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This week
Car collection - an Obsession or Passion or Both.
Some ten cars collected by Rotary members friends were presented in the car park at Eastern Golf Club before the meeting began to give members an idea of how the concept of collecting cars can vary. Most were of the park in the shed variety which are brought out a few times a year for exhibition. A Mark 1 Jaguar 3.4 litre with gleaming chrome wire wheels and rear wheel cutouts (an expensive option in their day) was an example of a car that the owner may prefer not to get wet, for example. Sports cars - two Mercedes SLs, an MGB, a Riley 2.5 litre drophead convertible (the roof folds like a pram on the rear of the car) and a full on sports-racer, a Lotus 7, were on show with a 1960s Rover 2000TC which is one of the safest cars made and a 1974 Mercedes taxi model, a modern Rover, and some other models such as the powerful and fast BMW M3.
They showed the diversity of offerings that enthusiasts collect.
When you look at the digital clock at your bedside and the numbers make automotive sense you have an inkling you are obsessed according to motor writer Chris de Fraga (member Balwyn Rotary Club), this week's speaker. When the time is 3.23 and you think of the BMW 323 or 4.54 and that translates as the cubic capacity in cubic inches of the V8 in an OIdsmobile, there probably more than a hint that obsession is overtaking passion.
Collecting cars is a tricky business, particularly if the results have to add up. The thought of cars as an asset must be dealt with first by writing down the value of the cars collected to zero because then you will not be worried by the varitions in interest rates, exchange rates and sometimes soaring or plummeting values on various markets. Collector cars can bring more than $10 million today - mostly in the United States.
The place to start is whether the car is to be driven daily because many of the collectible cars are not amenable to the daily grind of commuting or shopping or school runs. An example of this would be the `Pagoda Roof' Mercedes 230SL compared with the two SLs in the car park outside. The Pagoda was a delight to be enjoyed on weekends and the other SLs could be driven daily without fear of unreliability creeping into their use. The 230SL, however, was put around a race track in Switzerland by Rudi Uhlenhaut, Mercedes' racing chief, on its 1964 release only 0.2 seconds slower than the larger engined Ferrari 250 GT driven by Mike Parkes, a Ferrari racer and tester.
The other thing to bear in mind when restoring a car was the availability of parts. If the car is not complete the replacement of parts can be almost impossible and potentially cripplingly dear. George Hetrel of Bayswater had Ernst Heinkel's two-tone red 540K Benz in restoration - a car with a market value upwards of $1.75m - and it lacked the proper jack to fit its underbonnet mountings. Everything else was there including the chromed staff on each mudguard for the appropriate flags. Taking out the windscreen George found its mounting slot was still painted German military grey for the aviation designer owner. He found the part he needed - the jack - on the internet and flew to America to inspect it. He bought it because it was the right part in the right condition and it was the only one on offer in the world. It cost $US15,000. But in the overall cost of the car, it was probably appropriate. A Porsche 356 could be restored completely from the internet down to the proper decals to go on the various engine parts. Porsches are an example of a car that is notoriously difficult to assess in value since there were many different models in its eight years of manufacture. But bits are still made for it.
Restoration can be tricky. The speaker had bought a Fiat 500 bubble car from a friend's sister on the spur of the moment at 2 am at a party knowing it had been blown up by the leaving out of the dipstick on a trip to Stawell by its teacher owner. This lack had sprayed out all the oil and siezed the motor. He did not know that restoration of the engine did not include assembly and when picking up the car found the engine still in parts in boxes on the owners wardrobe and it took a weekend to reassemble it, jack up the Fiat so its four flat tyres could be inflated and then the car towed home.
Choosing the right car - whether it is to be driven daily or not, whether it has any pretention to safety by modern standards or not - is vital and preferrably it should be original and different to give it character.
Racing regulations made manufacturers change their cars and performance is a strong indication of value although shape is another major determinant. Performance is a strong attraction and a racing history is handy if the car is capable of sustaining some pace.
Ultimately, the quest for a collectible car is always frustrating and annoying but driving a properly restored car whether on a rally or racing it can provide wonderful solace. Goodness, is that the time? 2.30 - it must be a Mercedes.
Apropros Mercedes: She was the daughter of the Austro-Hungarian consult to Monaco, Emil Jellinek, who told Gottlieb Daimler that he would buy 10 of his cars if Daimler called them Mercedes after his daughter. His daughter's name was Adriana Muela Ramona Jellinek - but her family nickname was Mercedes - Spanish for grace.
Click here to view a pictorial essay
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