga ve an o pportun ity to study thecars. O ve r 100 to sec . A us t ra lia h as a sim ilar motor racing hi storym New Zealand, with spec ia ls built over the years using any th ingfrom Ford flarheads, Hillmans, Austin Sevens a nd many H oidens.M y favo ur ite was th e C irrus , a b it like a 20s Vau xhall, bu t poweredby a n a ir co oled C irrus uircrafr engine . It so unde d ju st lik e theC ro pd usrc r.

A s th e weather deteri orated we headed west to warm er anddri er weather in Bend igo for more sight see ing including theCen tra l Deb o rah go ld mine and the h ist oric Talking Tram.

The return tr ip to Melbourne, ne xt day, was via Maldon wherea chance look through a n ope n door found ,I panel beat er workingo n seve ra l ea rly bodies. W c got tal king and found a commoninter est in Ford side va lve mot or s. Hi s B model eng ine was du st edoff so I could phor ogruph the rare A ussi c mad e [ cnkins ioe co n ve r­sion.

Nav igat ing back to Mel bourne , we ma naged to a vo id th e to llroad as this had to he paid by phone, and we were not quite sureabo ut th e deal, so took a so ft option .

Returned the rental , purc ha sed another bag for the ex t ras andprepared for trip hom e. The week was over, back to work . W ehave lots o f memories, new sh in s, the ca p, the badge a nd so mebo tt les o f good wine .

A last question. I sho uld have taken more notice while lookingunder the bonnet s, the manufacturer 's p late is right th ere in fullview, hut I do not remember see ing a car number with mor e thanthree di git s. So how many Sky line G Ts wer e mad e ! 11Contacts for the Prince Skyline GT Register

Gary Arps P0 Box 5369Papanui Christchurch Ph 03 3598734 orNoel SinclairPO Box 32 Surrey Hills Victoria 3127 Australia

Wairakei ExperienceGeoff and Phyllis Morris - Nelson Branch

Undeterred by appalling mid-winter weather, our

correspondent from Nelson Branch opted to motor to

Taupo for this year's AGM in their MG tourer.

W e had hop ed to travel with the roof down b~t ala srain, ra in and then more ram forc ed an alte ra tion to

these plan s.We arrived in to Taupo on Thursday and with man y other

del egate s on Friday too k time to enjoy Taup o shops and cafes (inth e rain). Friday evening it was down to th e busin ess of theexec utive meeting with on ly a few empty seats. Congratu lat ionsJuli e and team for gett ing a lmos t everyone th er e on time.Discussions cov ered budget, prop osed execut ive stru cture and theNotice of Motion.

The Saturday AGM began with th e John L Goddard Trophybein g awarded to a very deserving C lub member who has really

sho wn how Vintage Ca r C lub memb ership can take you all over theworld and become a lifetime hobb y. The President's award was givenby President Leigh Craythorne to [ulie C airns for her commitmentand dedication to th e managing th e National Office of the club .The standing ovat ion from th e dele gates was well deserved.

It is encouraging to see so man y members, past presidents, pastman agement personnel at the meeting and taking an ac t ive part indiscussions. Their experience is inv alu able.

After an excellent lunch deleg at es gathered to see th e doubleDecker bus start up and with a lady driver take the wives andpartners on a tour of Taupo and th e craft cent res around Wairekei .

2oo4!5 Management committee: Back row left to right: John Coomber(Secretary! TreaslIl'er) , Rob Knight (Club Ca!Jwin No rthern Region), Gm'YBeaum olH (Management Committee) , Bob Ballant)'ne (ManagementCommittee) . Greg Tenill (Management Committee), Kevin Clarkson (BeadedWheels C hain nan), Rod Brayshaw (Regist1'(ll')Seated left to right: Beet)' \X!allace (Archivist) . Julie Cairns (Administra tionManager) , Leigh Cra)'thorne (President) . Dian e Ross (Club Captain SOllthC171Region) .

The AGM continued with a session on reports and one of thelongest general business discussions for some time . The C lub is ingood health and financi al position. The Notice of Mot ion to capth e 30 year rule was lost in the postal vot e but with th e highspirited discu ssion s th at were held I am sure we will see it hack

some time in the futur e.The evening dinner was enjoyed by all with dancing to the

music of the 50s 60s and 70s and we all seemed to know most ofth e words. Memories kept flowing back about when we heard thatsong or what we were doing at that tim e!

Man y delegates too k th e opportun ity to visit th e Taupo C lub

Rooms on Sunday morning to enjoy a cuppa before starting forhome. We headed to Napier in rain and wind and from th ere toWellington where we had a three day wait until the storm abatedand th e ferry crossing was possible on Thursday.

Thank you Taup o (or your hospitality and friend ship. 11

Presidential Awardhe first Presidenti al Award has beenmade th is year. U nder the terms ofthe award, it may be made to peop le

nominated for services to the club and notrestricted to VCC members.

T he first award has been made to [ulieCa irns our Na t ional Office Administrat ionManager. [ulic has been an employee of theVintage Car C lub for almost nin e years,since October 1995. She step ped into thevacant position with no pre-knowledge ofthe C lub's affairs, and with enthusiasm anddeterminar ion set about quickly re-organ ­ising the office funct ions and systems.

Co mmun icat ion is one of [ulie's strengthsand she has formed and maintained a closeworki ng relati on ship with Branches andExecutive members. She too k the office

WHO IS ELIGIBLE FOR THE PRESIDENTIAL AWARD?The scope of this award is to cover all aspectspertaining to The Vintage Car Club of New Zealand(Inc.) (excluding restoration) at a national level. Theaward is not limited to members only and could beused to recognise outstanding service to TheVintageCar Club of NewZealand (Inc.) by non-members.

Anniversary Rally in C hristchurch in orderto meet as many members as possible and to

raise the profile of the Nation al O ffice to themembership.

Upon appointment [ulie was given twodirectives, one to create a detailed officeprocedure and constitution al requirementsmanual and two, to create and implementfinancial reporting system for the ManagementCommittee. Both of these projects have beenoutstanding successes and are vital for theadministration of the club.

The int roduction and development ofnew computer programmes and the produc­tion of the updated Branch Manu al have alsobeen major projects that [ulie has under­taken . The development of the computersoftware with assistance from her friend

Nomination of the award should be made direct ly tothe President of the Vintage Car Club of NewZealand (Inc.) by any member of the Executive inwriting stat ing the reason for such high honour.Adjudication on the award will be made by thePresident of The Vintage Car Club of New Zealand(Inc.) and the two longest serving Manaqernent

and saved this club 111 ,111y tho usands ofdoll ars. The purchase of our new officepremises and subsequen t move involvedmajor plann ing and orga n isation over aperiod of several months and we now havean asset we can all he proud of.

[uli e's dedicat ion and commitment to th isclub and our mem bers goes far beyond thatwhich is expected from an employee. Shealways goes out of her way to assist memberswith queries, and has regularly worked manyhours of un paid overtime as our membershiphas increased by 50 per cent during thisperiod and the functions of the office havebecome more complex and demanding. Herprofession alism and dediction have been amajor asset to the Vintage Car C lub of New

AGM

M a rt in Ferner was this year'srecipient of one of our Club'smore prestigious awards. His

nomination came under two categories - aparticularly significant restoration and amemorable motoring journey.

Martin is a long-standing member whohas served his branch as BranchChairman, Committee member and ClubRooms Construction "Boss" as well asNational Vice Club Captain in 1972. Hismotoring stable has included tourers,roadsters, saloons and a special.

Significant RestorationA 1912 Minerva Type BB sleeve valve

Tourer is a very large and complex qualityvehicle.

The car was found in a derelict state inPorongahau in 1966. The motor was seizedsolid and one side of the body wascompletely rotted out, but most of theessential parts other than instruments werethere. The car was dismantled soon afterrecovery but many other projects, not tomention family and business commitmentsmeant that a slow but steady progress wasmade until, with new determination, theproject was restarted in 1990.

Martin had initiated the establishmentof the highly successful panelbeatingclasses for members at a city (Wellington)

Polytech, one of the first in New Zealand.By the mid seventies he had made

mudguards, cowl, valances, bonnet anddoor panels. Complex work was carriedout and completed on the chassis, engine,clutch and starter motor system until inDecember 1992 the engine was test run forthe first time. The completed chassis wastowed into daylight in August 1993 andrestoration continued.

The car was completed in 1996, just intime for the Club's 50th Birthday Rallyin Christchurch .

Of course many helpers were involvedin the restoration of this magnificentvehicle, but Martin completed much ofthe work himself after much researchand perseverance.

A Memorable Motoring JourneyEarlier this year Martin and his wife

particpated in a 90-year re-enactment ofthe 1913 Austrian Alpine Tour in their1912 Minerva BB Tourer.

The original event had 47 entrants,including a team of Minervas similar to

the Ferners', competing over 2,600 km ofmountainous terrain and no mechanicalrepairs were permitted.

The 2004 event followed the originalroute as closely as possible and coveredmuch of Austria, Northern Italy,Slovenia and Croatia.

At the age of 76, Martin accepted thechallenge of motoring a large heavy andcomplex veteran car with two wheelbrakes over more than 2,000 km in

Europe in extremely difficult terrain onthe wrong side of the road!

The vehicle was shipped in a containerto Hamburg and then by rail to Vienna.The rail company lost the container andafter much panic the Minerva arrived withonly hours to spare!

The tour was completed successfully, amost amazing European challengecapturing the spirit and adventure of preWWI motoring, negotiating 13 spectac­ular mountain passes.

In presenting Martin with this awardthe VCCNZ has recognised his remarkableachievement of completing an adventuretruly in the spirit of John L Goddard in acar restored by himself. 11

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I' \ "Above: Sizaire- Naudin llwdinRonto the SS Earns/all! ,Q ueenstown.RiR/U: O ur line-up of vehicles raring to RO in \\Ialla/w.Lower riRht : Ha/)/))' /1OlIr at Oamanl.

Another fantastic trip organised by John and

Margaret Wallis started in Picton and

finished in Tekapo 24 fantastic days later.

Theweather did not play ball all the time

with a drought-breaking rain spread over

the three weeks and a lot of strong wind,

always from the front.

Text and photos Wendy &. Laurie Cocker

Southern Lakesby Veteran Car

On Wednesd ay January 21 I left

home in he av y sideways rain on ly

to freez e o n arrival at the

Wellington waterfront in more ra in and

wind . O n arr iva l in Picron it was a

different cl imat e, th e weather was warm in

sp ite of gale force wind .

Our journey from I'i ct on to Dunedin

was sprea d o ve r four days - we joined

severa l Ve te ra n gathe rings on th e way

including an Edw ardian \V'eekend Rally in

Amberlcv, a public di spla y in W orcest er

Boulevard , C h ristc h urc h, and an

Edwardian Picnic a t Ferrvmead H eritage

Park C hr istc h urch. Oarnaru provided agrear place for photos with our Veteran

cars se t off perfe ctly by the local sto ne

buildings in rhe hi storic part of the tow n .

O ur stop a t th e Mocrak i Boulders

co inc ided wirh rhar of Kevin and Mariett eBeesle y 1l!1 their way to Dunedin, they had

bo ugh t Murrn y Lowc 's Del uge. In Dune d in

we joined the O tago Branch of the VC Cfor sev er al rallies ov er five da ys. These

were the Na t iona l Veter an Rally o n Frida y

30 January, the 50rh A n n ive rsary of the

Duned in to Brighton run on Saturday , (itwas gre at to see the Iine up of nine of the

cars from the or igina l run) and on S und,1y

we had n Picn ic Day our to the Wingatui

Racecourse . U nfortunately , it was ve ry wetand cold for most of th e weekend whi ch\V~l" di ' ~ .1f "'\n()lntin O' f()r rh !' (Jr ~-H)"n R T"'-~nrh

organiser s, but we all en joyed ea ch ot he r's

co tn pa n y and wrapped up well in o ur

wat erproof clothing. The Cad ilia c de cid ed

to get its first flat tyre a t the Dunedin

Holiday Park in rhe pouring rain so we

util ised th e covered barbecue a rea to mend

the puncture with the help nf some ex tra

h ands, ad vic e and hilariry.

O n Monday we joined with the

Founde rs Prince Henry Tour to N aseby

and C lyde. N aseby was an o th e r goo dph o to oppo rt un ity with rh e o ld buildings

and shop fronts heaut ifull y restor edpro viding a wonderful ar rnosphe re. En­

route to C lyde we visited rhe hi storicHaves Engineering Works whi ch was ope n

and wo rking for us. Many remember ed

using tools and far m equipment produced

by the Haves firm. We tra vell ed rhrough S t

Bm ha ns, Oph ir and on to C lyde.

O n W ednesday, we rej oined the

Southe rn Lak es Tour a t C lyde and wen t on

to Arrowrown. So me of [h e party travelledto Q ue cnsrown ro see Bob Turnbull rake

hi s 1907 S izaire-N aud in ac ro ss LakeW akatipu on th e SS Earnslaw 1'0 Wa ite r

Peak S ta t io n , then on to Lumsden

fulfilling a long time dr eam of hi s. W e

returned to Arrowrown , reg ro upe d and

so me of us visit ed the ea rly C h inese Go ldMining Sett lement.

Te Anau was the rall y's nex t stop for

four da vs of sioh tsee inc. rest an d rep airs.

There was the DOe Bird Sa nctuary to

vi sit, w ith some lu cky enou gh to see

Miltord So und before a big di esel spill

closed th e area off to a ll.

At t h is stage Wend y and I d ive rted to

Rivcrron to visit the lvlcKenz ies whose

191 0 C leme nt Bavard had broken down in

D uned in wirh magneto pr oblems. OnSunday we a ll went O Il the SourhlandRall y to Gore fllr the G or e Trac tor Show.

The McKenzies were in their da ugh te r's

Austin A40 truck which they h ad

borrow ed to com plete the tour,

Then ir was back to Te Anau and the

tour, We moved on to G le no rc hy o n

Monday 9 February. Robert Wood , John

Hu gh es and Lydon Bcn sh arn took o n thechall enge of raking th e 1914 Buick across

Lak e W akatipu on the SS Earnslaw, from

the Te A nau end via Waiter Pea k Stat ion .So me of us wait ed a t Q uec nsrown and

took ph otos of the ca r in a met al sling

being winched off the boat. There was a

st ro ng head wind o n the way to G lcnorchyand man y of us had problems wh ere the

lak e nar rowed, c reat ing a wind runnel

whi ch nearl y blew us off the roa d as we

came round th e co rne r of the bluff. Ar

G lenorchy the hotel h ad run our o f

accommodation and food with so manyVet era n ca rs converging!

W ednesday 11 Fe bruary prese n ted thehi fJ Pesr c h <l llpnpp o f t1w ra l l v fo r ti ll'

1954 BSAC10 &1957 Triumph

1953BSA

..Veteran MotorcycleNeville King 1911 Abingdon King DickVintage MotorcycleAllan Budge 1930 BSA SloperPWV MotorcycleNelson Turner NSUP60Stuart McElrea TriumphBonnervilleMost Travelled DistanceTony & Leigh Craythorne Panther CombinationRiders ChoiceBrian LedgerwoodHard luck PrizeStu Adamson

...

Cad illac with th e Crown Ran ge a hugeobstacle on the horizon. The plan was thatif we could not make it up we woul d headhack down and go the lon g way round. ";;li emade it up first set of zig zags quite success­fully and th en enjoyed the Crown Terr aceflat s. The seco nd set of zig zags proved tohe more of a cha llenge. We were nearly atthe top when we started running out ofpower and Wen dy had to jump out of theveh icle to put a chock behi nd the backwheel. She gave th e car a small push andwe moved four metres up to a flat piece onth e corner. I got the revs up on th e car andwe made it to th e top . The McKenzies,Robert Wood and [oan and Co lin Pearcewere th e o the r three cars th at met thechallenge of the C rown Ran ge. O n theot he r side we enjoyed lunch a t th eC ardrona Hotel. At Wanaka that night wepresen ted John and Margaret Wallis with agift for fantast ic organ isa t ion . Back to

Twize] th e next day and the following dayto Lake Tekupo via Mount Cook, anabsolutely beautiful drive in fine weat he r.Lake Tekupo was our final d inner togethe rwith a ll to ur members.

Nex t day we tra vell ed back toC h ristchurch interrupted by our seco ndfla t tyre of the journ ey a t G era ld ine.Fortu na tely we met Kevin Mercer whohel ped us with the repair. A very strongsou'weste r blew us to Blenheim th efollowing day in 41/2hour s. We stayed herewith friends for two days as high wind sprevented th e ferry c rossing the S tra it ,finally departing Picron on Tuesday at 3amin light spitt ing ra in wh ich later developedint o th e huge downpour th at nearl y burstthe da m above Picron .

We came hom e to Ron gotea to face theworst flood our area has ever seen. \'(festruggled to find roads open , but we finallyarrived having rrave led 2108 miles andwere 29 days older and wiser.

Part icipant s who com plet ed th e wholerun were Robert Wood and Au st ralian sJohn Hughcs and Lyndon Benharn, Johnand Murgaret Wallis, [an e and MichaelC urry, Sylvia and Ad rian G arret, We ndyand Lauric Cocker.

O the rs to do the trip by joi ni ng andleaving wer e Roy and daught er LihbiSouthward , Ton y Airs, Cath and Ton yBest, Bnrry und icola Birch aIl, G wen andBrian Black, joan an d Martin Fern er, Kareand Ri chard Foster , Andree and BooHaves, Lily and lan Ho gg, Sh irley andA lwyn McKcnz ie, Kit Maxwcll, [ oan andC olin Pearce, Dian e and Rob Ross, BillShe ars and Kev in and [oyce Brook(Austra lia) Bob Tum bul l, Ma rgarcr and

John & Zdmll Swnlq lip the creel, witholtt a paddle.

T on y gives me to understand thatonce the engine gets warm, we willbe too. T h e lights endeavour to

show a feebl e glow. T he big six stutters onfive and a half, then five and we stop forpetrol while Tony gets under the bonnet tocheck the plugs. He had just completedthe Irishman Rally with nary a problem.Six cylinders returned as we worked ourway towards Sefton a nd Hayco ck iscommenting on the Durnnt's performance."The Titanic handles like a sports ca rcompared with the Durcmr. . ." and he goeson to say that he bought the gallant oldsaloon from Bu)', Sell cd' Exchange to breakup for bits to use on his Durnnr sedan .Haycock is now a three- Durunr man ,Problem is that this 'parts car' performs sowell that it looks as though fellowVintagents won't let him break it. It alsohas the rego DURA NT as a live plate.

Then the lights quit a few miles fromour fry-up. U nde te rred , we press on intothe gathering dawn as the Lord takes over

the lighting for us. Headlights behind helpto co ve r us. It's Avon Hyde with hishandsome little Austin Seven spe cial onthe trailer. He will spe nd all day ch asingPhil Major for points up impossiblegradients, gre asy grass faces, wheel­spinning mud, quick-sand riverbed gnweland conquering the river itself.

Breakfast behind us and we are now ina paddock with much arm-slapping, see­your-breath in th e brisk air and MichaelPidgeon push-pnlling on the wheels ofeach competitor by way of an audit. Adrive -off and brake on the crackling grassand another car is passed to compete.

There is much mis-information pass edaround in the paddock, as alw avs atVintage events. \Varner Manger has hi selegant Rilev special with its wonderfulexhaust note, a budget ERA by any othernoise. Son Phil competes in all forms ofracing from a hairy-chested Formula 5000at Ruapuna to the spidery little light­weight Austin Seven special at Balcairn.

T he Darlens. father and son, have ahome-built car e fully-created Ford 10spec ial and it soo n becomes apparent thatthe y are their own closest com pet it ion .The Rogers girls - [ulie and Annc ~ bringa touch of glamour with the big classictwenties-shaped pointed-tail 1928 C hev 4Spec ia l that ofren proved too big and toolong in the chassis for the Balc<lirn stages,but the girls never gave up, both having ago, It was the first Balcairn they had heenin since the death of their father, .JohnRogers, who had schooled his daughters inthe delights of Vintage motoring and youcould sense the pleasure in the cockpit ofth e big special and on the viewing banks,that the sisters wer e carrying on the familyenthusiasm. It wasn't a question of a winor an FTD, it was the taking part. Doing itfor Dad , mayb e.

G arrv Moore, MayOI' of C h ristch urchduring the week, is a Vintage petrol -h eada t the weekends, and he was field ing hi squ estionable Vintage C h rysle r tourer at

with his son, [olinnv, and daughter Rosieinvolved, either driving (johnnv) orbouncing (Rosic ). Moore is my sort ofVintage enthusiast. He wants a car he canenjoy and if it looks Vintage in a Bentleysort of way and it behaves with all theaberrat ions of a Vintage car, does it reallyneed to have every part bluepr inted as1920s? 1 know there are true Vintageenthusiasts who believe that good carsstopped being built on New Year's day1932, but in my hook that's hair-shirt stuff.Why not have a car that looks like old-carfun and whi ch you can enjoy withoutbeing underneath every time an originalbit fails? And to confound his modernush)concoction, its engine took a mightyhiccup in a river run and the bonnet bentitself into a contortion that saw theMayoral car run the rest of the day withbare engine.

It seemed that if you didn't have anAustin Seven in Chummy, pointed-tailUlster 2-seater, or a lumin ium home-madespecial configuration, you might as wellhave stayed at home. The combination oflight weight, friendly torque and engineunbursr.ihilirv gave the babies a hugeadvantage while the bigger, heaviermachinery was hobbled by power and sankin wheel-spin on the grassy gradients andin the shingle riverbeds.

Nelson entrant, John Stanlev simplysank in the river when he continuedupstream instead of climbing out at th emarker on the banking ... and his littlespecial tried to submerge itself in a poolwhile the crew climbed to the highest parrof the vessel, awaiting salvage by LandRov ers. It took a long time for th e ingestedriver water to run out of the little cm.

Stages followed one after the other andduring the later runs the points standings

began pointing at the Hyde and MaugerAustin specials and father-and-son, Billand Peter Datlen in their Ford 10 special.Taking a wrong swerve turn in a riverbedaiming into a blinding setting sun couldand did cost points and a chance at thewin and it was eventually between Hydeand Mauger as it has so often been.

If you weren't called Mauger it mighthave seemed like a wasted winter day.\Varner won the long-chassis award withhis Rilev Special, and son I'hil won theOld Boot trophy overall by just one pointfrom Avon Hyde, who is consideringapplying for Balcairn bridesmaid statushaving been second for the third time. Ifthat makes sense.

Being a true Vintage event, while themost of us were slak ing thirsts after a long(fairly) dry day, Tony and helpers weretracking the source of the lack of illumina­tion on th e Dur ant. Apparently a fuse thathad done service for 74 years had cried'enough' on the morning drive out, and anew fuse solved the problem. To mymod ern eye we st ill needed a cigarettelighter to see if the lights were working,but we made it back to Christchurch andafter telling Tony 'never again, it's toodamn cold/long/steep/old , I'm alreadycounting down to the next Balcairn. If theLord spares me. I always need someone toblame. Tony says he is framing the fuse asan antique.

From every aspect, Balcairn is its ownevent, with a major following of competi­tors and afternoon spectators, unique inNew Zealand motoring sport and a highpoint in the C anterbury old-car calendarthat attracts entries from all over theisland. III

Avon H)'de and I'hillvlaugcr

Bill Clark

Th is year Bill C lark has ce lebra ted 50years memb ershi p of the VCC ofNZ and a lso 50 years owne rsh ip of

his Vin tage Bentley 41/2 litr e.Bil l was hrou gh t up in ,1 motoring

LlInily and had many different ca rs as hegrew up. In 1949 Bill did his ("lE in the UKand work ed at A lvis Cars in th e servicedep ar tment for two years. While the re hepurchase d his first car and like man y othe rsit was an A ust in 7. This was traded on amore sporty Wolseley Hornet S ports wh ichwas written off on h is way hom e from th elocal on the first day he owned it..

O n returning to New Zea land in 1954 acar was needed and as a sporty one wasdesired he purchas ed th e Vintage GentleI'and used it as his everyday transport forbL _ D :l1 _L 1 { I C_ . L

th e Hampton Tyre Compan v before takingit ov er in 1957 . During th ese yea rsIrishman rall ies and other VCC eve ntswere entered. 1960 was a busy tim e as Billstarted ano the r busin ess Hamco Spee dEqu ipme nt and ex panded his tyre int ereststo include the Apex tyre retr ead ingcompany. During th e 50s and 60s thesewere two of the few co mpan ies who cou ldsupp ly vintage tyres.

During 1960 Bill wen t on the tra il of are tired rac ing ca r, the ex works P3 A lfaRomco wh ich had won th e Ge rman G randPrix before th e war and, after co ming toNew Zealand , the Lady \Vigram race threetim es. It was trucked down in A uckland,purchased, and over a number of yearsrestored and raced in vintage mee tin gsL _ .1. L .

An int erest in rac ing Cooper 500..;c cars

led to th e owne rsh ip of many di fferent

models of a ll types of these ca rs. The

rema ins of a 1956 Cooper Bristo l were

found an d complete ly rebuilt and it was

raced for man y yea rs in Vintage and

C lassic race meet ings by Bill and his son

[am es, Tragically [ umcs lost h is life wh ile

rac ing th is car at a \Vigram meeting.

Now in retirement Sill has reduced his

Vintage fleet down from 14 vehicles to 5. He

st ill has the old Bentley, and XK 120 Jaguar,

a Frazer Nash Lemans Replica and an A lfa

UT B 1600 Sp rint, plus the old Gee eee Ess

racing car which is on loan to a friend.

The vce co ngra tulates Bill on hi s 50

l

Geoff Owen

Genff had been invol ved with theVC C in the early days of the cluband joined up as a member once

act ivit ies got underway again aft er the

recess in 1953. At the time, Ge off was anapprentice motor mechanic at theFarmers Ga rage in C h ristc hurch. nowBlackwcll Motors and his first ca r was a1923 Au stin 7.

Earl y event s were attended in a 1933Morris Minor Spo rts Car. This ca r wasfrowned on by th e VC C hierarch y as itwas n ot Vin tage so a 19 29 TriumphSuper 7 was purch ased and rebu ilt. Th isca r was no t enjoyed much as it was a bitof a gut less wonder and so th e hun tcon t in ued for some th ing more sport y. In1955 a derelict FIAT 50l S was found andco mplete ly rebuilt. This car was usedex te ns ively in VCC events during th efifti es and early sixt ies including the195 6 Pic tun and 1960 MorrtnsvilleNa t iona l Rallies.

In lat e 1960 a Vintage Bentley waspurch ased from Charlie Stanton and th eflAT was so ld to Bruce Pidgeon . The

Bentley had been used competi tively byth e S tun ton Brothers aft er th e war hutthe eng ine had been in pieces for about10 yea rs. The Bentley was rebuil t andback on the road for th e 1962 Easter rall yand h as been in co n t inuo us use eve rsince , clock ing up over 150 ,000 miles ofra ll ies, to urs, races a nd hill cl im bs.During the six t ies th e or igina l 3 lirr eeng ine was used in the car but afte r twobroken crankshafts a stro nge r 4 '/, litr eeng ine was fitt ed which mad e it a verypot ent machine. The author reca lls a racefor Bentleys held at an early VC C speede vent a t Ruapuna Park, around 1967,whi ch was eas ily won by Geoff in thi s car.Another recollection is of the Bentley

being raced at Wi gram where blue smokewas coming off the rear tyres under acce l­erat ion out of the hairpin corner.

In th e mid fifties Geoff me t his wife-tu­be Sh irlev who has suppo rted him in hiscar hobby over the years a tte nd ing many

ev ents. Geoff worked for fe llow VC Cmember Bob Scott before sta rt ing his ownmotor garage in 1965. Over the yea rsth ere hav e been a number of ca rs in thefleet, in particul ar MG s. A superchargedJ2 was raced and hill climbed for manyvcars. Currently a 1935 supercharged

Magnette is used for co mpet it ion . AnAust in 7 Tri al s ca r was built andcompeted with and currently a Ford 10Trial s car is und er co nstruct ion. This yearGeoff entered th e So uth Island EasterRall y with hi s 3.8 Jaguar.

Geoff has been a committ ee mem ber ofthe Can te rbury and Banks Peninsul aBranches. A fte r 50 years of VC Cmembership , G eo ff O wen is st ill one ofthe mo st act ive ,1I1d ent hus ias t icmembers of th e Banks Peninsula Branchattending almost all events. Well don eand congratulations to Geoff on his 50

years of VC C membe rship. =

Text and photos jodi Tom/in

This is my account of our trip of a lifetime to the 1OOth Anniversary celebrations of

Harley-Davidson in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

T he journey for us was ab out seven mil esand this was undertake n by our escortswith suc h pageantry, incl ud ing a ro llingroadblock . They were very sk illed ride rs.

While t he dealershi p was ded icated toH -Ds the mu seum certa in ly was not . Theyh ad man y marqu es on display and in themem orabilia sec t io n e ven had a mo to r­cycle tea to wel from Southwards M useum.

The next day was the beginning of t hetrek from Vancouver to Milwau kee, Wedepa rted Vancou ver h eading directl ysout h to cross the bord er in to the Uni tedS ta tes of A meri ca. This day en de d inEverett , W ash ington a fte r h avingmea n dered our way down t h e ve rybea ut iful W h idb ey Island.

Se cond day in to the tri p and today isgo ing to be one of the bigger tests for theseven an tique bikes, as we c ross Src ven 'sPass, a cl imb from sea le vel to 4061 ' .Thank full y, after all the co nce rn s o fclim bing such passes on th e 'o ld girls' theta sk reall y tu rn ed o ut to be a bi t of a non­ev en t as th e road construct ion of suchpasses in the U SA, du e to the heavy trafficflow, mean tha t the grad ien t does no texceed six percen t so that a ll traffic canmai nta in a reasonabl e spee d . Eve n our1925 H -D got to the to p in second gear!

A t the to p of S reve n's Pass we werewe lcomed to the area by th e ColumbiaRi ver C hapter of HOG (Har ley O wner'sGroup) . They themsel ves were a gro up ofabout 60 (mo st of them having taken theday off work to co me and greet us), andwere to be our escorts fo r the rest of theJ ay. First they took us to Leav enworrh, arepli ca Bavarian tow n , for lunch , and th ento the to wn of C as h me re to visit th eAplets & C ot lets Turkish Deli ght Fac to rybefore fina lly taking us on to our n ight 'sstop at Wenatchee.

HOG HEAVEN

A year has a lready passed sinc e weco mpleted thi s journey. The timesin ce h as passed by so quickl y,

pe rh aps du e to th e many man y years ofplan n ing and , might I add , th e restorationof th ree J mod els and sideca rs, a 1925,19 26 and 1928 . The 1926 & 1928 wereexist ing bikes that were str ipped down andrefurbish ed while the 1925 was a, groundup , full restoration fro m a "p ile of bits".

There were t imes wh en the likelihoodof three H -D' s making it to the USAsee med so mewhat rem ot e, but th ey diJand th is is th e record of th e journey th ateac h of th em completed .

The bikes depart ed N Z in June last yearbo und fo r Vancouve r, C a nada,' wefo llowed at the end of Ju ly. The group wehad decided to travel with were based outof Pa lrnersro n Nort h , the key organisersbei ng Pe te r and Jennifer Thornson. Thetota l gro up was around 60 people on 38bik es, se ve n of the bikes were "an tique"with I1 no t so ant ique people riding th em.Th is was how the "The re turn of th eMagni ficent Sev en" phrase ca me about !

From 27 Jul y 2003, for the ne xt sixweek s, we were to be tr eat ed to theamazing hospit ali ty and ca mara de rie of theCanad ians and A me ricans.

O n ly two days into our adven ture andwe were hosted to a bru nc h by a localVa nco uv er H arley-Dav idson dea le rsh ip,Trev Deel ey Motorcycles. After we hadhad our fill at the deale rship it was tim e tobe escorted to t he dealer shipfounder/owner' s Motorcycle Mu seum. A swe ex ited the sho p, to ge t ready to makeour way to the mu seum, th e Van couverPol ice Drill Team arrived, our esco rts tothe museum. There were 14 poli cemen , onH -Ds of course , and two squad ca rs. We allstood in awe of the spec ta cl e of th edism ount from the bik es, just incredi ble !Peter Ak!erdice and \Villie G Davidson

Pat riotism at its [mes: - 100 jlags for 100 years

.•• ,' .,1

The lvIilwQ1thee sent iment!

T he MalVlificenr Seven at Devil'" Gulch

After se t tl ing into our hotel and co oling

down a little (it had been around the 40°Cmark since descending Ste vcn 's Pass in themorning) we then headed about half amil e down the road to the local deal er ship .The HOG C h apte r combined with the

dealership to put on an amazing barbecuedinner for us, as well as hand out gif ts to usall. The gift we ea ch received was a VERYuseful cooling gel neckband. You wet themdown a couple of times a day and rhcvtruly kept you coo l in the sea ring hem.These ge l bands were to be thrashed byeveryo ne for the rest of the trip.

The ne xt few da ys saw us rak e in theco lossa l Grand Cou lee Dam, with irsspec tacu lar Laser Light S h ow in thee ven ing, the resort town of C::oe ur d'Al cnc ,c ross the border from Wa shington intoIdah o, then a day later from Idaho intoMontana , In Missoula, Montana the group

received a mavorul welcome as the town ofMissoul a is a siste r city to PalmcrsronN orth . The mayoral reception included a llthe ohligatory speec h es but al so againincluded a barbecue dinner for us all. This

·was an other di spl ay o f down-homeAmeri can hospitality, by th e people of thec iry rind rhc local HO G C ha pte r.

O ne of the a ims o f this trip for Peterrind [cnnifer Thornson was to keep th ose of

us on t he a n t iqu c bikes away fromlntersrares and Freeways. So for the ne xrfour da ys we visited many sm ,111 towns

ac ross Montan a including Philipsburgwhere we visit ed the "S wee t Pal ace", themost amazing ca ndy stor e you have eversee n. In her e we sampled Mo ose DroolC hocola tes, Huckleb err y Salt Water Taffyand Blue S ky Fud ge. W e ovc r-n igh rcd inBurrc and while th ere visit ed a brothelmuseum, an eye op ener for us a ll. \\lestav ed in Columbus wh ere we ga mbled a llo f a quarter ( 25 cents) ea ch and this

en titled us to co mp lime ntary drinks for theeven ing - I th in k we bent the rules justslightly her e, bu t then , the barmaid let usdo it!

,«le then a bsorbed history at Little

Bigh orn and enjoyed the towns of Ucross,C lea rrno n t and S po tt ed H or se (p opula­tion tw o) .

The Aucldandcr., at HO HQ

O n 8 August we hit Rapid Ci ty in th e passed through the Sout h Dakotaafte rnoon but before sto pping th er e we Badl ands, This land is ex tre me ly rugged,visited rhe De vil's Tower, th e mountain many likening it to a moonscap e , howevermade famous by the movie 'Close I think it is better described like th is:Encounters of the Third Kind ' . Ima gine those little mounds you mad e in

Rapid C ity was o ur home for th e next the wet sand , m the beach as a ch ild , byfour nights while we took in the 63rd clenching your fist and a llo wing th e sandAnnual Black Hills Rally at Sturgis, So uth to dribble rh ro ugh one end of your fist.Dak ot a. N ow mult iplv that abo ut a tho usa nd times

S turgis - what can I say ? I had see n to ge t th e scal e of the Badlands - stun n ing .pictures in magazines of the bik es ga the red, Pierre is th e So uth Dak ot a srarc ca pita lbur th ere was ce rta in ly nothing quite like and in this town th ey have one of th oseturning th e corne r into the main st ree t and ver y American domed Cap itol buildings.being con fro n ted by three blo cks worth of To our surprise we wer e a llowed to JUStH-Ds parked side by side down both sides walk around inside it too! Althou gh mu chof th e st ree t, as well as two rows down the to eve ryo ne 's reli ef th ey did have a sign a tmiddle of th e st ree t. The roa d is cl osed to the d oor warning yo u that guns wer efour-wheeled vehicles - th er e 's o n ly banned in the building. Phew !eno ugh roo m for rwo or three-wheel ed Dur ing yet another day of sizzling heart ransport between the parked bik es! and clear blue skies we crossed the Low er

After a da y of being a 'biker' the ne xt Brule Indian Reservation th en th e C rowda y was dedi cated to doing rhe to ur isty C reek Indi'1I1 Reserv ation before having <l

thing. W e were up early this morning and guided eve n ing tour rhrough the Aktapassed through Sturgis, sta ying long Lakora mu seum, explaining what life wasenough to do breakfast (b y now we wer e like as an Indian in the mid -wcsr in hi storyinto th e American mode of bre akfast in and today.diner s). Then we took to the road and The town of Mirchcll is renowned forh eaded. via 'The Boondocks' , to Mt its Corn Palace. Oh yes , only in Amer ica,Rushrnorc . a building that ha s its ex te rio r cl ad in

Mt Rushrnore was one of the thi ngs co rncobs each yea r. Ever y yea r th er e is athat [ had o n my list of "must see " pla ces differ ent th em e to the co b art , 2003 wason th is trip. After having, f{lr years , look ed th e yea r for depicting "Scenic S o uthat pictures of th ose four Presidents carved Dak ot a".in to the side of a mountain, to stand G arretso n was our first srop of th e dayunderneath them was amazing. The on August 15 to visit Dcvil's Gulch, th eac h ieve me nt of such a sculptu re is awe- supposed locati on where [esse l am esins piring espec ia lly wh en yo u he ar th e escaped rh e Northficld posse. This "gu lch"story - and the fact that no one was kill ed is at least 20 feet wid e and ve ry rugged , Iduring the ope rat ion . And , of course , it could not see ,1 horse achieving this jump -was a lso very patriotically American. bur it 's a good sto ry. W e a lso took in the

O nwa rd, this journey must co nt in ue . to wn of No rthfie ld a da y or so lat er,After rh is break in th e travels the next 12 visit ing the hank wh ere the [ arnes/Youngerdays were a ll abo ut wending o ur way Eas t ga ng mad e their last h old up . Most of th eto Milwauk ee . Becau se o f th e not -so - gang were ki lle d outside this bank as thewonderful ti ming of S turgis and the lOath Northfield men took them on.A nn ive rsary cele brat ions, there was really From Northfield we headed north to

a bit of time to kill over the next tw o Farm ingro n to regroup with all the mod ernweeks so our journey now turned into a bit bik e rider s and to be met by the Twinof a zigzag, but du e to the ca reful planning C it ies C hapte r of HOG for an escorted tripof Pe ter and [ennifer Thomson it reall y in to Twin C it ies Harl ey -David son indidn 't feel like we wer e killing time at a ll. M inneap olis and th en on to our hot el. The

The ne xt bir of st un n ing scene ry to be an t ique bik es were kindly escorted by tw osee n was the Jay we left Rap id C ity, as we lad v rider s who were happy to c ruise with

us at the frenet ic pace of 35mph. O ne ofthe ladies had custo mised her bike in atr ibute to Murilvn Mon roe, with ashocking pink and wh ite co lour sche meand cloth ing to marc h .

We spent two full days in Minneapoli sand while the re were hosted to anafternoon at th e home of the mo rn of on eof our group members. That was a verypleasant ex pe rience, be ing ab le to relax onher back lawn an d be treated to Root BeerFloa ts and S' mores for desser t . For th eunini tiated S'mo res are two swee t biscuitssa ndwic he d toge the r with a co uple ofsquares of Hershev's chocolate and tworoa sted marshmall ows - an Ame rica ncam pfire treat and sheer decaden ce.

After Minneapoli s we had on ly fourmore days unril we hit Milwau kee. Inth ose four days we cruised a piece of "T heG reat River Road ", this road is a famo us"road trip" road that tllllows th e MississippiRive r from Minncapolis to N ew O rleans.Wc ex perience d several Arni sh settle ment sa lthough did not see too man y A mish Outand abo ut , we did get to see one fathe r andson on their horse and cart out on th eroad. T h is area appeared to play more toth e tou rist's requi rements of A mish craftsra the r than being a true A m ishcommun ity.

We ducked south into Iowa to visit BurrOak, the hom e of Laura Ingalls Wilder,known to most because of th e te levisionseries Little House on rhe Prairi e, ada ptedfrom her boo ks. We the n stayed the nigh tin Decorah.

From now on in th e journey cont inuedeasr to M ilwnukee kickino off wirh an othe r

crossing of th e Mississippi , but before wedid th at we enjoyed lunch in McGregor,Minnesota, th en hir ed a littl e boa t to rakea cruise on th e Mississippi. While outcruising aro und we all con tributed to somevery tor tured chor uses of Battle of NewO rlea ns, 0 1' Man River and any ot he r

song that we cou ld think of tha t related to

the M ississippi. We ended th is d,ly bycrossing th e Mississippi for th e last rime onthis journey, this t ime crossing intoWisconsin .

Second to last da y on rhe road andtoday we visit th e Fran k Lloyd Wri gh t(famous A merican arc hitec t ) Visi torCen tre and stretch th e finan ces on a cup ofcoffee whil e th ere. There was a beaut ifulgift shop ar th e Visitor Centre but on ly ifyou had an open cheque boo k. . . Then itwas on to "The House on the Rock".Wow! I don 't know tha t th ere are actu all yword s th at can approp riately descri be th isplace . The hom e / museum / co llec t ion ofA lex Jord an. He co llected everyth ing fromTiffany G lass to plasti c toy sold iers, andsomehow it all fitt ed ? It rakes you a so lidth ree- four hours to wa lk this p lace ,cove ring 2.5 miles (nor th at you no tice th edistance) and even th en you've don e itquickly. No, I simply canno t do it justicehere - you simply have to see it to believeit. The day's final destination is Mad ison,W isco nsin sta te capita l - and anotherdo med Capitol building. Tom or row is THEday, it' s a ge ntle 80 mil e r ide intoMilwaukce.

A hit of rou t in e maintenan ce isperform ed th is morning befo re all leavin gth e hotel together, all 38 bikes, to he ad to

the local dealersh ip before th e final run forth e day.

W h ile milling around at th e dea lersh ipPeter Thomson and I have a discussionabout our app roach in to Milwaukee, as Iam nav igator for rh e seven o ld ies o n

virtuall y a da ily basis by now. We decid eth at it is on ly fitt ing that as we enterMil wau kec we sho uld rid e str a igh t to[uneau Aven ue, th e site of th e or iginal'Harley-David son factory (no w th e ndrnin­isrr ation headquarter s) and re tu rn ourbikes to where th ey departe d bet ween 60and 78 years previously.

So , th at' s exa ctl y what we did. As werolled in to th e ca rpark and parked und erth at bro nze Harley-Davidson plaqu e onth e red brick wall , tears were just rollingdown some of our checks. Here we were,from littl e o ld N ew Zea land, 3500 milesfrom our start ing po in t in Van couverCanada and all seven antique bikes madeit. Yep, we were pret ty prou d of ourselves!

A fte r a ll th e ob ligato ry ph otos weretaken we pushed off to our hotel , home forth e ne xt nine nigh ts.

The next e igh t days in Milwauk ee sawus visiti ng anot her th ree-four denlershi ps,meet ing Willie G Davi dso n, meeting JeanDav idso n , a tte nd ing the HO G 20 thA nniversary celebra tion along with about400,000 o the r d ieha rd H-D enthusiasts.Even the bike rally for that nigh t wassomewhe re around 286 ,000 . All you couldsee for acres were Harlev-David sons. Wealso visited th e local museums who eachwere putting on th ei r own tri bute to H-D.We rook a day bus tr ip to Davenport, Iowato attend the Antique Motorcycle C lub ofAmerica's Swa pmeet - and was it a seriousSwapmeet ! No flea mark et junk th ere, tha twas for rea l.

The last highl ight of th is event for us wasthe Para de through the cent re ofMilwaukee. Of the half million t ickets soldto th e Birthday eve nt s th ey drew names"our of th e hat" for 5000 peop le to be partof th e parade . Unbel ievab ly, my name waspicked along with three ot he rs in our group.

This meant on Saturday 30 A ugust ,Pell" ~n rl 1 Pf'tf'r A Idf'rrl ;rf' ~nd P P t f'" " nd

The Magnificent Seven were:

Milw aukec Zoo carpark to line up for th estart of thi s event. We ar rived at abo ut6:00am and took ab out anothe r 30minutes to craw l to our start posit ion . At9:00a m the first of the bikes left, we lefr at9:55am. As we headed ou t of the zoo th erewere qui te a few peo ple lined along th ed rive screa ming and chee ring for us an d itwas quire exh ilarat ing, th en we turned outonto the road and th e crowd tu rne d intoobservers five peo ple deep all screaming atus, rush ing out beyond th e po lice line to

high -five us an d chor tle at us on our o ldgirls. Most American s reall y could no tbelieve th at we ac tua lly ride the se o ldth ings.

For th e next seve n and a hal f miles thecro wds go t bigger and loude r and the goosebumps becam e a pe rmane nt fixt ure onyour body . Man y of the crowd h adespeci all y made signs welc om ing th eparade and H-D riders to town , man ysimply saying "We lco me Hom e" and"Happy Birthday". It was very touch ing to

see thi s ove rwhelming suppor t for ahom egrown pro duct but th e best sloganwas a billb oard th at H-D th emselves hadbeen using rhur to ta lly summed up th eevent, it read : "T ho usands of Bro thers andS isters, O ne Rirthday".

A ugust 3 1 was th e Big Party with a rockconcert in Veteran" Park on the shor es ofLake M ichi gan . Aga in huge crowds turne dout for th e evening's entertainment and tosec H-D donate over $7million dollars toth e Muscul ar Dystrophy Assoc iat ion , H­D's official cha rity. This money was raisedduring the O pen Road tours, Rides Homeand the weeke nd's celebrat ions.

So, th at' s our sto ry, a journey of 3500miles, across seve n stares. Wc had one dayof rain in six weeks, experienced a h ighremp cmturc of 116°F or 4r C in Srurgisand made numy friend s along th e way. Weby no mean s had trouble free rid ing, wechanged man y a spark plug on the side ofthe road , rc-spokcd our rear wheel on theside of the road one sizzling afternoon ,reb uilt a bro nze bush in our gea rbox, didendless mainten ance to eac h bike along th eway. But it was sooo worth it - we wouldn'thave missed this for the world ! III

An Update on the 79th National Motorcycle Rally

A ll th e endea vours of th e en trants andth e efforts of the marshal s will be rewardedwith the Sunday even ing dinner and prizegiv ing. S uitable en te rt a in ment andgene rous prizes will be the culminati on ofwhat we are sure will be a memorableweekend for th e entran ts and all o f us whowill be invol ved in producing theoccasion .

O f course it doesn't all fini sh rightthe re. The next morning will see a ll th osewho have allowed th em selves th e pri vilegeof a region al tour sett ing off on th is part ofthe ir Waikato expe rience. TheCoro rnande l Peninsula, Rotoruu, Ruapehuand Waitomo are all destinations thatfeature in thi s week lon g sojourn . Theorgan isat ion of th is aspec t of th e eve ntincludes tran sport of all en trants luggage ,hack up veh icle s to rescue an y wear ymachines and a supporters minibus forth ose not riding or weary from doing so.

As we get furth er in to the organi singschedule fur th e even t we arc adding detailto the ove rall conce pt and improvin g anyand every aspect that we ca n. Research isshowing us that man y owne rs of motor cy­cles have initiated steps to get a VIC forth eir machines. Ho wever we would st illremind members that the 19th Nation alMoto rcycle Rall y is one of the first eve n tswhere these cards are a prerequisit e forentry, so don't den y yourself th e opportu­nity to take part in th is even t by failing toarrange one.

Entry forms have already bee n ma iledto past entrants in this National event andthey ar e a lso ava ilable from BranchSecretaries or by co ntact ing;The National Rally Secreta ry,V&.VCC (Waikato) Inc,PO Box 924, Hamilton or by email to:

oaklea.cottage@xtra.co.nzRegards from the O rganising Committee

MOTORCYCLINGMANIFESTATIONS

A s you will be aware already, th eVeteran &Vintage C ar C lub(Waikato) Inc. is to host th e 19th

Nation al Motorcycle Ra lly over theweekend of 11, 12 and 13 February 200 5.Planning is well und erway and it is th ewish of the organ ising committ ee to keepall of you members inform ed on what isenv isaged and being organ ised.

G reg Terrill, Terry Pidduck, H alO'Rork e and Bob Hay ron were the sub­commi tt ee th at put togeth er a proposal forpresentati on to the National Executive .The co ncep t enta iled a weekend rally atCa mbridge foll owed by a five or six dayregion al tour. The C lubroo ms were to beused as the star t ing venue, Victoria Squarefor th e gymkha na and display, and th eTown Hall for en te rta in ment and dinners.All th e planning thus far has remainedtru e to this or igina l form at.

Friday night will feature a 'pea , pie andpud' light meal for entra nts , with the\Vaipa District Council Deputy Mayor to

offic ia lly ope n th e rall y. A soc iableeveni ng cat ching up with ot he r entrantsfr~)m a ll parts of th e count ry is th eobject ive for the first eleme n t of theweekend.

Three rally routes have been laid outproviding for sho rt , mediu m and longopt ions in th e compet itiv e part of therall y, which will take place o n theSatu rday. The routes rake in much of th edi verse range of sce n ic roa ds that th e\Vaikato has to offer and we feel that allentrants will take away a grea t ridingexperience .

For those attend ing the d inner onSa turday night we have o rgan ised anotabl e gues t speaker who has a longassoci ati on with motorcycling and 'will nodoubt keep all en thralled with account s ofhis many exp loits during an int ernationalcareer. O nce again soc ia l int ercourse isalso th e a im of th e eve n ing.

The pict uresque Victo ria Square will bethe centre of atten tion for Cambridge onSunday as our riders take on th e obscure andchallenging con tests th at are planned forthem as parr of the gymkh ana. The publicwill be able to enjoy watching th ese anticsa, well as viewing all th e bikes, includingth ose tha t are en te red in th e C onco ursd'Elegance competition . The timing of thisevent co incides with th e regular monthlyCambridge Street Fair which will supply anaddition al and unique d istrac t ion for~ .".~" •..~ A ,-"",,~ • • ~.,- ,,1 '1 .. ,

Peter &. [ennifer ThomsonPalmerston NorthSteve MurrayLincolnNoel &. Margaret FootPalmerston NorthMark TomlinAucklandHoward &. Marion SimsMastertonPeter AlderdiceAucklandPaul &. [odi IornlinAuckland

1937 U

1928 lE

1926 lE

1925 lE

1927 lE

1944 WLC

1930 VL

]

j

marketFOR SALE1910 NAPIER LANDAULETTE mostof work donemust sell so come and see it and make anoffer. Phone/fax 09 425 7015 emailhicks.family@xtra.co.nz

1911 DAIMLER PARTS possibly 14hp: includechassis, suspension wheels, radiator, gearbox,diff. Suit person rebuild ing such a car. Offers.Phone 09 524 6233 .

1924/25 DODGE FOUR PARTS engines,gearboxes, backends, wheels, front axle springschassis, body parts etc. 1924/25 Buick Master,gear boxes backends, wheels 22", motor parts,crank case, crank shaft, cam shaft, clutch, conrods etc. Phone Gordon Hoffman 03 217 6587,Invercargill. Mem.

1926 CHEVROLET SEDAN SUPERIOR K MODELfull restoration recently completed. Topcondition throughout. Reg & WOF, ready for theroad. See www.c1assiccarfair.com for photos,open to offers. Phone Murray on 03 3266980.

1926 MODEL TTUDOR SEDAN. Prof restoration,leather, Ruxtell, Reg on hold, $12,000. 1922Model T Speedster project, All head, Hayeswires, newtyres etc. needs metal work to finish,$8,000 will neg on both together. Phone Mike09813 0547 or 0274945632.

1928 HARLEY·DAVIDSON 350cc single model Bin olive green fully restored and in mintcondition has Vin and reg is on hold. Includingspare parts $20,000. Phone Alex 021 145 3785.

1929 DE SOTO SEDAN & spares. Motored 3,000miles since restoration. Photos and further infor­mation available to interested persons. Vehiclewill be at Marlborough Branch Swap Meet &Rally 23-24th October unless sold previously.Phone 03 5784142 . Mem.

1929 PONTIAC SEDAN 6 cylinder 95%complete. New spokes, brakes, rolling chassis.Main body panels restored, engine almostcompletely reconditioned . Good restorationproject $10,500 ono. Phone/fax Richard 09 4205048.

1930 FORD MODEL AA 1'1> TON TRUCK Colonialcab model, deck restored as original $5,000ono. Phone or fax 03 689 4999

1930 FORD MODEL A TOWN SEDAN. Very goodbody, complete new wood kit. Unrestored,65,000miles. $8,000. Phone or fax03 6894999

1930 MODEL A TOWN SEDAN excellent interiorolder restoration but in nice condition goes wellReg & WOF painted in maroon & black. Ownedover 20 years. Phone 09 625 5046. Mem.

1930-31 Model A Phaeton all running gear,body restored. $12,000. Phone or fax 03 689

lace1931 STANDARD BIG NINE a complete car,some restoration started, spare recond motor,offers. Phone /fax 03 9602391.

1938 AUSTIN 10 CAMBRIDGE, good condition,goes well, WOF & reg. $6,000 ono. Phone 094803148 work, 09 441 4136 after hours.

1942 MERCURY CONVERTIBLE in very soundbut unrestored condition. RHD. Very rare.$30,000 negotiable. 1965 Jaguar - E typeCoupe series 1,4.2. Mechanically restored. Somepanel work & paint to be done. Also 1966Jaguar MK 11 3.8 MAN/OD, 80% restored. Phone09435 2608 Whangarei .

1947 DE SOTO S11 fluid drive custom. Righthand drive six seater American sedan. Rarestylish model similar to Chrysler Windsor.Original and complete with some mechanicalreconditioning having been done plus numerousspare parts. An excellent restoration project.Phone 03 688 1374. Mem.

1948 FORD PREFECT Good motor, body, runninggear. Small restoration job. $2,000 ono. Phoneor fax 03 6894999

1952 TRIUMPH MAYFLOWER CAR good restora­tion project. Reconditioned motor, spare partsavailable. $600. Phone 0274 39 1818 (Neil).Mem.

1954 SINGER SM CLOCK MODEL. 85,000original miles, one lady owner. Garaged 34years. Complete car. Offers. Phone 06 372 6721.Mem.

1963 HOLDEN EJ WAGON Model A Ford rebuilt6V & 12V generators and starters and distribu­tors horns repaired. Wiring looms with braidedcable also indicators wiring in loom. Generatorsearly Chrysler, Plymouth De Soto 6v &12v.Phone Brian Hickey 03 354 0103 site 337McLeans Island. Mem.

AUTOMOTIVE WOODGRAININGWhen restoring your car there is onlyone wayto restore your metal window frames &dashboard: metal woodgraining. For informa­tion and free quotes contact Alan Markby.Phone 03 445 0988 or write to 11 BoynePlace, Cromwell. Mem.

KING-PIN KITS, TIE ROD ENDS,Spring shackles, ignition parts, bulbs andsealed beams, spark-plugs and coils, enginebearings, engine mountings, head gaskeUsets,pistons and valves, timing chains and gears,flywheel ring gears, tyres, carburettors,magnetos, etc. for all makes and models,especially: Austin Chevrolet, Chrysler, Ford,Hillman, Morris, Standard, Vauxhall.

Ronald Lever,87 Tui Rd, Papatoetoe,SouthAuckland.

Phone 09 278 3888 eveninas.

CLASSIFIED RATESDue to space limitation, classified advertisersshould refrain from the use of dashes, spaces,logos, blank lines and centering.All classifiedrates include GST.The 65word limit includes contact details.Advertisers requiring ads longer than thestandard 65words, or who require typographyor space, must apply display rates.The advertising department reserves the right toeditor return c1assifieds not meeting the criteriaMember of Vintage Car Club Inc$12.00 for first 40 words or part thereof,thereafter 15 cents perwordto a maximum of65words peradvertisement. Members must befinancial and state their Branch..Non Member$16.00 for first 40 words or part thereof,thereafter 15cents perword to a maximum of65 words peradvertisement.Text in a BoxedAd$20 members, $24 non-members.Photo Ad in Box$32.00 members, $44 non-members, enclose aclear photograph and an SAE if return required .Colour Photo Ad in Box$50.00 members, $54non-members, enclose aclear photo and an SAE if return required.Above rates apply for each advertisement.

Advertisements should be typed or clearly printed.

ENCLOSE PAYMENTCheques Payable to Beaded Wheels.Post to:Advertising, PO Box 13140,Christchurch, to arrive not laterthan 10th ofmonth preceding publication.Phone 03 332 3531, Fax 03 332 3827 .

DISPLAY RATESCasual 3 Issues

(per issue)Full Page $900.00 $720.00HalfPage $490.00 $390.00Horizontal Quarter Page $270.00 $216.00All display rates quoted exclude GST and are forfinishedcamera ready artwork supplied. Artwork can be arranged atan extra charge.

Deadline for copy 10th ofmonth preceding publication.Beaded Wheels willconsider articles ofa technical natureforinclusion initseditorial space. Beaded Wheels howeverregrets that it isnotable tooffer editorial space foradvertisements nor forthe promotion of products.Marketplace advertising cancellations received inwritingprior toadvertising deadline will be refunded infull. Wherepossible Beaded Wheels will refund 70% of theadvertisement cost forany cancellations received aher thebooking deadline.Beaded Wheels makes every eHMto ensure nomisleading claims aremade byadvertisers,responsibility caonot be accepted by Beaded Whi.'t'lsOf theVintageCarClub ofNew.Zealand(Inc.)for the failure ofanyproduct orservice 10 givesatisfaction. Inclusion ofaproduct or~ervi(e shouldnot beconstrued asendorsement ofitbyBeaded WheelsorbytheVimage Car Club.

Noliabilitycanbeaccepted fornon-appearance ofadvel1isements and the textofall advertisements isSUbject totheapproval ofthe editor who reserves theright torefuse any advertisements which are not compatible with the aims,objectives. andstandards ofBeaded Wheels OftheVintage Car Club ofNewZealand(lnc)

Inaccordance withthe provisions of the Human Rights CommissionAct1977BeadedWheelswillnot publish anyadvertisementwhichindicates orcould reasonably be understood as indicating anintention to discriminate by reason of sex,marital status. religiousor ethicalbeliefs. Advertisers shouldtake all care in draftingadvertisements as they couldbe held liable, as wellas the magazine

1966 NISSAN PRINCE GLORIA Vauxhall motor.Body could be restored, good badges, chrome,seats, hubcaps. Located Queenstown . $100phone 03 442 2002 .

1968 MK I TRIUMPH 2,000 manual o'drive.White with red trim. Second owner, since 1973.Mileage then, 17,000, currently 230,354 miles.Straight body, all still very tidy, regular mainte­nance. A very sound vehicle. $1,500. WriteWilson Hawke, 5 Kew Place, Richmond 7002 orphone 03 5448653 for moredetails. Mem.

1973 MORRIS 1000 VAN in very tidy conditionvery reliable and runs well, 76,000 miles. Newfloor and completely lined out in back, newbattery. A real eye-catcher around the town.$3,500. Phone 03 547 4277. Nelson Mem.

AUSTIN 16/6, unrestored, completeandoriginal,not running, digital photos available, $4,000ono. Phone 03 208 1282.

AUTOMOBILE QUARTERLY: Most copies fromVolume 1 Number 1 to Volume 33 available. Thisis a great chance to fill the gaps in your collec­tion or to find a specific article. TelephoneWheels On Paper Ltd 03 366 4404 or emailinfo@wheelsonpaper.co.nz

DISTRIBUTOR PARTS AND SERVICEWe can supply many new old stock distributorparts for Lucas and other makes, and havebuilt a New Zealand wide reputation forrestoring worn distributors to as newperformance and finish . All aspects of repairundertaken including Vacuum AdvanceUnits. Work fully guaranteed. contact QualityRebuilds, 5 Fenhall St, Christchurch, 8004.Phonelfax Barry Emms 033425677 . Mem.

EUROPEAN HOLIDAYS. Camper vans,motorhomes and cars for hire. Excellent helpfulservice, best rates in UK. For brochures phone078532711 or phone Kiwi Hire Direct 441 432870410 fax 44 1 432 870875

PISTONS PISTONS PISTONS PISTONS

FOR VETERAN, VINTAGE, CLASSIC &ODDBALL ENGINES.

We can supply piston sets for most makes &models. All piston sets come complete withrings & gudgeons. We have over 700 listings

at competitive prices.

M S Coombes Ltd344 St Asaph St, Christchurch

PH 03 366 7463, FAX03 366 7462

HUBCAPS - ANY PROBLEMS CONTACT MEI now produce either hubcap skins or completehubcaps. These are top quality replicas. Pressednot spun to the closest possible originalspecifications. I can manufacture any model thatuses theskin system plus many others providedthey do not exceed 10'1>" in diameter.For more information phone Dave PattenReplica Manufacturing (2003) Ltd, Ph 025 2477956, 160 New York Street, Martinborough.I=m::lil ,.1:=1\10 n::lttonrnhMiCQ nQ,t n7

MECHANICAL FUEL PUMPS REPAIRED.We can restore that faulty pump, including fuelresistant diaphragm. Work fully guaranteed.Contact Quality Rebuilds, 5 Fenhall St,Christchurch 8004. Phonelfax Barry Emms 03342 5677. Mem.

MOTORCYCLE MARKETPLACE MAGAZINE.For motorcycles, parts & services, VintageClassic & Modern. Just $5.50 in bookshopsNationwide in New Zealand and Australia .Website: www.motorcyclemarketplace.co.nz

BROCHURES, ADVERTISEMENTS, POSTCARDSAND CIGARETTE CARDS: We have approxi­mately 6000 items for sale with a particularlygood range of 20s, 30s and 50s pieces.Availablesoon .. . Saturday Evening Post ads from 1948through to late 60s. Check our websitewww.wheelsonpaper.co.nz or telephone WheelsOn Paper ltd 03 3664404 or email info@wheel­sonpaper.co.nz

CHEVROLET EAGLE 1933 PICKUP green andblack. Wire wheels wooden cab, steel doors. Reg& WOF 5'8" wooden deck, mechanical work alldone vinyl roof. Leather seats. Spare radiator,wheels. $7,500 Phone 03 449 2352 . Mem

CHRISTCHURCH SWAP MEET; Wheels on PaperLtd will be at the Swap Meet in the Trades Tentwith a good range of brochures, advertisements,books etc. However due to space we will nothave anywhere near all our stock there. For thebenefit of out of town buyers, we will open ourshop situated at 5/173 ChesterStreet East ontheFriday andSaturday evenings from 7pm-9pm.

HANDBOOKS AND ILLUSTRATED PARTS LISTS:Over 500 1920s to 1950s available includingCrossley 25/30 hp 1920, Daimler 20nOc mid 20s,Lagonda 2'h litre c1950, Lea Francis .1 0 hp c1924/25, Vauxhall 20/60 1929 - justarrived hugerange of Lucas wiring diagrams 1937-1948.Check our website www.wheelsonpaper.co.nz ortelephone Wheels On Paper Ltd 03 366 4404 oremail info@wheelsonpaper.co.nz

HARLEY-DAVIDSON 1928 MODEL J1000 CC withsidecar photo P24 issue 269. After a mechanicalrebuild this very reliable vintage mic was riddenacross USA to Milwaukee last year. Long historyin NZ $28,000. Phone 09 530 8834. Mem.

HD 1942 WLA original condition in full militarytrim. A reliable runner will be enhanced by aspray of paint. Price will be negotiable butoffers over $18,000 desired. Phone 03 312 2088ask for Donna or email atdawber@xtra.co.nz

HOLDEN 138 GREY ENGINE, short block assy,reconditioned, rebored, new pistons, ringsbearings, cam gear. Crank shaft and cam shaftreground. $500. Phone Maurie 07 345 6540.Mem.

MG MIDGET 1967, 1275 cc series 3 excellentcondition, reconditioned motor, H/top/soft top$8,000. 1962 Morris 1000 good motor dereg$250. 1933 Austin Seven special, quick, reliableCOD. Log book and VIe. Phone Mike 09 813

JAGUAR 1956 MKI a restoration worth doing,$1,600. Daimler V8 saloon restoration project$2,000. Jaguar Mk 11, Moss overdrive gearboxes$500 each .Austin Wolseley 6/99-6/110, 3 speedfloor shift overdrive gearbox, can supply partsfor auto conversion, $350. Austin-MGC 3 litre 7bearing motor, $850. Lots of parts for 1950-70English cars. Phonelfax 07 868 1062, Thames.

MG TC PARTS Tyres eight Firestone and two BFGoodrich 4.75 x 19 wire wheels; four 48 spokegood condition - onepoor. Carbies: pair of 1.25inch SU 's; wire wheel centres: four 48 spoke.Phone 03 4780860.

MINI COOPER Swheels, steel mags, mechanicalparts, 1300 engines, boxes. Ford V8 heads,Standard engine early vintage, Fiat 125 wheels,hubcaps, Fiat 130 mags and hubcaps. Puchmotor/gearbox. Vauxhall 3.3 head, steel wheels,wire wheels 21 " 6 lock ring 80 mm spline.Triumph Herald front screen, 2 ash peg drivehubs, 2 20" commercial sankey wheels withlock rings. Phone 073484227,021 043 7673 .

MOTORSPORT: Ourextensive range includes: GPCar 54 to 56 by Setright, The French Sports CarRevolution by Blight, VintageSpecials by Bateman,Brooklands Giants by Boddy. Check our websitewww.wheelsonpaper.co.nz or telephone WheelsOnPaper Ltd 033664404or email info@wheel­sonpaper.co. nz

PENRITE OILS. We carry a full range fromVintage to Modern Engines. Lubricants for pre-1984 HD motorcycles, gearbox oil for Japanese2 strokes. Full range of diff steering box andgearbox oils. Competit ive prices. Try us first.M.S. Coombes Ltd., 344St. Asaph Street, Chch.Phone 03366 7463, Fax 03 366 7462.

PISTONS FOR VINTAGE AND CLASSIC ENGINESMost models available in standard oroversizes. Also pistons can be made to specialdimensions. Contact George Calder, 307 HoonHay Road, Christchurch. Ph 03 338 5372.Fax 03 338 5482 . Member.

ADVERTISING THAT WORKSBeaded Wheels is the only magazine delivereddirectly to over 6,400 members of the VintageCar Club of New Zealand every two months.Beaded Wheels is also sold in bookshopsthroughout the country andoverseas - We are adirect link to a a huge audience of motoringenthusiasts. Use your advertising budgeteffectively - choose Beaded Wheels when placingyournextadvertisement.

SU FUEL PUMPS REBUILT, we rebuild yourpumps 6V and 12V. We also stock a full rangeof spare parts. All work fully guaranteed.Contact SU Fuel Pump Services (NZ) . PhoneRick 0274 528 178 or 03 383 9119 afterhours.Email: sufuelpumpservices@inet.net.nz

VINTAGE WOOD PROBLEMS? For all yourVintage wood work requirements, I canreproduce your car's woodwork from originalparts, patterns and photos. Model A partsmade to order, also Morris Traveller Van kits. NRhodes, Furniture of Distinction. Purakau Rd,M",tnn Phnnc Oh 1/7 h1 hLl

Choose the next vehicle foryour collection from thishuge selection of vehicles from 1920s - 1970s

Viewing Friday 15 October, Auction Saturday 16 October.For details contact Ray or Paul Singleton, 07 573 6547.

Full list will be on our website www.vintagecars.nzhere.com

TE PUKE VINTAGE AUTO BARNANNUAL MONSTER AUCTION

1969 AEC Ranger Bus1969 Ford Lincoln Continental1969 MG B Roadster1969 Rover P5B1970 VW 150cc1971Austin 3 It1972 Rover 2000TC1973 Holden Torana S1973 Mercedes 350SLC1974 Peugeot 5041975 Mercedes 450SL1976TriumphTC20001977 Ford Fairlane Marquies1977 Ford Granada1979 Daimler Sovereign1979 Jaguar XJ6 S21979 MG B GT1979 Mini Clubman1980 Chev Impala1980 Leyland Mini GTFord model A RoadsterMG TF Replica

1952 AlvisTA 211952 Humber Hawk MK IV1953 AJS500cc1953 AJS 500cc1953 De Soto sedan1953 Ferrari 5001953 Velocette Mac1955 MG TFReplica1956 Chevrolet Truck 1300 cwt1957 Chevrolet Belair1958 Landrover fire engine1963 Chevrolet1964 Ford Capri GT 2 It1964Ford Consul Cortina1964 Ford Galaxie 500 2 Door1964 Ford Thames Freighter1964 Hillman Minx1964 NGK 30 Austin1964 Rover 1101965Austin Westminster1966 Jaguar Etype1968 MK 11 Daimler 250 V81968 VW 1500cc

191 3 Humberette1923 Buick1923 Willy OverlandTourer1924 Chevrolet Pickup1925 Fiat 509Tourer1927 Erskine Sedan1928 Renault Viva 6 Sedan1929 Chevrolet International1930 Ford1934 Riley Imp Special1937 Morris 81947 Bu ick Super1947 Ford Prefect1947 Norton Commando 850cc1948 Alvis TA Woody1948 Buick Sports Coupe1948 Chrysler1948Morris Minor Low Lite1948 Packard Sedan1948 Velocette Mac1950 Bedford K1951 Ford Fordson1951 Morris Oxford

VINTAGE TRUNKS as seen in Issue 201 ,page 17. Leather trim, waterproof, stock sizeor made to your measurements. Phone/FaxAIIan on 06 844 3959 or 025 469 331 todiscuss your requirements. AllanJones Joinery,Napier. Member.

AUTOMOTIVE REPAIR BUSINESS FOR SALE,easily run from garage at home, well estab­lished business with good client base, can beoperated from anywhere in New Zealand.Would suit retired or semi-retired person. Price$10,000 including stock and plant (neg). Phone03 386 1939 a/hour andaskfor Rick.

WORKSHOP MANUALS & SALES BROCHURESlarge stock of new and used for all types ofvehicles from early 1900s onwards includingcars, motorcycles, farm equipment, tractors,trucks. Transport book-find specialists.Mail, phone and secure online orders.DML Transport Literature & More.www.manuals.co.nz Phone 03 614 7900.PO Box 25, Pleasant Point, South Canterbury

WOLSELEY OWNERS Didyou knowthere is anactive club in New Zealand catering for yourneeds? We offer a top quality monthlymagazine, comprehensive spares service, and alibrary of technical information. Six branchesthroughout NZ. For info contact the NationalSecretary, Graham Pate, ph 07 888 0009 or visit. . .. . .

1930 DODGE DD 6 very reliable and smartlooking car. Brakes overhauled, new radiator.Grey interior, some spares inc two gearboxes.Reg & WOE III health forces sale, $16,500.Genuine enquiries only please. Phone Les 03 2038454 (evenings). Mem.

1927 CADILLAC LA SALLE BUSINESS COUPETotal ground up restoration back on the road1987 has since done less than 2,000 miles. Verygood condition WOF & Reg, $45,000 ono. Phone094361494, 025920221 Whangarei . Mem.

1929 DODGE DA SEDAN EXCELLENTCONDITION. Full body off restoration completedlate 1980s. Immaculate interior, good rubber.Some spare parts. Current Reg & WOE Nicetouring car, reluctantly for sale at $18,000.Phons Oq 42":1 711\7 Mpm

(61 32 3·3995Alllrs (61323·3868

Memb er of Munawatu V.C .c.H.C.C.A. (NZI

Vern Jensen

-F""'''. -<i'''9'.'"~ .~

~· r.AOTEAROA WOODEN WHEELS

VINTAGE & CLASSIC QUARTZ halogen bulbs.Replace your existing bulbs without rewiring theheadlamp assemblies. Up to 100% brighter thanyour existing Tungsten bulbs. Will fit mostreflectors fitted to Pre & Post war cars andmotorbikes. Also available in single filament 55watt P22 &BA 15bases for use in spotlamps andmechanical dip reflectors. Most bases andconfigurations available in 6v& 12v. Further info:Norm & Jan Sisson, sole NZ Agent. Ph/Fax 03389­0643 also Henrob Welding Torches. Model BoatSupplies, 38 Ottawa Road, Christchurch 6. Noterh ;mnp nf nnon» numoor

WOODEN WHEELS made for your metal­work. Steam-bent felloes, any shape spokes.New beaded rims available in some sizes.Phone Vern Jensen 06 323 3868, 16 OsborneTerrace, Feilding. Mem.

-

1931 HILLMAN SIX CYLINDER 4 door saloon,side mounted spare, complete, original and inrunning order. Some spares. $3,000. Phone 03572 9138.

1935 AUSTIN 7 RUBY Recent body off totalrestoration. Professional paint job. New tyres,radiator, battery, upholstery, wiring loom etc.Rebuilt three bearing motor. Original papers.Receipts available for all work done. Phone 035786133. Mem.

1951 DAIMLER CONSORT - colour black oversilver. Three ownersfrom new. Engine rebuilt twoyears ago, $7,000 spent. Repainted 10 yearsago, along with new hood lining. Good tyres,runsbeautifully. ContactBruce Henderson Phone07 856 8260, Hamilton,evenings.

1966 DAIMLER V8 Beautiful, highly original carin everyday use. Professionally maintained byenthusiastic owner for last 14 years. Re-uphol­stered (leather) and new hood lining. Excellentmechanicals and tyres. Drives exceptionally well.Original toolkit plus workshop manual. $11,000.Phone 09 407 7562, Kerikeri.

FIAT SPIDER 1979 1800cc manual RH drive,good original condition, has full flow exhaustsystem & twin Webercarbs. Fully rewired. Blacktop new last year. Goes well. Ex Calif in 1989.$6,900. Call 021 630 647 or evenings 04 5660344. Mem.

ROLLS-ROYCE SILVER SHADOW 1974.NZ new, serviced by RR agent. Cardinal red,magnolia interior. Paint and chrome excellent,mint original interior. Drives superbly. Currentowner 10 years. $30,000. Phone 09 424 7554.

1937 PONTIAC rust free, one owner last 26years. New carpet, VIC, Reg & WOF. Maroon,some spares. $11,000. Phone 09 435 3963, fax09435 3964. Mem.

1974 ROVER P6B English-assembled, tintedglass, heated rear window, 234,000 km, runningvery smoothly. Current WOF & Reg, just needstidying. $3,500ono. Phone 07 5762046 or 0274848718. Mem.

SUNBEAM S7 DE LUXE 1952 done 100 milessince detailed ground up rebuild, nothingoverlooked. Previous best in show winner. Reg &WOF, superb condition. $8,750 or swapmid sixtiesTriumph-BSA same condition. Phone 09 4376040.

1949 FORD BONUS BUILT PICKUP only71,500 miles and three owners from new.Complete with original ownership papers,owners handbook, factory parts book, person­alised plate 49V8.WOF & Reg. $25,000. Phone03 332 1113.Mem.

DKW AUTO UNION RT 175CC 1954 4 speed.Totally original fasteners unmarked chromepaint and seat excellent. Has tool kit andinstruction manual. The most correct qualitylightweight in New Zealand. Good investmentsare not cheap but very satisfying. Phone 07 8532711. Mem.

ROOF SIXTEEN VALVE CYLINDER HEADWANTED for modelT. Prefer Veteran era type A.Anything considered even if you think it'sbeyond repair. This is the last thing required tocomplete this restoration. Phone Joseph orAndrew McClintock 03 338 4049. Mem

WANTED TO BUY

1967 DODGE AMBULANCE. runs well, looksgreat - regularly at Wanganui Branch ralliesbeside King Country branch outings. next run KCBranch Journey Thru Time 9 Oct unless soldprior. $4,300 ono. Phone Malcolm Peck 07 8955015, malzjeepz@hotmail.co.nz

1928 MODEL A PHAETON full restoration1966. WOF & Reg current. PP 28-35a $27,000.Phone or fax 03 689 4999 Mem.

1924 BUICK MCClAUGHlIN SPECIAL4 cylinder, ohv tourer. Older ground-up profes­sional restoration. Modest mileage. Always keptgaraged, Reg & WOF, well maintained, turnedover & greased. Original papers, some spares.Full hood, all curtains, carrier etc. $24,000. Phoneor fax 09 426 3211, cell 025739 643.Mem.

DAIMLER V8 MAJESTIC MAJORS 4.5 Litresestate of the Late Frank De Latour. 1. Sedan1965 Good condition. Only minor rust now inbody. $3,000 spent on "A" pillar areas. Engine& trans. out for replacement of cyl. head &fitting of recond . trans. (Supplied) 2. limousine1964. Import ex USA, but is RHD. UsualCalifornia sun baking & needs total restoration.3. Spares car. 1964 Saloon, No engine butotherwise complete. Workshop manual/partsbooks available. Many NOS parts go with cars.$12,000 the lot ono. Ph eitherLois De Latour 094182164 or lan Goldingham 09 445 8811

TWO DYKE'S automobile and Gasoline Engineencyclopaedias 14th edition and 20th editionboth in verygood condition. Can view or phonealso several years back copies of Beaded Wheels.Best offers. Phone 063683472.

OLD & RARE MOTORING BOOKS: Huge rangeincluding Motoring Entente by Nickols & Karslake,Grand Prix Bugatti by Conway, Rover Memories byHough & Frostick, Vanden Plas Coachbui/ders bySmith, Complete History of Chrys/er by Langworth &Norbye, The Miller Dynasty by Dees. Check ourwebsite www.wheelsonpaper.co.nz or telephoneWheels on paper Ltd, 03 366 4404 or emailinfo@wheelsonpaper.co.nz

OVERLAND ROADSTER 1916 new clutch, $30kono, Austin Seven sport 19304 speed box, $4kono. Austin Cambridge, 1964 genuine 70k milesall original papers $2k ono. Radiator, veteran,cast top tank, reliance patent Manchester caston cap, 3ft high, 2 ft wide excellent order $500firm. Reason for selling, shed full - bank empty!Phone 07 847 7784 evenings, Russell. Mem.

QUALITY NEW MOTORING BOOKS: Recentarrivals include Alfa Romeo 6C·25OO by Anselmi,Bentley 50 Years of the Marque by Green, 70 Years ofBuick by Dammann, Ri/eyas Old As The Industry byStyles, The Real Wo/se/ey by Painting. We have NZ'sbest range of motoring books. Check ourwebsitewww.wheelsonpaper.co.nz or telephone Wheelson Paper Ltd, 03 3664404 or email info@wheel­sonpaper.co.nz

1920 V8 DE DION BOUTON. Wanted any partsthat are available for current restoration,especially starter-generator, carb, period instru­ments European wire or wood spoke wheels,approx 23 inch, any literature etc. Phone ColinLyon 03 614 7232, South Canterbury. Mem.

1925 BUICK TOURER WORKSHOP & PARTSManuals, body drawings, seats, hood bows, sidelights, any interior trim or fittings. Phone 03 4883776 Mem.

1934 CHEVROLET STANDARD COUPE PARTS, rearbumper and irons, roof insert moulding, runningboard rubbers, interior light switch knob, sidemount equipment, information on dickie seatconversion and rear wind down window. PhonePhilip 04 299 7075 or email Matai32@xtra.co.nz

ANY PARTS OR LEADS FOR 1928 International 1ton 6 speed special truck especially wheels, brakedrums, front axle/steering gear. Phone 09 5338050 triumphmodelh@yahoo.co.nz Mem

BUICK 1947, am restoring a convertible willconsider all parts offered, even good runningsedan/coupe with rough body. Particular partneeded is front divided seat pref with electro­hydraulic parts. Phone John 09 5224418 (Akld)

EARLY HUBCAPS THREADED TYPE as fitted towooden wheels especially unusual makes. Alsowould like to buya badge collection pre-war eraor individual badges. Still need a good frontbumper for 1934 Plymouth deluxe andspeedometer for 1929 DeSoto. Stephen Satherley,17 Methuen Rd Avondale Auckland 7. Phone 09

VELOCETTE 1954 350 cc MAC. Spring-frame.One family owned 34 years. Unregistered.Original manuals. Motor, clutch, gearbox,restored, remainder original, but needs helicoil.Runs, rides beautifully. Easy starting. Usedannually few days only past 25 years. OffersMiles Hursthouse phone 03 548 3533, m.hurst­house@c1ear.net.mnz

VETERAN LAMPS BRASS Set of Howes and BurleyLtd, Birmingham. Pair headlamps, pair side lamps,tail light, generator and Lucas horn with bulb.All inexcellent order and ready to place oncar.Willbeonshow site 180 Canty Swapmeet on contact RonDuckworth, 302 Russley Road, phone 03358 6510.

WHEELS ON PAPER LTD; Finally we have movedinto our new premises. Please come andvisit usif you are in Christchurch to view NewZealand'sbest range of motoring literature from Veteranto Postwar classics. Shop hours Monday,Wednesday, Friday 11 am-5pm, Saturday10am-4am, or by appointment. Wheels OnPaper Ltd , 5/173 Chester Street East,Christchurch. Telephone 03 366 4404, fax 3664406 or email info@wheelsonpaper.co.nz

VALVES exhaust quality stainless for Vintageengines. Available in blank form or machinedto size required. Contact; George Calder, 307Hoon Hay Road, Christchurch. Phone 03 3385372, Fax 03 338 5482 . Member.

FORD 1930-31 MODEL A COUPE or Roadster inneed of total rebuild or any parts towards theproject. Phone 04 973 6070 evenings or emailgentry@paradise.net.nz Mem

HALlBRAND QUICK CHANGE spur gears Set No223/24 tooth set No 5 21/26 tooth. Also anyHalibrand V8 centre section 201 casting or partsfor one. Phone 03 208 7932 Mem.

HARLEY·DAVIDSON PARTS - WLA petrol tanksand engine parts, and 1937-48 Big Twin frontwheel and brake. Phone 09 238 6833 or writePO Box 495 Pukekohe Mem.

HORN FOR 1936 FORD V8 base 5" dia cone 7"long with angle brk to mount. Ph 06 364 2192.

LEVIS MOTORCYCLE ENGINE 1936-39 500cc ohvpreferred but a 350 or 600 any any other Levisparts considered. Phone 07 548 1990 GrahamRoss. Mem.

MANIFOLD AND CARB. INCH THROAT, clamp orflange mounting, for 1928 Dunelt 250 twostroke. Also drive side sprocket forVilliers 4 speedgear box. Phone 04 563 6342 Bill Munro Mem

HEDSTROM INDIAN CARBURETTOR or anyinternal parts for same, any condition. Also anypart whatsoever for Hedstrom cycle or mechan­ical appreciated. Phone Roley 09 846 9743 .Mem.

ENGLISH COLLECTOR OF PRE 1918 AEC,Thornycroft, Napier, etc seeks anything from abutton to a complete vehicle. Please senddetails and photowith relevant numbers to Patthe Anorak, Glazebrook Farm, Ashingdon,Essex, England, SS43JI or phone 001 702

4-6 February 2005

The Southland Branch cordially invites all past and present members and

supporters to join them for their 50th Anniversary celebrations to be held

Gearbox gearsCrownwheel & pinionsWiper motors (vac)Wheel cylinders & kitsWng gears & pinionsClutch platesFuel pumps 8; kitsSteering box partsIgnition partsEngine mounts

Saturday 29 January 2005An interesung and varied day's VeteranMotoring and field events areplanned,

followed by a prizegiving dinnerin the evening.

For further information and entry form contact:Marion McConachiePh/fax OJ 453 0404

email bmmcconachiewxrra.co.nzor Vintage Car Club of NZ lnc, Otago

Branch PO Box 5352, DUl1cdin

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT

lan Ridd Phone/fax 03 236 1077Ronald Irwin Phone 03 236 4103

Email: theirwins@xtra.co.nz

Engine gasketsSteering jointsElectrical fittingsShock absorbersShackles (pins & bushes)Water pumps & kitsCarburettorsPistonsSpeedo cablesLenses

50th ANNIVERSARY

Southland BranchVCCNZ Inc

Mechariical Restorations• - I

and Vlnta~i'wares (1980)~ < :» --"\1, -0'- ~J' I ! .-'- r '_ 0" ',.,

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MECHANICAL RESTORATIONS & VINTAGE SPARES (1980)RD 7 • Fordell • Wanganui • Phone/Fax 06 342 7713

Kingpin setsSuspension partsSpark plugsEngine bearingsMaster cylinders & kitsRear axlesClutch coversBrake & clutch cablesValves. springs, guidesTiming gears & chains

PROGRAMMEFRIDAY Welcome, Noggin & NatterSATURDAY Rally and dinnerSUNDAY Light lunch and farewell

OIL CO ENAMEL ADVERTISING SIGNS, anymotoring related signs, Motor Spirits, Tyres etc.Anyitems, Big Tree, Texaco Sternol, Europa, Sinclair,Valvolene; oil bottles, delivery drivers hat andjacket, badges, sample tubes of oil. Interested inanything related to early motoring. Phone 09 4444066 RBallantyne. Mem

RALLY CAR WANTED. Mike Margerum and friendsregular visitors to our rallies from USA., would liketo borrow or hire a rally car for the 2006International Rally. Preferably from Christchurch,they understand Studebakers. If you can helpcontact Jack Hoven 201 Darraghs Road Tauranga3001. Phone 07 576 6222.Mem

REAR DIFF SEALS for my 1931 side valve MorrisMinor roadster. Car number SV5710, chassis noU5759A, alsowanted for my 1934 Morris Minor 2door sedan front and rearbumper brackets. PhoneJohn 07 871 9527 evenings.

S U CARBS 2 INCH SLOPERS as fitted to AustinHealey 3000. Zenith 48k carbs with rotary barrelthrottle. Beaded Wheels issue December 1956.Grand Prix Bugatti by Hugh Conway. Contact PaulHicks phlfax 09 425 7015 emailhicks.family@xtra.co.nz Mem

TRIUMPH MODEL H 1922 & P 1926 parts needgear levers, tank caps, carb, top tank, handle barlevers, stands, carriers, wheels, mag mounts, clutchand oil squirt parts lists/pictures three wheel DOTparts 1928Ariel frame (W) Swap 1927. Phone 09533 8050triumphmodelh@yahoo.co.nz Mem

VESPA &LAMBRETTA MOTOR SCOOTERS wanted,anything considered. Phone Kevin 09 849 3211.email kevmate@wildmail.com Mem

MKII ZEPHYR CONVERTIBLE BODY or whatyou may have. Phone 06 304 9996 emailmaisonfrere@xtra.co.nz.Mem

WIRE WHEELS SET OF 6 NEEDED for mid size USvintagecar i.e.ex Chrysler, Plymouth, Dodge, Chevetc. Must be in good usable condition. Prefer 18inch but 19 inch considered. Phone Malcom 06855 5119 or email info@chapelwick.co.nz Mem

VINTAGE OR VETERAN MOTORCYCLE restorationproject wanted, anything considered. Phone Paul094789699. Mem.

WANTED LUCAS NEW TYRE 19 x 550, and. steelspoked wheel for 1926 Graham Brothers truck.Phone Mike 03 344 0425mike.heather@paradise.net.nz. Mem

1928-31 FORD A PICKUP WANTED TO BUYRecently completed restoration required.Professional restoration preferred. Must bein immaculatecondition interior and exteriorwith reliable engine. Email:charnbill@hotmail.com

MG PRE WAR. Would consider anything from acomplete restored car to a project, or even justparts. Ph Peter Lyttle 03 693 9080 evenings. Mem.

NASH METROPOLITAN parts required for restora­tion. Complete hood bow set for convertible,stainless steel side strips, 2 inside sun visors, insidedoor and window crank handles, petrol tank.Phonelfax 07 889 5582 .Mem

A ll owners and supporters are all invited to

2005 NA T I O NA L

SOUTH ISLAJ\TD EASTER RALLY

I

CLUB CAPTAIN'S TOUR 2005

SATURDAYRally and Social evening

and meal

ITINERARY= Assemble in Oamaru= Cromwell= Cromwell= Balclutha= Gore= Gore= Dunedin= Dunedin= Moeraki/Hampden= Waimate

Methven= Methven

Tuesday 5 AprilWednesday 6 AprilThursday 7 AprilFriday 8 AprilSaturday 9 AprilSunday 10 AprilMonday 11 AprilTuesday 12 AprilWednesday 13 AprilThursday 14 AprilFriday 15 AprilSaturday; 16 A

5 - 16 APRIL 2005 INCLUSIVE

Further information andrecommended accommodation available from

The Club Captain Southern Region,Diane ss, Keenans Road, R 0 2, Ashburton.

Phone 03 3082356 FAX 03 3082355email randross@xtra.co.nz

TIME TABLE

FRIDAYRegistration,Briefing and

Social gathering.

MONDAYFarewell from Clubrooms.

Parts shedopen.

SUNDAYPublic display, Concours,Field Trials Penzoil Trophy.Evening:Awards Dinner.

:JOt/{ -us t» kelf ~/eJn.,a:fe 5"0years of I/t/{ftLqe Mofoh'ltq t'lt

~o-uftt. ~fer-!F-ury J-w--t'ltq,der- ZOO5".

RallyRoutes

PIONEER 50 miles return overall sealed roads.Suitable for fragi le and slower vehicles.

COUNTRY RAMBLE Approximately 70miles oversealed roads. Suitable for later Veterans, slowerVintage cars andmotorcycles

TOURING 100 miles return over fully sealedroads covering South and Mid Canterbury.Suitable for cars and motorcycles capable ofsustaining medium speeds over these distances.

ADVENTURE Approximately 100 miles returninvolving limited off road and unsealeddistances. Majority of journey over sealed roads.Suitable for cars, motorcycles and drivers willingand capable of exploring.

CRUISING 170 miles over fully sealed roads.Suitable for those vehicles capable of sustainingroad cruisingspeeds.

CONTACT Mrs Nola Day: 88Acacia Drive, RD3,Timaru 8621.Email noladay@clear.nel.nz Phone 03 688261 7

The Horowhenua Branch of The Vintage Car Club of NZ Inc

2005 National North Island

EASTER RALLYEASTER 2005 • 26 28 MARCH

WAHGAN UI O

o

.,

Contact

Rally Chairman, Alton Harrison 06 368 3065

Rally Secreta ry, Bruce Wilde 04 904 0173, email brun oel@parad ise.net .nz

NZVCC Inc Bay Of Plenty Branch

SWAP MEET & MARKETSUNDAY 17 OCTOBER, 2004 - BAYPAC COOLSTORETotara Street, Mt Maunganui

• VINTAGE CAR DISPLAY • CAR PARTS OLD & NEW • GARAGE SALE • COLLECTABLES •

• BOOKS OLD & NEW • A MUST FOR CAR ENTHUSIASTS • FOOD • HOT AND COLD DRINKS •All catering by BOP VCC- No other refreshment stalls permitted.

Further information from Ray Singleton 07 573 65470r Ray Nitschke 07 573 9264

Gates open 7am • Seller's Vehicles & Driver 55 • All others 53 • Children Free

Invites all members, ex members and friends to help our branch celebrate its50th Anniversary over Labour Weekend 2004.

SATURDAY Noggin & Natter - meal at c1ubrooms, display of memorabiliaSU NDAY Hun ua Rally. entry forms available mid August.SUN DAY EVENI NG Celebration dinner and prize giving at Sorrento, One Tree Hill.

Join in all or part of our weekend. Look forward to seeing you .

Contact: Rally Secretary, Shaaran Price, phone 09 833 8575 , em ail: asprice@ xt ra.co.nz

For an entry form and programme of

Art Deco Weekend events contact:

ART DECO RALLY18, 19 & 20 February 2005

Hawke 's Bay BranchVintage Car Cluh

For club eligible vehicles up to and including 1945

Entry form willautomatically be sentto last year 's entrants

RALLY ORGANISERSGeoff & Dianne Quarrie

Phone/fax 06 876 4009 or email

dianeandgeoff@paradise.net.nz

or write to PO Box 3406', Napier

NINETEENTH NATIONALMOTORCYCLE RALLYCambridge Feb 11-13 2005A rminder thatwe are including a mini-swapmeet onSunday 13th. StillwaitingforyourVIC? Send your entry nowand VIC number later. Haven't gotanentryin yet? They have tobein byNovember 8th. Forms from your branch secretaryor The National Rally Secretary PO Box 924, Hamilton,

wheels trade directory • beaded wheels trade directory ••

murray @vintagerestoralion s.co.nz

eo..()Ql...-

'1:s

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Vintage & Post Vintage Restoration Work Undertaken

•

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or RAntATOR .f ~l~,!I ;'i '.rORfS tOR " . ~~ ~

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maintainthecharacter of yourcar withM originalpattern radiatorcore.11 will provideyouwithollicl.nt andreliablecooling. and properly

maintainedwilllasta lifetime. If I cannot supplyyou with Iheoriginal corepattern youneed. then I

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John Rummery. R.D.9. Whang.re l. New Ie.londFa" 164,914350-790 reI' (64·914346-330....I. gs

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deb.ian .cameron@xtra.co.nzPO Box 76

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Motorcycle & CarWire Wheel RefXJirs &Restorauons

Parrott & Son Ltdmotive instrument specialists

Specialist gauge repairers since 1946Over 75 years of combined instrument repair experience.

~ii.llI~ We Speoalrse In• • Custom Made Sookes • Speedway VVheels

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410 Gretn Road. RD 6. Palmellton North Day or Night

affordable effectiveadvertisingYou can reach your customers quicklyand cheaply byadvertising in theBeaded Wheels Trade directory.From only $55 perissue your fullcolour advert will beseen byover7,000 readers and motoringenthusiasts every issue.To find outmore contactRosalie Brown at Beaded Wheels,phone 03332 3531 oremail beadedwheels@vcc.org.nz

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. . .

_ idIe_~,-"","~

Ashburton Roger HartSpring motoring sta rts ea rly with Milner

and Jan Jam bs' Myster y Meander on 29August. With the ra the r poli tically cor rec tin vi ta tion for th is reading "So du st off th eo le girl, c rank 'e r up and bring it a long",Milncr and [an could well be in the runn ingfor job s in th e Beehi ve lat er this yea r.

This Meander will no doubt act as asha ke down for the combined run withSo ut h Cante rb ury to foll ow on 19Septe mbe r and the lat er "S pring" rall y on17 O ct oher for whi ch Peter Lam bic andG ary Hawke are hat ching plans.

T he an n ua l dinner at Rrigadoon was wellattended wit h 120 mem bers (old, new ~1l1d

some who have not made an appearance forawh ile ) and par tn ers pre sent. G uest speake rLco n ie Opako gave a very interesting andmoving talk abo ut her experi en ces and th ehard shi ps see n and ex pe rienced during th etim e she was nursing in U ganda.

A no the r an n ual event , the Au gust Qu iz,ably org.m izcd hy David Oa kIcy, this yearheld at hom e base , saw Ashburron Bran ch(which now ca n righ tfull y claim to he thekn owl edg e centre of th e plai ns) co n vinc­in gly wrest the tr oph y o ff SouthCanre rburv, Helped hy our Mastermind, BillDa rlen co rrec t ly an swering all hi s questions.Subjec t ?Cad illacs nf co urse!

G reat to see S tcve G icling h "ki ck- start"th e local mo tor cycl e section with hi s"S ho w a ll day". Twelve hik es and keenowne rs turned up with most marques repr e­sented, including a neat array of Ari els. Allinv olv ed look forward to regular gat heringsand a motorcycle resur gen ce. So it is a veryappropriate time to welc om e new memberMike A da ms with hi s 1951 and 1954 RSAsand 19 56 A40 Austi n tru ck .

Lin dsay O lscn has just rescu ed th e C h ingSpecia l from th e wild s of South Can te rhury.This brigh t yellow Ford 10 based car ha shints of C and D Type Jaguar in its sty ling(m in iatur ised of course ).

A Spec ia l Gene ra l Meeting is to be heldon 21 Se pte mbe r for discussi ons on th edraft plan for the proposed new C lubroorus.

Auckland John StokesCondo le nces to the famil y of Ross

Duncan. Ross was a ke en motorcycli stown ing a wide var iety of machines; he alsorestored an immaculate 1923 C hcv FourTourer some years ago and act ively enjoye dhi sto ric avi ation with his Tiger Moth.

Veteran: Top marks to 75 plu s year o ldBill She ars for appearing in the 1917 Moonon our rather wet and windy co mbine d runwith Nort h Sho re . Barr v Birchall is buildinga new motor house to store hi s Veterans.Georgc Mili alj cvich's 191 2 HudsonSpeedster body is co mple te and G eorge is

.1 11 1 ' 1 1

co mponents . Jim Welch's 1905 Rilev hashad th e mud guards made and the uph olsteryis being sor ted . The Ren ault charuba ncengine is heing reassembled . A llan Price 'sC lemen t Bavard is making progress in th egearbox.

PW PV: Brian So le has brought a 1973Triumph 2.5 Estate car. Forty sta rte rs set offon our P\V' PV run , a well th ought outeffort by Rod ger and Val Ball throu ghsce n ic Sou th Auckl and . Colin and PamBell in the ir 1939 C hcvro ler co upe lost on lyfourteen poi nts to win overa ll

New members: John Golics 1958 RSAA [0, John and Jean Hnrris 1957 Au stin AJ5 ,1958 Nos h Me tropoli tan con vert ible, 1960Hillrnan Minx co nve rt ible. N ils and SandyPearson 1928 Model A Ford pickup , SrnnSmith 1929 C hcvroler two door sedan , 1938Austin Big 7 roadster, 1939 Au stin 8 W,lSptourer and 1962 Ford Consul convert ible.

Mo torc ycles: Don G reen is working on a1953 Norron 88 ex the Brookes estate .Michucl W aldron is wor k ing on a 19 10Roval Enfield 21/1hp however he will haveto source a Morosococh e V twin to mak e itgo. He is a lso busy with a 1917 Day ton1156cc V twin and a 191 2 C lyno . He is a lsogo ing to at te nd Projec t Walk in Californ iato assisr hi s recovery from th e injuries hesuffered en route to a rally some yea rs ago.Ski Massey has almos t complet ed a 1927RSA 770cc V twin ex th e A rthur Se n nEstate and Garv Wald ron has fin ished a1953 LE Velocertc.

Bay of Plenty [irn WebbThe mid -winter rall y on July 25th saw a

good turnout o ( fift een ca rs gathe r a tWaipun ,1 Park . T heir destinati on was th earea wh ere 'Riding for the Disabled' ta kespl ace. A video was sho wn .m d a livedemonstration gi ven. Both pro ved ve ryint eresting and with th e magni ficent viewfrom th e top of Reid 's Road combined withth e goo d Bay of Plenty weather a ve ryple asant af ternoon was passed by a ll.

O ur A ugust monthly meeting ende dwith an addres s by Ati ria Arrnstron g, theManager of \X!omen '~ Refuge in Taurangu,wh o en lighte ned us wi th th e tri als andtribulati ons co n nec ted with ad min iste ringsuch an insti tution . \V'e were impressed .

The mid -week out ing on A ugust 11thtook us in to Waikat o's winter wh ere aneager group visite d the O koroi re Hotel andgo lf cou rse for an a ll da y programmeorgan ized by Jack Hov en and Jenni . Therewas golf for th e go lfe rs, Fren ch cric ke tplayed to suit the not so spr igh rlv, walks inrhe forest for th e walk ers and even hotpool s for th e swimmers plu s a mid dayluncheon . Ther e were some wide-eyedstares at a st rong presence of police ca rs at

1 'T'I

idl I •

to be a semina r in pro gress - a rally with ad ifferen ce.

The an n ua l pr ize giving dinner, soc ialand dance in mid A ugust with manymembers wearing clothes of th e era of the ircars was ind eed a won der ful cele bra tio n ofthe past yea r's eve n ts . O ur MC wasPresident Ray wh o in the absence of a packof card s reverted to spin n ing an empty bee rbottle to sing le out the winners of th eMonte C arlo . The ladi es, bedecked in th eirfinery lcnr co lour, ghlmo ur and spar kle to

this soc ial. Kurhy and Tom Wood won the'C oiffur e and Costume Compet it ion' andth ere were many othe rs wh o also deservedth e hi gh est prai se for th ei r trouble andeffo rts. The bea ut ifu l jewell ery, headbandsa nd ga rb guvc ,1 tou ch of Las Vcgusni ghtclub life. The swing-a long hand andTom 's enterta inmen t add ed sc int illat ion toa mem o rable even ing .

So me thi rt y trophies were lin ed up at aspec ia l tabl e fo r di stri but ion and wer epresented in th e usual manner amid cheers,hig smiles, handshakes, flashli ghts ,111d a kisso r two. O ve rseas trips and win ter ill saccounted for some abse nt ees . To name justa few winners: the Duggins , Les and Helencoll ect ed five in all - a boor full it see med:th e Concours went to lan Roll s with hi s1960 MG A while th e keen est mem ber thisyea r we n t to G le n Nitsc h ke (1 9 51C hcvro lcr) - well done G len!

O n 22 August our Garage Run began <It

th e Pycs Pa H all wh ere upward s of fifty carsassem bled . So me Vetera ns up to a qui etmention of mod ems! Bob H yslop ca me inhi s newl y rest ored 1957 Austin Healey100/6 Sports ca r. The fin ishe d strca mlinc r isH credit to him. First ca ll was to O wcn an dMuru arcr Goldsm ith 's ga rage whi ch th eyopened up to show us th eir veh icles. Theseincluded an A A Ford truck , a DaimlerDrop hcad , a Dodge Tourer of rhc twent ies,a 19 35 Plymou th Coupe to nam e a few. Inall, some very interesting restorati on s andmechanical work in pro gre ss filr VC Cmembers.

Moving on a few miles to 1van andYvonnc A lleu 's sta ble to sec some magni fi­ce nt Veterans lined up in th eir o n road statewhile three or four stood by sho wing th equa lity of their pr ofessionul rest or atio n ,e ven tho ugh there would he many morehours of TLC to see th em completed .Yvonne impressed th e ladi es with he r fineco llec t ion of doll s.

Next po rt of ca ll was the Te PukeA utoha rn wh er e o ld cars are seen andloved . Paul S ing le to n expla ine d , to th edozens a rriv ing, st a t ist ics of many o ldmodels - o ve r one hu ndred heing o ndispl ay, terrific prese ntat ion . Inside viewingwith showers f~J1ling outs ide W <lS a treat for

serv ed and our thanks go to Ray and AnnNitschke for their or ganizing and hardwork .

Canterbury Tony BeckerJul y's mid -winter A nnual Ball used to be

THE soc ial event of th e year, however mostrecent years have been poorl y suppor tedwhen measured aga ins t th e tim es that thi seve n t had been so ld out in advance . Thistrend may well see th e disappearance of th eBall a ltoge the r if so me th ing doe s notch ange. It is very discouragin g to dedicatedorg anize rs like John an d Sy lv in Bart ler t,who turned on such a wonderful evening forth e be ne fit of o n ly 80 members out of ourgrowing membership of way beyond 1100.

Unfortunately the trend does no t sto pthere. Member participa tion in man y ofo ur motoring even ts too seems to be agro wing concern, exam pled by 2004Restorat ion of th e Year Rall y on whi ch JUSt20 vehicl es appea red and three lonelyentries. We as members need to th inkmore support ive lv if we wish to ret ain o urclub's rnot iva rors ' interest .

No w th at that is off th e chest , we ca nlook at th e events that did win support.

\Vinter annuals included the mo tor cyclerun to Hunmer via C heviot ami Leslic Hill sand apar t from a number of punctures andth e odd mechanical misad venture this was amuch enjoyed and well suppo rted ou tin gattracting abo ut 30 motorcycles, including acouple of th ree wheelers.

The Winter Picnic Run was also reason­ably well suppo rted give n the time of year,aga in about 30 cars, not a ll of them vecvehicles had a pret ty good day out withplenty to chat about .

Back in Jul y the 9-90s celebrated mid­winter at th e Barn in front of a roaring firelit ea rly by organ izer John Kui pers. Anumber of young famil y members togetherwith their parents and grandparents had alovely meal , the creat ion of many hands,being a BYO co llect ion of vari ous rust les!

Als o, a co uple of birthda y boys werece remo n iously presen ted with lovel y ca kescourtesy of our lead er, who happ ens to be aprofes sional baker! Surplus dishes of th eBYO good ies found goml appe t ites am on gth e Parts crew who soo n dem oli shed th eseat their afte rnoon nosh .

Another well -attended act ivity is theC ante rbury Branch Nogg in and Natte rnight and th e A ugust one was no exception .A lways a feature of interest is th e displayo rgan ized by Ne il Coope r, and A ugustnoggin was graced with Restoration of theYear winner s. Errol S mi th 's beaur ifullvrestored Ford Veteran and Colin Rue'shandsom e Buick.

The Hi gh Tea run this yea r tra velled

so me of the new est mult i-million dol larhou sin g estates to th e north of th e city.Abour 50 people in around 20 ca rsatt ende d .

Bran ch sta lwart Colin Rae is researchingmaterial for a book he is to writ e soo n,about th e Can te rbury Branch 's 50 yearshi story. He invites relevant input and infor ­mation with ph ot ographic support whe repossible.

Eastern Bay Of Plenty Sue MooreLife has been a little uncertain ove r the

past few weeks in rhe Eastern Bay withincessant rain, flood s, slips and earthquakesbut most of our Branch even ts have goneahead as usual.

Our Jul y C lub run saw 10 cars and abo ut20 mem bers and friend s meet at Matuta fora trip over th e Manawahe hill s to Rororu a.O ur destination was th e Tc Amoran gimuseum at Holdcns Bay. This quaint folkpark was founded by the late ArthurSheward to displa y his co llec t ion of ove r8,000 ar te fac ts, but has been added ro overthe lasr 50 years and is well worth a visit.We had a pleasant picnic lun ch with someof the members of th e Rotoru a \Ice beforem<tking the journey hom e.

We have had a co uple of interestingspea kers ar our last two C lub nigh ts, th efirst of who m was Rod Brayshaw wh o gavemembers a grea t insigh t inr o "emissionstest ing," "vehicle identification card s" and"how best to trac k down the history of yourVintage cars." O ur July guest speaker wasJohn Carte r from Kaweruu , who , aft erlosing th e use of hi s legs at a very earl y age ,h <IS surm ounted numerous hurdles to go onto lead an act ion packed life includingriding mo tor-bikes and racing go-carts !Amazing what you can do in life if you havethe righr att itude !

Far North Dave DuirsThe Moll oy Trophy run proved to be a

stunne r - we had fantasti c warm sun nyweather, so me rwcuty cars a nd guestNational Man agement Comm ittee memberBob Ballantvnc and his cha rm ing wife. \X!emet at rhe Taraire Warer G arde ns south ofKaco for an introdu cti on to whar would bea great place ro visit in rhe summer.

Our compet it ive tour rook us throu ghfarming co un try out to th e coa st pastMatauri bay and on to Te Nga ire Bay for aprol on ged sto p on th e beach for a lazy hourof cam arad erie , before co nt inuing along th enewl y sealed to urist route past Tauran ga Bayback dow n to Whangaro a harb our and th enewly co mp leted parking spot on th ewater 's edge . Ru n sheers dul y handed in, th elazy run back to Doubtless Bay and th eC lubroo ms brought th e day to an end with

Wool lam s in th eir Bro ugh were th ewinne rs!

The ne w monthly meeting format with anon-bu siness feature to co ncl ude theevening had "t ime pieces" as the to pic andJohn C risp , Robin Park er and RoscoPennell brou ght a lo ng so me inter est ingcloc ks and wat ches.

The ne xt meeting was devot ed tohelping folk to o rganize their V1C cardswith th e assista nce of our registra tio n team

The Annual Dinner at the Taipa BeachResort , organ ized by the C risps, saw fo lkdressed in the peri od of their ve h icle s.There wer e some ve ry fine outfi ts withMargare t and John Wall ace and Phyllis andJohn C risp be ing vo ted joint winner s.Robin Par ker was rewarded for being first topurchase h is ticket . President RoscoPenncll and C apta in N aomi Ma sonpresented annua l troph ies:

\\!oollallls with Mollo)' Hall)' Trophy

Above and below FNVCC Anmwl Dinner

idle ,

Molloy Rally TrophyWarwickand Penny Woollams

Brian Parker Memorial Rally, PointsTrophy and Matthews Bras TrophyJune and Murray Baird who unfortunately wereunableto be present asthey toured the land of Oz.

Mothers ' DayTrophyLyn and Mike Pooley whowere also overseas!

Clubman of the YearColleen Brownlie

The Winter W ander Rall y was enjoyed bya small gro up sta rt ing in Kaitaia and travel ­ling "ou t west" to Ahipara and back over thehill s to a look in at Mason's Panelbeaters tovie w some exotic restorati ons.

As the weather wa rms up, we have hadsome very co ld days recently with frost tothe wate rs edge, o ur n ew tea m h aveorga n ized so me in te resting and di ffe renteven ts. Do n't forget to pen cil in 8 January2005 for our annua l C lass ic C ar Show andA utoj umble , an abso lute mu st for anyoneplanni ng to co me north of \Vhangarei inthe N ew Year.

Glsborne Rodney ClaqueWe h ad the p lea sure of welcoming

North Island C lub C apta in Rob Knight andhi s wife Pat to {JUl' Jul y cl ub nigh t. Theyhad attende d the Rotorua S wap Meet theprevious wee kend a nd t ruve led throughG isborne on the ir way home. Rob gave a nexcel lent overvi ew of the club and broughtus up to date on the many happenings go ingon in the background that a re not norma llyseen by the average member. The previouseve n ing he had add ressed the newl y formedcommittee to run the Easter Rall y here in200 7 and gave them some helpful hints.

The Rotoru a Swap Meet was so mewh atof a wash out for our members, with theearl y bird s making it the re a ll right , buthaving to return home the long way viaTaupe and N api er bec ause of the floodingin the Eastern Bay of Plenty area . O the rsgot strande d in Opot iki overn igh t , slee pingin the ir ca rs to allow ev ac uee s from ne arbyareas to make full use of the facili ties a t theWa io ka Marae.

O ur an n ua l dinner was held on Jul y 24with abo ut 40 people sitt ing down to <Inenjoyable meal at the local RSA. Thefoll ow ing d ay was our Ladi es Run organizedby Lynsey Bartle rr. Ni ne ladi es took part ,fo ur drivers, th ree naviga to rs and two backsea t passengers out for a ni ce dri ve . The runwas won by Doro thy Hopps in her 1966Morris 1100 . It ha s been encouraging tohave t he company of Mike Little and GailMenzies from Wa iroa a t our monthly runs,with G ai l raking seco nd place in this run.

A gro up o f ve hi cles from her e is toco nverge on H awkes Bay for the weekendof Se pt emb er 10 - 12, taking in LesLern mon's mu seum at Puketi t iri and the

as view ing a co llec tion of o ld ca meras an dmovie eq uipme nt.

The Hawk es Bay Safa ri visit to Gisborneat Labour Weekend is ga theri ng momentumand I believe there are a good n umber ofen tra nts al read y list ed .

Prep arati ons for the 200 7 Easter Rall y inG isbo rne are und erway with the for mationof a rall y com m ittee of 10. Alread y thevenue h as been booked , and wi th thenumber of hotels an d motel s be in gconstructed the re sho uld be no sho rt age o fbeds when the t ime co mes .

W c wel come new member s Mi chaelWhite and C hr ista Will iam son with the ex ­Tonv N otting 1926 Pontine, Da ve and [ an etH all with a 195 5 Morris Minor, and M ikeand Kay Allen with a 19 29 HupmobileCen t ury 6.

Gore Ron OsborneIn May the A n n ua l Night Trial took

pla ce in the for m of a scavenge r huntaround our Wiper advert iser 's prem ises. Achallenge to remember wh o and wh ere theya ll were. Finishing back at the clubrooms toview some o ld movies of th e G o re area .This was foll owed by a great po tluc k supper.

The Ladi es Ru n was held in indiffe rentwea ther and also to ured around the to wnwith a qu esti onnair e to fill in on thi ngso bserved o n the way. Than ks to MarilynProctor for organ izing th is and goo d luck toLynda Mill er , th e winner, wh o will organ izenext yea rs eve n t .

C los ing Day Run on 4 Jul y in vol ved atrip via Kaiwera, Waipahi to C lydeva le andon to Tuapeku Mou th with a trip ac ross theClurha River by punt. From the re it was o nto the C lvdevale Commun ity H all wh erewe were joined by the So uth O rago Brunchfor lun ch and field tests . The weather wasgoo d which helped to make it an enjoyableda y ou t.

The Annual Dinner was held on Saturday17 July with forma l dress. There was a goodturn out and an old t ime dan ce band wh ichall made for a wond er ful evening . GerryKennedv was presented with a 3 5 yr badge .G rae rne English , Ray Harv ev and RussellBraden a ll received th eir 25 yr badges.

Trophy winners on the night wereBeginners Paul CorcoranOpening Run Barry C1earwaterMost Rallied Vintage Ken Youngson2nd Most Rallied Vintage Neil McVicarMost Rallied PWV Russell Newland2nd Most Rallied PWV Cordon DiackMost Rallied P60v Murray ProctorBest Presented Veteran/Vin Evan HendersonHouse convenors Trophy Brian NeilsonClub Captains Trophy Betty Clearwater

The Dunedin Aurospecracul ar this yearwas held on 10 July in the Edga r Spo rtsSt adium. This event is more nf a ca r show

whe re on e can purchase ca r parts et c. Bei ngan ind oor even t it has bec ome ver y popularo ver the yea rs.

C o m ing events in our area are , a GarageRa id co m b in ed with South land Branchmem bers in the Gore area. Our OpeningD ay Run u n 19 September , and theAlexandra Blosso m Festival Rally on 25September which is followed by a SwapMeet on the 26 September at the c lubroornsin Cromwell.

Sad ly on e of our o lde r members passedaway on 29 Ju ne . H e was Jack Davidson , amember of our branch fro m the ea rly 1990suntil the ti me o f h is death. Jack was aret ired farme r wh o h ad restored a barrelnosed Fo rd V8 tru ck which at one stag ehad been in use on his farm . The branch'scondolences go to hi s wife Pearl and fam ily.

Hawke's Bay Rod McKenzieEven though it is usu all y q u ie t for

Vin tage motoring in the winter months,the re has st ill been plenty of activ ity inHawke's Ray. In Jul y 25 veh icles lined up totake part in the "Deco Deca nted" day o ut inN apier , and most of the passengers wer eappro priat el y a tt ired too. In A ug ust amyste ry run had ove r 20 ca rs enjoy ing asun ny day o ut visiti ng some interestingplaces, incl ud ing one of our members wh oh as a surpris ing co llect ion of a ll manner o fth ings from a very ea rly militar y collectionto te lep h one s, a nd a two he aded lamb,whi ch met a tax idermist many vears ago.

The Au gust monthly meeting was held inCentral H awk e's Bay and ove r 60 peopl eturne d out for a meal before the me eting.This has bee n an annua l ritu al for some yearsan d was orga n ised th is year by R,ly Brook er.

New me mbers are st ill co m ing on boa rd,and one jo ined up rece ntly wh o had on lypurc hased the car the day before, had dri venhack to Huwke's Bay and was keen enoughto bring it out the next day. G reat st uff!

A day was h eld a t the clu brooms to

prepare a nu mb er of the me mbe r's ca rs fortheir VI C . Fo rt y app lica t io ns wereprepared that morn ing and t he ad m in ist ra­t ion sta ff were flat out processing them. 1tce rta in ly is wor thwhile for t he committeeto arra nge th ese things wh en they ge t thatkind of suppo rt .

C o m ing ev ents incl ud e a motor cycleRall y put on by G lyn n C lemen ts. We havenot had o ne for some yea rs a nd I am toldth ere is a good ent ry for the day .

O th e r co m ing e vents include theA n nua l Sa fari this goi ng to G isbo rne atLabou r weekend , and the Annual VeteranRall y and H omest e ad Run in lateNove mbe r.

The C H B crew are arra ngi ng a "Daffod ilRun" in ea rly Septe mbe r to a couple ofwell-k nown places, and will a lso be staginga "N ight Tri al" in Oc to be r abo ut the time

1973 VB Rover1965 Vanden Plas

Keep in mind the "A rt Deco" eve nt inFebruary. It again promises to be a grea taffair! And thi s year it is supposed to be fine!

Manawatu Robyn CorpeAt th e July C lub night Adrian Broad

from The A roh anui Ho spice gave us anexcellen t insigh t in to the workings of th ehospice.

The annua l Brass Monkey Rall y washeld on 19 June. As usual it was darkresulting in a few navigat ors giv ing thewron g direct ion s. Allan Hard acre mad e itrather d ifficult with sheets of instruc t ionsand ano the r two sheets of quest ions. To gofrom insrrucr ion s to quest ion s in th e darkwith the driver co mpla in ing about the lightin his eyes made for fun and games. Passin gover the Sadd le Road we saw all th e newwind tur bin es being erected hy Mer idianEnergy. From Wood vill e on it was back­country roads to Pahi arua whe re we had avery nice d inn er at the Tararu a C luh. Afte rmore da rk nar row roads eve ryone returnedvia th e Pahi ar ua Track (0 th e cluhroom s forsupper and prize giving. G reat fun thanksfor All an and Brian Burrough and of co urseTail -end C harlie Ste ve Brigh t.

Results1 Roger McLeod2 Don Dennis3 ChrisButler &: Robin

Simpson, Wellington 1960sBorgward4 Trevor &: Sandy Hardy 1972 MGBGT

The H ard luck Prize went to RoyHaywood for having no lights in his 1939Dodge . Bad luck for Roy who has been ou rvery a ble C lub Capta in until rec ently.Ge rald White, our librari an . has so ld hisFord V8 and purch ased th e ca r of hi sdream s a 1967 VC Valiant pictured on th ecove r of th e Jul y Tourer. Dian e, his wife,owned an A30 many years ago and afte rsome gentle persuasion G era ld agreed to

tra iler home from Tauran ga a bright Kell yGreen A35 in need of some T LC for her.N ow with a W O F "S ha rnus" will provideman y happy miles for Gerald and Diane .

Welcom e to new members Peter Lea withhis Morri s 1000 from Pahi arun and to KevinWoodward from Palmerston North. Kcvinhas Fords - a Model A and a 19.3 4 V8 truck.

Al istair Howard's art icle in th e Au gustTourer was about his long search for hisfather 's 1928 Essex Coach . This vehicle hasbeen finall y found bur not for sale so A listai rhas purchased a 1928 Essex 2 Door Conch.

Horowhenua Peter &. Shona NightingaleMargarer and Derek Ran som organ ized

th e Jul y Sunday Run, which saw about 25peo ple travell ing to Waikanae to see BillPvnc's co llec t ion of Minis and I lOOs. Allveh icles were well presented , some resto redand o thers o riginal.

BillShauky inS/Jeering his motor on rJle Austin Six

Just ac ross the road to a displ ay ofJaguars, Rovers, Morris 10s Wolsele ys etcmainl y 1960 and 70s . A ll in beaut ifulcondi tion and belonging to Ra y Savage. Ave ry in ter esting afte rnoon, wh ich wasenjoyed by a ll.

The Au gust Sunday run was a garage raidto Foxton. Our first sto p was at VatO'Leary's to sec his 1922 Essex Roadsterand 1918 Essex tourer. Then on to Mik eKhul l's to view progress on the 192 7C hrysler 70. A ll present were invited toexp ress an op in ion o n th e co lours for uphol­stery and hood. I don 't kn ow if it was ofmuch help to Mike. We the n headed forIvan Benge's shed where his 1927 Britishtruck is ready for fina l pa inting. Me mberson thi s trip tota lled 45 .

We not e th at Bill and Putricia Shatrky's1928 16/6 Au st in O pen Road Tour er wh ichth ey have owne d since 1968, is mobi leaga in after an engine removal to find andcor rect a mis-shaped part in the timingcha in ten sioner, This problem manifesteditself by a llowing th e cha in to goco mpletely slack and cl imb over thecamshaft sprocket teeth with consequentvery late valve timing.

Nelson June CampbellJu ly C lub run was a sun ny but co ld

afte rnoon's mot oring around the Waim eaPlains for th irty vehicles. Geoff C lark wasamused when he travelled th e distance andended up having afternoon tea over th eroad from his hom e. Tim McDowell askedth e question "How man y of the ca rs out onth e run noticed how much better theengines ran with fuel not vaporising, givingmore power on the cooler days especiallywith a sleeve valve engine !"

The A ugust Annual Snow Run was toLake Roroiri, a turno ut of sixteen ca rs inlight ra in. Everyone looked forward to th eprospect of sno w but heavy rain and windthe night before was ev ident with t hest rea ms running at full force and so mesurface flooding. But th e sun came out an dso did the sandflies.

Nelson Branc h enjoy meeting up wit h

idle

ca tc h up w it h so me keen A usti ne er sfro m Blenheim , name ly Sue and AndvD it rne r, Lew Wad swo rth a nd ' ou r(ex Iow u ' John W h ite .

The officia l open ing of the newTransp ort and Mili tary Museum too k placeat th e Pigeon Valley Steam C om plex on 8A ugust and fro m what I hear, a ve rysuccessful day was enjoyed by a ll. I haveheard it said th at it was like a big reuni onfor a lo t of peopl e. This ven ue is well wort ha visit for travell ers to the Ne lson area .

Branch stalwart and Model T enthuth iastNea l Dome is at present in hospital and byth e time this issue goes to print, we hope heis well on the way to recov ery.

Northland AustineerIn the last few months we have had

Rall ies and Lookins with good support frommembers. O ur membe rs survey resul ts weresupp orted by the num bers attend ing the lastLookin when we had 30 supporters.

O ur last clu b mee ti ng was a SpecialGenera l Meeting which brought a breath ofnew life to the Branch . We decided on a newdirecti on for ex tra club revenue which wasun animously supported by th ose present.

Even ts coming up include Fathers DayRun , Swap Meet on 18 Se ptembe r(N a tio nal event ), Ladi es Run 10 O ctoberand of co urse th e Far N orth Tou r 6 - 7Novembe r (National even t ).

It is great to see so many membe rs awayon ra llies mixing with o the r Branch eve n ts.G reat stor ies and many new ideas comeback to our Bran ch . This is also a way to

mee t and make friends. I st ill co n tac tfriends made on th e 1978 InternationalRall y in Au strali a.

To end on a sad note , we lost a muchrespec ted and ha rd working member, VernFa irbro rh er who at 88 years was st ill a verybusy me mbe r. A gre at loss to our grou p.A n obitua ry for Vern appea rs e lsew he re inth is issue .

Otago Arthur BennettO ur commisera t ions to Nort h Island

members who have suffered co ns iderabledifficulties with th e vaga ries of the weat herpatterns and th e hear tache that has beencaused . John C oomber representing th eNational Man agemen t Comm it tee visite dour Frida y N oggin and Natter rec ently,explaining th e committee's functions as wellas tha t of th e Nationa l Office. He presentedhis mat erial well and answered problemque stions to the sat isfact ion of the enquirers.

The 50 th celeb rat ions were conductedwith crowds, hilarity, joviality, grea tweather and sat isfied custo me rs from th ePart s Department.

Recently we ret urn ed a visit from NorthOra go members, 36 of us travelled by busdriven by member, Ralph Harr ison . North

O tago turned on a warm reception for us, wesoo n had our cams and jerseys o ff. They ha vea n ice friendly c lubroo ms a nd atmosphe re.Severa l Otago-itc s fou nd th e Parts S h edsat isfied thei r immediate wants fur projectsin hand. After seve ra l hours che wing the fa tere we left fur the South full o f tu ck er for thejourney. Dun cdi n is 80 odd miles fromOamaru with plenty of hills in bet ween .

W e held a public d isplay recentl y ofve h icles photograp hs, ea rly a ids fa

mo toring , hub/gr ease ca ps a nd o urLocorn obile up to it s presen t po int o fconstruct io n . This pr omp ted en qui riesabout o ld da ys witho u t proper roa ds .Inte rest was a lso e xpressed in joining theV C C fro m car o wne rs wh o wan ted tobecome members. The venue was in theC o m mun ity Roo m of th e Art Galle ry nearthe Octagon. Ba rry Longst affe sudden lyfound a read y buye r for hi s Triu mphMnyflower which is a n ice little cl assic ca r.Di n ny S h rim pro n says h e is go ing to cher ishit.

O ur P60 v ra lly had e igh t eli gibl e ve h iclesplus 12 o ther cars out for th e a fte rnoon run .Afte r a sho rt run arou nd to wn it was ove rThree Mil e Hill with so me snow Llyingabo ut a nd o n to the Tiucri. Pro ceeding outof O urrnm hcuvv sn o w sh o we rs sta rredco m ing from the South, coa t ing everythingin sight. \YJe had to de tour from the plan ne droute du e to th e co nd it ions a nd fini sh ed therun at Gcorgc a nd Marjorie Martin 'sresidence in Mosgiel. The o ve rall win nerwas Ray and Ma rion C ra ig in a not mad e inAme rica , A ustra lia , En gl and or o t he rEuropean co untry mo to r vehicl e . The P60vwinner was John Noble in h is Mu stan g. Agrea t a fternoo n run with a few mil es to hoot ,c harged up rh c burrcrics.

En t ries now wan ted (or th e 2004 Tai eriTour.

Rotorua Doug GreenRor o rua Branch had a successfu l swa p

meet a lt hough the takings we re do wn ab out25 pe r cent a nd the day was ver y we t a ndco ld . The ce nr c r of the race cour se wasclosed beca use of flooding a nd all parki ngwas o ut o n th e ro ad sid es. The weurhe rcl eared arou nd lunchtime and pe oplesta rt ed to st rea m in hut by 2.30 pm. a ll whohad bee n there since six were cold, wet andsta rre d to go h o me .

O ur Branch has put up a fence round thec lubroorns beca use o f bo y racer s sk idd ing o no ur lawn a nd firing mud up the wall s. \YJeh av e a lso had ou tsiders using o ur ramp tochange e ng ine o il a nd lea ve th e resulrunrmess for so meone else to cl ean up . Than ksto the co m m ittee a nd th e fencer, a goo d jo bhas been co mp le te d a nd it looks grea t .

This mo n th's garage run is to TaurungaBra nch as we know they hav e a lot ofhidden t reasu res and this run is alw ays a

O n the restoration scene , Gruham Boneis in rhc middlc of resrorl ug a 1947 Fo rJ 10.It is ge tt ing c lose r as the year goe s by.G rulia m is making a good job of this car a ndjudging by his past restor ations th is sh ouldlook great. Keep up t he good work Bones.

John Mayhew is in the fina l sta ges o frestoriu j; another mo torc ycle from groundup am i this will shar e hi s gar age with th ebeauti full y resto red Dragonfl y. Bill Skeltonhas th e e ng ine o ut of hi s A ust in 7 C h um mya nd is giv ing it a new lease on life withpisto ns , va lve s ctc a nd soo n it will bezipp ing aro und agai n .

At last, a fte r a long hun t, I h av epurchased the cor rect engi ne to co mple temy Gruharn Puigc co nverti b le four door.The eng ine ne ed s a full rebu ild and a Jiff.

In my wor k I sec man y o lde r cars co m ingour of th e woodwo rk to be restored for thefuture from ea rly 19 24 C hevrolers right up tosixt ies H oidens Fords et c . A lso some rarear my sur plus veh icles, Ford and Jeep brands,a 194 0 Do dge ex army carryall and a 1941gun carry ing Do dge pick up. Bot h ve h icle sra re and ir will he goo d to sec them fini sh ed.

Ph il Mcnzics a nd G a i A rmo ur h av epurchased a 1947 For d [ailbar p ick up ro gowith rh e 1947 Ford Coupe. Bo th ar e inmint co nd it ion and will ger mu ch use o ve rthe sum me r months. 1r is good to see newvehicles co m ing out o f she ds a nd joiningra llie s, as the Vintage sce ne is becomingve ry modern with many peo ple wantingpowe r steering and hea ters.

We hav e been in v ited to Tc Kuiri forthei r ce nte n n ia l ce lebra t ions in N o vemberto jo in in rhe C en ten n ia l Pa rade . Th issh ould be i l grea t week e nd , a nd thank yo uTe Kuiti (or letting us cel e bra te 100 years inth e heart o( th e King Coun try.

O ur next interesting rall y will be theJourney Through Time in Ta um urun u i,v isiti ng the o ld sc ho o ls in the di stri ct.

A reminder that th e 2006 Jubilee ra lly inln vercargill will creep up amI bit e us before weknow it , so keep up th e work on th ose cars.

Southland Paul RodmellThirt v-four (fool') hardy souls in 12 cars

lin ed up at th e racecourse gates for the Jul ymid -week run. The weather was incle me nt,tr eating the participan ts to a ha ilsto rm ju stbefore the start , and th er e was o n ly a sligh timpro vem en t for th e first par t of the run .The ru n t rave lled north throu gh Mak arew aonto the Grove Bush roa d . Ther e was so megra ve ! for a fe w miles befo re th e sea lto ward s Spring h ills; th en onto the gm velagai n to tr a vel pa st th e o lJ S no wd rift[irn cworks. T h is road was used in th e 1950sfor Spo rts Car Hill C limbs. The route ledpast th e Forest Hill C h urch tow ards Brownsand passed Tikona Lod ge - the ideal p laceto spend a few ni ghts wh en yo u wan t to ge tawa v from it a ll and h av e about $ 1,200 a

Brow ns, whe re so me found the pub stillsh u t , th rou gh C ent re Bu sh to W ill to n,wh ere a lo vely meal W;) S ser ved at theMiddle Pu b. A fte r the meal , most went tolook at the o ld Dairy Fac tory, a nd the o ldtractor s and mach ine ry there.

A well planned n ight tria l was held o nS a tu rday 24 Jul y. A s the part ici pant sarr ive d , exci te me nt gre w to ep ic propor ­ti ons as t h ey studied t he in struction /questi o ns shee ts . The organ ise rs, N ev a ndNoclenc Co urts noted th e pa rt icipants whowent into the Iibrary to find th e answers to

their q uest ions a nd immediately elimina tedthem fro m th e co mpe t it ion .

Nine brave dri ve rs a nd their ner vo uscrews depart ed fro m 7.30 pm at l -rninuteintervals to negotiate the ve ry ea sy ro ute.While rhcv we re away a ve ry tast y suppe rin the warm c lubroorns was prepa red fixtheir re turn .

The resu lts were: Driver's prize went to

Ve rdon Burson who was spo t o n in his time

keep ing. lan R idJ a nd Ru sset Keen eac h

lost o ne po int in this sect ion .N aviga to r's p rize went to Louisa Black

with no poi nts lost .O ne part icipunr a nd crew, th e EYEE's

team, were very e nt hus ias tic at the sta rt . Itwas th ou gh t rhur they left o n time, hut asth e nigh t wore o n the o rga n ise rs we reheginning ro wo nde r wh er e the y we re. Theyfin all y a rr ived 26 minutes past their a rriva lrime , wi th the dri ve r no t saying mu ch a t a ll ,bur everyo ne W<lS st il l ta lking to each otherat th e e nd of the n igh t , so it mu st hav e beenO K.

A N a viga to rs Award is heing introduced ,on a rrial bas is for the 2004-0 ~ year , withtwo see rions: Se n ior for those 16 year s ando ve r and Junior fo r those I ~ years a ndunder , to e nc o urage an d support th e harJworking, sk illed , hut unsu ng h el pers.

South Canterbury Bill WeirIn June S rua rt H arron plan ned a ll inte r­

es r ing ru n o ur rh ro ug h M uungu ri ,C a n n ingto n and then hy a va r ied ro utehack into Timuru f~ l r a late lu nch a t th eC lubroo ms. A ver y ple asan t day was h ad hya ll with a good rumour o f member s, th emost intrepid of whom we re Ke ith and JeanH opp in g in rh eir Bu ick Ra ce -Abo ut. TheRuic k S tr a igh t 8 is certai n ly a v iciouslooking beast with those after market freeflow ex haust e xtractors.

Kc irh and Jean in esk imo ga rb (or win te rmotoring . A dedicated na v igator as she doesnot have a sc ree n - not e the dr iver does!

The AG M went srno o rh ly wit h thep resen ra r ion of o ur a n n ua l re ports a n dawa rds .

Na viga to rs Trophy was presented to Va lH arron, th e C h a irma n 's T rophy fora t te nd ing o the r V C C C lub e ve n ts wa saccepted by Ngairc \XIehbe r o n beha lf of

;)(Jluh Canterbury member.l , Keith and .JeanHall/ling in their l3uick Race-AbrJ!(L

Brian. Frances and Les lrving accep ted thetrophy on beh al f of the W ednesday Teamfor the mem ber or mem ber s wh o h avecontributed most to (h e C lub over the pastyea r. France s was al so prese nted withflow ers for h e r efforts as A ss istantNe wspa pe r Ed itor as well as o t he r d ut ies.Bar ry Yares rece ived th e C h airman's Bad gefrom your scr ibe wh o congra tulat ed himand th e incoming Office Hold ers.

A 25 yr Bad ge was presen ted to KevinHeywood , a lso el igib le Guvin Ladbrook 25years and A lan Mill er 35 years.

South Otago Bill CrossO ur A n n ual meeting n ight held in June

was well at te nde d and a spec ial welc ome wasex tended to N ational Secre tar y-Treasure rJohn C oo mbcr, Re t ir in g ch a irma n TonySmit h and Club Capta in Wall y Ollerenshuwwere record ed a specia l vote of th anks for ajob well done ov er the past fo ur years.

Those ele c ted to run th e affa irs for th enext year were Joh n Cook C hairma n, KcithCollie r Se cretary, Paul McN abb Treasurerand Del ega te , lan McDona ld C lub Capta inand Librar ian , A ssistant Dav id Renron ,S p lit Rim Ed it or s S tua rt a nd N oel ineMi lnc , Commi tt ee Bill Fa lco ne r, LenBen ucrr, Pe te r Da wso n, Leon M agui re ,A lla n Budge Custod ian, Stua rt Mc Elre aSo cia l, Spa re Pa rts Ph il Sel l G raerne [arvieand Allan Budge.

O ur Branc h suppo rted th e O tag o Bran chat the ir 50t h Anniversar y on 17 July withth e fo llowing ma kin g the tr ip to Dunedin.Dean Karon 19 28 De Sow, A ngus Karon192 9 Dc Sow , Rob in McCa ll 19 36Plymo uth, [im Beebv 1937 A ust in Ruby,ra n M cDonald 19 55 Zephy r, Ma lco lmMcI ver 19 5 5 Singer, Wa lly O lleren sha w1954 MG T D, Kay McNabb 1965 Vauxha ll,Joh n Cook 196 7 Mor ris O xfor d Travel ler.Pe rcy Bur rows was all se t for the tri p but the19 28 Plymou th was de te rm ined it was notgoing to make th e 50 m ile trip.

O n Cl wonde rful sunny winter afte rnoonon 4 Jul y Branch cars ventured up th e river to

C lutha Valley to join a con tingent from theGore Bran ch for a zer together. O ur crouP

[ ar vie 1937 Pontiac . G rae rne S teel 1939C hcv rolet, Malcolm McIver 19 55 Singer,N eville King 1954 C itroen, W all yO llerenshaw 1954 MG T O, Joh n Cook 1964S inge r, S tuart Mi lne 1965 Wo lsele1', LeonMagui re 1965 Hillman , David Rento n 1966Daiml er, Bill Falcon er 1970 Rover, [oe Smith1974 Rover, Paul McN abb Valiant, StuarrMilne C apri, Rob in Benington Modern , IanMcDonald Modern, Ian Clark Mod ern.

The Branch were aga in on dut y a t theDu n edin Autospect acular and th e AnnualDi nner on 14 A ugust was prece ded by ashort run. The red books for the Vero 2006Rall y have bee n lifted from the Branchroo m ta ble and mem bers a re now booki ngacco mmo dat ion , spruci ng up th e caravanand find ing the tent in the basement .

lan McDonald has been busy send ing outthe flyer to branches invit ing entries to theClutha Ral ly on 13 N ovembe r.

I hear that t he Blue Smo ke Brigade anun offici al off shoot of the Bran ch arc nowbuyi ng up S ea gu ll outboard mo tors andorga n ising di ngy race s. I wonder if the nex tthing these enterprising fo lk will look atmay be T iger Moths.

South Waikato John LeeAs the past two mon th s have bee n ligh t

on Branch act iv it ies, I am pro vid ing a littlehi stor y of our cl ub's headquarters wh ich aresit uated a t Lichfi eld midwav be tweenPut ar uru and Tokoroa.

In 188 1 the C ambridge to Taup o Roadwas co mple ted to Waotu, so uth of Pu raruru.

The surro u nd ing land was so ld to th ePacte rc Land C o mpa ny by th e N gat iRa ukuwa . 1886 saw th e Lichfield Esta teauc t ioned and the Lich field village for me d .The Railway lin e from Tiruu to Lichfieldwas co mpleted and ope ne d. In 1886 tw o

quar ry wor ker s wh o obviously liked theirdrink ra n in to debt wi th the Lichfieldpublican . A s the local quarry had closedand as the men h ad no way of paying the irdeb t they agreed to meet the ir obligat ionby buildi ng the publican a sto ne store .Sto ne was quar ried from a nearby farm , andthe build ing erec ted alongside the hote l. Afew years lat e r, aft er the hot el had beenburned to the gro un d , a small house was tobe built on the site to retai n the licence,but until the house was built , bee r was so ld.m d serv ed in the old sto re bui ld ing .

A fter th e licence was tr an sfe rred to

Putaruru, the sto re buildi ng beca me vacantuntil in the earl y 1890 s wh en it was usedfor a short time as a pay office for the m illhand s at the Waotu sawm ill and work ers ofth e Thames Vall ey Lan d Company.

The buildi ng was agai n vacant du ringthe hard tim es of the 19205 and became arendezvo us for un employed and be cameknown as a tramp hote l. I( may not h avebeen the most comfortab le of places with a

idle . I

picked up , the tramp s drifte d away and thestore was used by rab bi te rs during th e yearsof th e rabbit boo m.

During the 1930s and early 40s ch urc hservic es wer e h eld in the Lichfield scho o lun til in 194 6 a Meth odist min ister decidedto co n vert th e sto ne build ing into a ch urch .A floor was built , th e stone wall s lin ed withwood pa nels, and one even ing in 1946 thebuild ing that 60 yea rs earl ie r had co me intobe ing bec au se two me n h ad d runk to omuch, was ded icated as an inte rdeno m ina­t io nal ch urch . The c h urc h was used byman y di ffere nt deno m in a t ions for yea rsun til o th e r bu ild ing s a ppe ared and t h eAnglica ns remained t he main use rs.Even tuall y to o , th e A ng lica ns moved to

Putaruru and the sto ne ch urch was o n lyused on spec ia l occasions.

In 19 75, the C h urch Soci ety co n tactedthe H isto rica l Trust , a nd th is build ingthought to be the o ldest sout h of Hamil ton,was leased to the Tokoroa Vintage C ar andMo to r C ycle C lub. The floor was replaced ,the hu ildi ng re-roofed , a ki tch en added andtoi let block s insta lled . In 1994 the Bra nc hwas ren ame d The So uth Wa ika to VCc.Lichficld residents la te r donated the land tothe So uth W aika to District Counc il for theuse o f the Vin tage Cc.

The buildi ng is now used regularl y by theBranch for mo nthly meetings, and th esta rt ing poin t of rall ies and outi ngs. O n 27Ju ne 200 4 , memb ers of th e VC C toge therwith th e Lichfield co mmun ity, young andold assembled together in wint ery co nd i­tion s to witness two of Lichfield's o ldest andmo st cher ishe d build in gs, The StoneBuilding and the C rea mery pre sented withh isto ric pla ques. Bot h were buil t in the 1880- 191 0 era.

Would we have the o ldest VC C buildingin NZ !

Taranaki Colin [ohn stonMem ber Ray Cook gave us a ve ry inter­

est ing talk a t th e noggi n and natter inA ugust about h is tri p to Cassino tha t he

out N ew Zealand to celebrate th e 60thann iversary of th e battle and th e eve ntua lbombing in World War Il. He had photosand souven irs that he brought back and hetold us abo ut hi s mem ori es of serving inth e war.

O ur annual mountain run to theMountain Hou se was hosted by BertaAnderson and was again very well atte ndedand by all acco unts the mulled wine wasjust as good as last year. We ha ve had midweek runs on tr ial and they hav e bee n wellsup po rted with the June one beingorga n ised by Phil and jill Franks. Membersmer at Inglewood and toured through rheback count ry roads, into and through Tararapassing th e McKee oil producti on complexwhere everybod y walked up the ste ps to thelookout. We were surp rised when a McKeeman ager turned up and gave eve ryone asma ll bottle of c rude oil.

Raew yn and Da vid Lusk, last year 'swinners, organi sed the Brick Run rally andit was a different rout e over Surf Highway45 and into th e beauti ful co un tr ysidearo und the Lusk's place. This year's winnerwas Robert and Margar et G udopp.

O n the restorati on side members havebeen busy ove r these wint er nights. N igeland Michelc Fraser in Pan cak e have a 1952C he vrolet which Nigel has been workingsteadily on for th e last year. They have hadsome of th e chrome work done to the frontand rear bumpers and found that the cost ofgettin g bum pers like thi s done emptied theback pocket by qui te a bit. N igel is doing abare metal respray on th e car so some expertpanel work was need ed , the car is beingpainted two tone and sho uld be impressivewhen fin ished. Ste v Lowe of Waitara is st illmaking steady progress on his 1927 C hevute. The C cab is on including th e tray andth e gua rds have been com pleted. Discwheels have been fitted so he can nowmov e it around . Patrick St ieller also ofWaitara is rebuilding his 1937 and 1939Dodge sedans. This will make a completeline up to go with his 1938 Dodge.

Taupo Jack HindessA major ch an ge in th e format of our

Brass Monkey Run occurred wh en wemoved from a night to an afte rnoon affair.Ab out 30 memb ers braved a cold and verywet Sunday in lat e Jun e to follow the runset by last years winners [oe and BerylRidlev, who gave us a map , a list of stree tstogeth er with some cryptic clues . It wasth en up to th e indi vidual to find th esho rtest distance to tra vel as well as topro vide th e a nswers to the clu es.Co ngratulat ions to Angela and Jeff C larkwho won the troph y whi ch carr ies with itth e obligat ion to organ ize next year's run .

At our Jul y meeting, G reg Terrill fromHamilton, brought us up to spe ed on

changes th at are proposed . During July, wehad a Sunday run down to the trouthatchery in Turangi. This facility sufferedsome dam age during th e recent flooding ofth e Tongari ro River, but ha s now beenrepaired and is open for visito rs aga in. Thevideo in the new visitors kiosk wasespec ially enjoyed.

In Augu st we had Brent Pirie along atour club nigh t. He spoke on the proposedexte nsion to the Taupe C ar C lub Racingcircuit. This was an extr emely good presen­tation and we can look forward to a .3 .5 kmc ircuit th at will be up to interna tionalspeci ficat ions. There will also be an indus ­tri al enclave specia lizing in motoror ienta ted work as well as dr iver teachingand learning facilities.

We are sad to report th e recent death ofLois Perr y who ha s been a lon g termmember of our Branch . O ur sympat hy isex te nded to Ray and his family.

Walkato Cazna PayneIn June, Rod Brayshaw from the VC C

Man agemen t Commit tee, was guest speakerat the Clu b N ight talking about th e h istoryof the Vintage Car C lub of NZ andth oughts on the futu re of the C lub.

In Jun e we had our White Owl Rallywith a brilli antly fine even ing and a turnoutof 16 cars with lots of kids and grandch il­dren roped in to being crew. Winners wereour newly transferred members, Bob andAnnette Town send.

In July Snow van den Broek ran a Quiznigh t with lots of tr ick y auto mot ive, andothe r question s - from th e road code , tonuclea r ph ysics! Our Jul y C lub 'run was ascen ic driv e to Te Aroha with a reci tal on avery rare Pipe O rgan at S t Marks C hurc h .

The Augu st club event was a run to theHu nrlv Coalfield s Museum with a goodturnout and a relaxin g dri ve through scen icback roads. There was a lot to see abou t thepast and present of the Hunrlv coal miningarea. The Au gust C lub N ight speaker wasBill Sh iells talking abou t Ae ro enginedauto mobiles.

Coming up in late August is th e annualLadies Rall y plotted by the Braddocks andpromi ses to be lots of fun with places ofint erest a long th e route to tempt the Ladyrallvists - starting at a chocolate factory ­yum! As with past years, the teams areenco uraged to co me in novel or interestin gcost ume, so th e day should be great.

Jeremy "Maxwell" Brook and Godfrey"Big IS" l.arsen arc planning a three dayBonnet s in th e Back Block s to ur inSe pte mber sea rch ing for the ForgottenWorld Highway through scen ic back roadsof the King Country.

Ent ry forms are out now for our 29thPost Vintage Rally on 3rd Oc to ber, thi s yearorgani sed by Robert and G lenys Bradd ock

open undulating count ry roads. C lasses forPV, PW and P60.

Entries and enquiries about th e 19thNat iona l Motorcycle Rally 11 - 13 February2005 are also coming in stea dily - don 'tforget to sort out th ose VIC' s in time forthi s big event.

A warm Waikat o welco me to newmembers Maril yn and Stewart France andto Dave Norrish .

Wairarapa Frances ElwinThe C asual Run, now ren am ed the

Margaret Gee Mem orial C asua l Run inhonour of Margar et who passed away onIS June 2004, was held on Jul y 4 2004.Pat Dutton , who had been organizing thi sevent with Margaret cont inued to orga n izeth e run . A great run with the morningsection travelling th rough the count ry toarrive back at the club rooms. After lunch afilm aftern oon was held , various raffles andprizes were presented including the newlypresented cup in Margaret's memory to Patfor all her cffor ts und er suc h sadcircumsta nces .

The Annual Au sti n Register rall y washeld on 15 August 2004. Although theweat her was threat ening a good turn out ofmemb ers and veh icles enjoy ed a grea t daysrall ying . Mike Low winner of th e Pet erSm ith Memori al Troph y, Mik e Marsh alfrom Palm ersron North won th e Flying Asect ion , Berni e and N athalie C hee r wonthe H on . Au stin Sect ion .

C lub n ight in July was our an nua l Ga mesEvening with the Vint age Machinery C lub.An average atte ndance from both clubs sawthe Thorneycr oft trophy go to theMachinery C lub,

A ugust cl ub nigh t C h ris S late r(Wairarapa Bran ch mem ber) gave an infonight on gett ing your veh icle ready for therally season.

Seve ra l members a re ve ry busy withveh icle restorati on s so it will be great to seeth ese veh icles coming out of their respec­tive workshops.

It is with regret that I repor t th e passingof David C h urch ill. At th e time of Dav id 'spassing he was not a memb er of th e VC C ,as he had resigned recently due to deafnessand sight pro blems. David, with wife Elaine,enjoyed man y years with the Waira rapaBran ch, in earli er years being on th ecommitt ee, organ izing rallies, and rallyingboth in the motor cycle and ca r sec t ion .

Drive well and safely.

Waltemata Keith HumphreysO ur major non- speed event each year is

th e "R'Oi lca n Rall y" organise d by thewinner of the previous year's event andsupposedly it is possible to win without

Wellington Elisabeth Smits-BrouwerA gain the Wellington Branch has had

two very busy months. The co ld wintermonths do not noticeably slow us down!The working bees have co n t inued relent­lessly and as a result th e c lubroo rns arealmos t fin ished with all th e histori c photosand memorabili a back on the walls. Mostboo ks, magazine and manu als are stackedin the new library and are being orga n ised

hot vegetable soup.Taking us over a devi ous but int eresting

route , one hundred miles lat er, we arrived atth e McNuts Ca fe north of Parakai, Here weenjoyed an exce llen t brunch and Dean,[ ane , and Kate Sa lter were winners of thequestio n/observat ion she et.

Coming even ts include an all weekend"Rusty Nuts Ramb le" in Se ptember,Pebblebrook Hillclimb in October, andC he lsea Hillclimb in N ovember

idle I I

Wanganui member, Sw Wi!.SOl1 , paintinl{ LenBrowell 's 1926 Swnclard cOl/pe.

and ind exed. No w the last big job will be tofin ish the work sho p and spare parrs dep art­ment.

In June we com peted in the Colon ialCup Rally, which used to be ca lled "T heEnd O f Registration Rally", for obviousreasons in the good old days . What asuccessful and enjoya ble event it was, andwhat a grea t turnout with over 30 veh icles!Top marks to Bruce and Fion a Bixley forcoming up with a unique "Internat ional"flavour for th e event. The cos tumes andpassports for the selected countries reallyprovided interest and added to the fun . Wevisited th e Vatican, Sco tla nd, the U n itedArab Emirates (with a she ik and a black­ve iled lad y) and Jamaica . Back at theC lubroo rns we were sto pped by Cu stomsOffi cers Sh arp & Sharp , who allowed us tu

re-enter New Zeal and . The rel atedmo toring q uest ions teste d our bra ins!C on gratulati on s to Kevin Buck and Joan naHine in the ir 1935 Ford V8, dre ssed toperfect ion an d skilful as well!

Two very sign ificant resto rati on s turnedout for judging. John Neill with his stun ning1955 BSA Golden Flash won the MunroMo torcycle Trophy. The judges could notfind anyth ing wrong with th e restoration sodocked John points for lack of o il leaks . Veryun-Brit ish! He look ed the part with hi sorigin al 1955 BSA 650 "pudd ing basin "crash helm et. The Co lon ial C up and TheSou thw ard Sa lver were won by Wilf andAl ison Milner for th ei r ten year resto rati onof th e 1927 C h rysler 60 Roadster - afabulous effort . John Neil spoke at th e Julyclu b night about his BSA restoration andWilf Milner ta lked about his C h rysler. HisGrand son Har ry Milner had received theYoung Navigator's C up during th e Colon ialCup Rally.

We had a most enj oyable Midwinter PotLuck Dinner ea rly July and we willdefinitely organise an other of th ese even ts:it is ni ce to co me together, have a drink,share a meal and cha t (not only) about cars.

Fifty-five members and partners, plus agood number of kids enjoyed th e Star GazerN ight Trial held on 24 July.The Trial sta rted

supercha rged MGJ2, at 50 .23 secs,and th ird, KevinAndrew in hisWolseley HornetSpec ial, alsodemonstrating greatverve at thehairpin.(51.68 secs).

Fin all y thereliable team ofA lan and LeeBooth put on yetano the r excel lentBreakfast Runsta rt ing at som eungodl y hour at th eA lbany Pub ,somewhat comp en ­sated by a bowl of

Wanganul Fay ChamberlainI guess ever y Branch scribe will sta rt with

the same comment, who rallies in suchweather as this? ... not us anyway. A llclubroom func tions require cars to parkoutside due to very soggy grass!

'\li e had a great sh iny part s auc t ion , th eusual fun had by all, and th e club benefitingby th e funds raised .

Behind the scenes th ough , there hasbeen a bit of restoration work going on. LenBrowell 's restorati on of hi s 1926 StandardCoupe has gone ahead by leaps and bounds,just look at the ent husiasm shown by fellowclub member Stu Wilson as he gets into th epainting. lan Cha mberlain in his retirementhas been kept pretty busy too . Many folkare making extra efforts to get resto rati on sdone for th e big 2006 Vero co ming up.

Our next club night spea ker will be fromthe n ewly formed gro up to assist C ivilDefence afte r th e Feb ruary floods. Thestor ies from th at are st ill circulating.

R'Oil Can adwnturers, Lawrence Poolman and Dean Salter in the "C" T)'/Je MG . onNinety Mile Beach late ojicraoo« ,

This yea r's event was organ ised by th every enthusiastic Max and Sh irley Belcherfrom Whangarei , and not surprisingly wasNorth land orien tated.

The weather fo rec ast was the wo rstimagin able , and we packed our yet to beused "Irishman" chains and to w rop e.Sta rt ing ea rly at Te Hana, Most entrantschose to spend the Friday ni ght atWellsford.

The maximum entry a ll go t awaywithout dr ama and followed a tortuousrout e north , as usual , much of it on looseme nd roa ds , wi th a supe rb morning teajust north of Whangare i. From there weheaded ge ne rally in a westw ard directi on ,fin all y ar riv ing a t the a lmos t unknown ,bu t delightful H oreke Pub on theHoki an ga Harbour for a splend id, if ratherlat e , lunch. Fin ally it was northward toA h ipa ra wh ere we drove onto Ninet y MileBeach for a tw enty mil e dri ve up to

Houhor a. \Vith the sun set t ing, this was amem or abl e expe rie nc e.

Wa shing the cars at th e Wagner Mot orC amp did not entirely remove the fish ysmell hovering around the ca rs as a result ofth e plentiful deposits of plankton on th eundersides of th e ca rs. A t the eve n ingdinner/p rize giving lan Bradley was bemusedto discover he had won th e event with itsattendant implicati ons. (N ever mind lan,you know the saying, "If you want a jobdon e quickly and well , ask a busy man ?")

The weather?Well it was superb too, andwe've yet to test our heavy weatherequipment. O ther part s of th e country didsuffer extreme wea the r.

With th e yet to be opened stretch of roadat Alb an y, st ill available , we were ab le tohold our third bent sprint on it thi s year andsurprisingly it still attracts a worthwhile entry.T he weather looked omino us, but hel d off(just) for all co mpet ito rs to get in plenty ofruns. FTD went to St eve Sh arp in hi sBuckler (45.29 secs) with some impressivedisplays of ca r con trol at th e very tightL_ ~_~:~ __ ~.J r\ : LL L_~ ~ _ L~._

idle

at the C lub roo ms and finished at the C arter Observat ory inWellington . Again Kevin Buck won this event. The observa to ryprovided grea t facilit ies for suppe r and prize giving . We enjoyed thePlantarium session and the oppo rt uni ty to view the moon throu ghthe 16" reflection telescop e . O ne of the hi ghlights was th e beauti­fully resto red 184 9 Thomas Cook 9" refractive tel escope thatallo wed viewi ng the rin gs of Satu rn .

Wellsford Rita jorgensenAt our June meeting Bob Ballantyn e of the Nort h Shore Bra nch

and member of the N ati onal Managem ent Comm ittee gave us 3

resume of the VCC history, defining hi s ex ec ut ive ro le an dou tli ni ng proposals for the future ben efit of the clu b. We also had avideo o f th e 1924 Troj an car, from asse mbly to roa d tra vel. A si len tmovie, ver y funn v in parts, but wh ere would we be if not for theea rly motoring pioneers.

O n Saturday 3 Jul y, o ve r 40 ve h icles asse mb led at th e Marakanamu seum on a cool windy sho wery morning to take part in ourann ual Winter Woollies Wander. We wer e tak en on a meanderthrough the beach se tt lemen t of Snclls Beach, th en across Highway1 at Warkworth a nd ou t o ve r th e Kaipar a Hills, throu ghHelensville and on to WoodhilI sch ool for a we lcom e lunch of hotsoup, sa ndwiches and ca kes. The afte rnoon sec t ion wound over ad ifferent route back to Matakana. We negotiat ed some metal roa dsbut not too bad co ns ide ring the awful wea ther we had been having.Thank you Tom and Maureen Belch for an excellent run thou ghsome of the questions definitely had a touch of Tom's quirky se nseof humour to them. [anice and John Gardner had the misfortune to

break an ax le on th eir 195 0 Ford Prefect bu t ass ista nce was soo nwith them.

At the d in ner and prize giving that evening at the W arkworthBowling C lubroorns the da y's winners were announced. O verallWinner Hal O 'Ro urke W aikato 1967 Jaguar. l sr WelIsfi.ml Briunand Vivi eune G uest who will have th e pleasure of plot ting ne xtveurs wander.

N eil C re ruer of the Nort h S ho re Branch had the on ly Vete ranca r on the run . A 1913 Ford Road srcr, After the prize giv ing yourstruly was both honoured and deli ghted to be as ked to cut theBranch's 25th Anniversary cake , made by Alma Henson andbea ut ifully iced by Rosanne , N ex t da y we enjoyed a short trip downthe Mahurangi River at \Varkworth on the S tea mboat S.S.Kapan ui. As th e vessc l on lv ca rries 20 passengers, the skippe r madethree short trips to accommodate us all on the high tide. An inter­est ing commen tary on th e river's hi story was give n. The lad ies thenwent to \Vil son House, whi ch is full of beautiful tap estry work,whil e the men inspected Paul H icks' ga rage am i wor ksh op. \Vethe n all me t a t the Wmkworth mu seum for a barbecue lun ch to

fini sh off a ver y success fu l weeke nd .A not her sh iny parts auc t ion was held at our Jul y meeting.

A maz ing wh at is brou ght out into the light. Ne il Fowl er was aga inour energe t ic auct io nee r. H e forgot hi s jesters hat this time, biddingwas brisk at t imes for a ll manner of a rticles . While it was hot workfor our auc t ioneer to sq ueeze eve n 50 cents from slow bidders forsome item s. Lors o f fun and some probably went home with th ingsthey reall y d id not need . It a ll helped to boost ou r funds.

The first day of August saw a sma ll convoy head out fro mW arkworrh to Hclen svill e. There we h ad a good sc ro ungeth rou gh two well stoc ked ant ique shops, then co nt in ued to IronPa rk ju st so ut h o f H elcnsville. W e wer e read y for o ur picniclunch as the Hibiscus Coas t enthusiast s who h ad been out on aru n arrive d to join with us. Iron Par k ha s a hu ge she d full ofmachiner y and mem or abilia . The big Perrcr ge nera t ing plant wassta rted up . It is a t wo st ro ke di esel of 85 lit res 5440 cub ic inches.f\ bit larger than a 20 2 Holden, 575 hp at only 600 rpm . Theladi es wer e glad to ge t aw ay from t he n oi se and wander ed. 1 l-, .ko C• .t., I.

obituaries

l:0rnan ArthurFairbrother

North-lan d Brancli20 Felmwl )' 1916 - 8Jlll), 2004

A large number ofVin tage Car C lubmember s ga the red o nWednesday 14 Jul y to

far ew ell a longsta nd ing member wh omade a lasting impres­sion on so man y.

Vern a nd Barbar acame in to Northlandin the late I960s, firstse t tl ing in Kaitaiawh ere he ran a motel,and then building anew one at Taipa. Hewas a lso the C le rk of~lorks for th e Northland H ospital Board , whi ch position heheld un til he retired in 1988. It was abo ut this t ime h e andBarbara became interested in the Vintage Car C lub and be ingthe person h e was Vern became involved in the organ izing sideof events. W he n he an d Barba ra moved to W hangarei to

oversee the hospital expan sion in th e ea rly 1970s they wereve ry co mm itted to the development of the club; whi ch a t thattime was planning to find c lubroo ms, He became the driv ingforce for bo th th e Iund ra ising and the build ing of the co mplexand o nce he h ad achieved this goa l, he then wen t on to put hi sene rgy in to th e developme n t of the Heritage Par k. Ve rn wasC ha irma n of Nort h land VC C Branch for e igh t yea rs, and duringt h is time no t o n ly had the build ings go ing up around us, but a lsoh ad us holding Nat iona l Eve n ts such as a Na t ional AG M , 100Years of th e Motor C ar, plus the 1977 Parli am entary Tour andlOO Year of the Tractor Tour from Wellingron . The local ralliesgo t plenty of a t tent ion too, with the Far Nort h Tou r be ing oneof h is developments, and [he Waitangi Han gi anoth er.

The restoration of his to rical vehicles of Northland wer e alsopar t of hi s dri ve and mem bers worked every ~lednesday even ingrestoring these veh icle s whi ch now mak e up the dub co llec t ion.Hi s own ve h icle s were beginning ro multiply ,IS well. H eimp orted hi s 1936 Ch evroler S pa ns roadster and th e 1922Merallurgique to ure r to keep co mpany with hi s 1926 Oaklandtwo door sedan and the 191 8 Ca lcott roadster, He and Barbaraattended many ra llies in N ew Zealand and Austra lia .

A s the Club grew he nurtured the groups in the outer areas ofNorthland until rh ey were strong enough to form a new branc hThus were dev eloped W ell sford and the Far North . WhenBarbara died sudd en ly in 1985, he moved hi s attention s to wardsth e de ve lopme nt of Heritage Park and since then, his ende av­ours h ave seen the park become place for a ll th e di strict to

enjoy.A sincere , honest gent lema n wh o will be remembered for

man y years .] A Shaw

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