Pagoda SL Group
Off Topic => Other cars => Topic started by: Mike Hughes on August 08, 2018, 19:05:52
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I thought it might be a good idea to move further photos and discussion of our Pagoda's stable mates here.
'54 M.G. TF 1250
'66 MGB-GT
'56 Dodge Job-Rated Deluxe V-8 Long Bed
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The SL shares the garage with different mates in the summer vs the winter. Most of them, however, are not cars.... and these are not all of them
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I can't quite make out the insignia on the black bike, is it a Norton or a Triumph?
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Mike
Very nice cars. Seems like owning British cars always comes in twos.
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Good move Mike, we were straying a bit on the Photo Gallery thread. Your Dodge brought back memories. My last couple of years in high school were spent knocking around in and tinkering with a friend’s slightly earlier but very similar looking Six cylinder Dodge PU.
I ordered the Hilux just after retirement in 2004 and it has been my daily driver in Italy since. It is at home on the river bed gathering stones or on the autostrada and we have covered much of Italy, France and Spain in it. Below pictured in front of the Casino in Monte Carlo.
A few years ago I was strongly encouraged by my usual fellow passenger to aquire something a little more esthetically pleasing. Thus the BMW Futura Coupe’. Thanks to the three liter diesel with xdrive it can be used as a stump puller if the Hilux ever gives up the ghost.
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On the other side of the pond the Pagoda keeps Company with another xdrive BMW. And a 1995 Jaguar XJS convertible.
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I can't quite make out the insignia on the black bike, is it a Norton or a Triumph?
;D ;D ;D It is supposed to look like a Brit bike, but it is not. At the time the photo was taken, those were the vehicles I owned with 4-valve motors.
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A couple more from the stable:
1987 Jaguar XJ-6 Vanden Plas
1989 Merkur XR4Ti
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And my first collector car, a 1951 M.G. TD, originally white and much modified and raced in the 1950's and 60's by its original owner, from whose estate I acquired it in 1972. You might see my 1800 ES in the background in one of the shots of my driveway "restoration."
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This is one of two or three cars I regret letting get away...
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When the Pagoda joined our stable Lucy and I owned six M.G.s, five of which we still have. The day these shots were taken four of the M.G.s and the Pagoda were saying good-bye to the black 1934 L-1 Magna Salonette that was being shipped that day to it's new owner in Kobe, Japan. The MGB-GT was up in the mountains and missed the party.
M.G.s from left to right:
1954 TF
1937 TA
1951 TD
1934 L-1
1967 MGB
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I have seven other vehicles licensed and insured for road use. Here are photos of four of the more remarkable ones.
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Here are two of my cars i have had the white 356 for some twenty years. The white one is a 1954 bent window pre A. Very early Porsche. The black one is a 1959 A coup last year of the A. I have other cars will take some pictures of them soon and post it.
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Added one yesterday. '66 Series 1 4.2
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My latest as of about a week ago. A Canadian built 1951 Studebaker 2R5 pickup with an in-line 6, 3 on the tree with overdrive. Can pull a stump as easily as cruising at 120km/hr down the highway.
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My daily driver and my just finished self-restored Volkswagen camper:
(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/hIQrqZ0ZQgMo9v1AzrmbekOG_IL_HwYGQELJkR-KBkZlq0wjoRjoweK26AKQ4UaJ2b4FhCrDnFxAkkvOStohBgK2XfDup11RU4ikRIKrfZ5P0VC_e3xVPLW268IGTuIXgyK9IRalv3eQ-gJm7r0l-QqnE36nsghUxKztCePjKG3KNSIO-Qjh6crxO1Np622nPCxmKe7mVsqEEtLCS8xL72su-FB5Yu4LK63Fse8OMPReDncQUqax3cXk70tSrAZEaUNiSkQIJGdq20ieTZ9ivJZPFhFSd2KrPx767YMC3P1R9bjGTk3HrcY7vZPBKH_r3Ega2wg4DQGycU98OFg6MW-fuadbHUBJjzat5HWZrD-4HEX-1efJF3_JAzCdR2LOamwnYSufn9ShmHg10DynkO2HNZMhrZRm0gQ1_yZGB6_dOaTJJYIiG-awHtGPmXVFfMLAOlz6yrSz1HyJMtDbgHgxzSW1xOSRE7DwaHLj11FHKxNOGpxDoIq21DG7eJwdSWCF0j0l0MASSbf4Yjr2i7Utdz5MaVPHgVM0OvHwF--UYx-x2UJNMj6iEPhE0_4K80j_J8NuEksrBax41X7Zol-zeVQiYKRiNcAZWKiT4qRWXgfDJdL6sTMYnO1gteRJa1ANUEcsh88t6NYq4nSFHMfwAsKbMpfraVvH4gOLmdaIXX3I0PGc0UEd=w535-h344-no)
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That's a lot of paint to redo.
really nice.
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Nice to see another VW owner in the Pagoda Group..... ;D ;D ;D
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That's a lot of paint to redo.
Not only the paint. ;D
Here can you find the complete project:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/RvQ5MLWzDhsT3uox1 (https://photos.app.goo.gl/RvQ5MLWzDhsT3uox1)
(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/qcNhWP1C5o7EQU1La27Uw2quRblizfqOH0voXkbT8I_h22VuqqEv0qMQC9t5RNOU_hpAB7PAbEMG0FCvAZm5Bg05XJIHoxbzTO_Un52Cz64N7PijMxuWlKO8Wkci_8ZzmeLDNEXSOCI8p9NTShOaIunPwpNKITCzY0j0euT90PuZceu4ysU07Uu3OzMzRXavdc1yrQIF_uoMRUsW9Vx2Z6p3aFAuizhMLcnnrgXXmjM2fS_iBqDWQL8kI3p4AqWl4w33XS2l-_RmisONbv4nfR2_8kyt2oUliqQq_6aj1yl8OT8pAzyNwgunLVIZuD1lqckmFSwE5d21rIzZw05JW5PKEjkWMEuFHaBSIgV48Ovbr3B05WaD0miJ74F-Zkz4CfNMJ4ERYx1gzmUtMVWhe_QIGyXvpuKh57jtF_csgsJ4Rgh-mBrZcxDm8RknLZwW3amEQeyiUZJonP-kp56YJmdc2pK9Cffg3KimkkIVQ2XuP97GfcxNm4GTEkKfnzmuE_9ZR6RQZgEk6-3_G25ycSabMg8Fo59peP_J9H7oh0Cpbk3uS2V3BMn8scwxxg4Y1yIV_L4bZc2gELNgOq_kZS64xTON6XS436rPscA0Ku-nHFsii6bnMa9sWkWFzQxoXIwT3KIbyeRIqNwQO4pny5fVLG1VhZmQTH2QlgR8ltlwAkqZ88jmx8GW=w1000-h563-no)
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looks familiar.
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We walked the same way! :D
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1950 Alfa Romeo 6C 2500 super sport
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That is one gorgeous car John. I'm guessing you got it out of the UK?
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It originally was sold in Switzerland and stayed there fro 50 years. It was completely restored from 2006 to 2012 in italy and came to the US after that. It came to me recently through a friend.
The drive trane is all pre-war design so its not as great of a driver as our Pagoda's are, but is fun to master. 110 HP straight six triple carburators. Great sounding engine.
Getting used to driving from the wrong side of the road!
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cool car, that Alfa
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Lovely beast, that! Who is the coachbuilder, Pininfarina? How many gears on the column shift?
Driving a right hand drive sports car on this side of the pond has its moments. I have owned a number of right hand drive M.G.s over the years, and still have two of them. The most fun I have ever had in one have involved a RHD MGB roadster I have owned for over 40 years, 1) a dog, and 2) a police officer.
1) Watching the double takes as I drove, slouched down as far as I could, top down on the GW Parkway with my sister's HUGE brindle Great Dane sitting up tall in the passenger seat.
2) While taking my wife to the Metro one winter morning, being pulled over for going 27MPH in a 25 MPH School Zone. The officer walks up to my wife's side of the car, asks her for her drivers license and registration and proceeds to begin issuing a summons. When I lean over and interrupt to point out that he should be talking to me I am curtly told to "Keep out of this, sir, I'm dealing with the lady!" So I do, and we both appear in court on the appointed day. After Lucy plead "Not Guilty" the judged asked her why. She said, "Because I wasn't driving the car, and the officer refused to issue the ticket to my husband, who was behind the wheel!" Then she handed the clerk two photos of the RHD M.G., one with the top up and one with the top down. After summoning the officer to the bench, the judge dismissed the case.
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Thanks Mike,
Body is by Pinafarina. Its a 4 speed on the column which I quite like. Plenty of torque so no problems starting out in any gears. I have to get more comfortable that everything is working correctly before I drive it much. We had to put a Ferrari master cylinder on it but the brakes still aren't quite right. I have a friend who can figure out just about anything who got the triple carbs sincing correctly and it running correct. Had it at the only-alfa club recommended mechanic in ohio's hsop for four months and he couldn't do it.
I have a shop manual and all of the repair and restoration records, but they are in italian.
Its one of few convertibles I think that looks even better wiht the top up.
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That really is a handsome car. How many were made? I would imagine that parts may be hard to come by.
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Hi John, you are quite right: Top up or down it has a lot of presence.
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Isn't it something similar to the one displayed in the glass garage next to the driveway to Villa d'Este?
I am not too good at Alfas....
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Alfa Romeo was never a volume producer until they came out with their Giulia and Giulietta four cylinder cars in the early/mid 1950's. Rather, they were a producer of successful racing cars, and bespoke sporting conveyances based on some of those racers for wealthy motorists in the period between the two world wars, mostly bodied by Italian carrozzerias Touring and Pinin Farina. A young Enzo Ferrari drove for the ALFA racing team for a time before forming Scuderia Ferrari. Like Mercedes did for Germany, Alfa Romeo represented Italy on the Grand Prix circuits of Europe in the 30's, and in the immediate post-war period.
After WWII it was soon obvious that the market for bespoke conveyances for the wealthy was not what it used to be and ALFA was going to have to go down market to survive. 6C 2500s like John's represent the swan song of the bespoke Alfa Romeo.
"Godfather" movie fans may recall that Michael Corleone spent some time in Sicily, marrying a local girl and teaching her to drive a closed cousin of John's cabriolet in the courtyard of the walled compound in which they lived. Watching that sleek black Alfa Romeo coupe being blown up is still one of the hard bits for me to sit through (although I suspect and hope a mock-up was actually destroyed in that scene)!
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Fantastic! An extremely rare and beautiful machine, John. It appears to be identical to the one offered by Gooding at Pebble beach last year.
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I believe there were only 63 cabriolet super sports.
And yes parts are hard to get and can take a month to order if you can find them. Makes one appreciate the knowelege and parts that are available for our Pagoda's. I really appreciate the car as I learn more about it but you just can't drive it like you can our pagoda's.
I will have it for a year or two, but my Pagoda will hopefully stay in my faamily forever.
Thanks everyone.
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Isn't it something similar to the one displayed in the glass garage next to the driveway to Villa d'Este?
Possibly. There was actually a Villa d'Este 6C 2500 model produced in very limited numbers with coachwork by Touring.
See here:
https://rmsothebys.com/en/auctions/ve15/auction/lots/r113-1949-alfa-romeo-6c-2500-ss-villa-d-este-coup%c3%a9-by-touring
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Added one yesterday. '66 Series 1 4.2
John,
Nice Jag. Will look great in your garage.
Need a video of you driving!
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Possibly. There was actually a Villa d'Este 6C 2500 model produced in very limited numbers with coachwork by Touring.
See here:
https://rmsothebys.com/en/auctions/ve15/auction/lots/r113-1949-alfa-romeo-6c-2500-ss-villa-d-este-coup%c3%a9-by-touring
I took a picture of it, but I was drunk and I somehow lost it...
But it looked beautiful as yours.
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John,
Nice Jag. Will look great in your garage.
Need a video of you driving!
Ditto. Like the 230SL a couple of years later, the E-Type was unveiled to the public at the Geneva Auto show and was a sensation. My favourite E-Type is the '66 4.2 Coupe - It embodies all the purity of the Malcolm Sayer's original design, plus the upgraded gearbox and more reliable 4.2L engine, but still is early enough to have escaped all the emissions and safety stuff that was looming on the horizon. (Kind of the same reason I love my '66 230SL so much!)
I've been studying the photos: What green is that? It's too dark to be BRG. Is the interior green, too, or black?
Back in the day Henry Manney III wrote in Road & Track that it was "the best crumpet catcher known to man!"
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Thanks, guys. It's Dark Green Opalescent. A dark green with a very fine metallic flake in it. Hard to get it right, but the guy who did it got it right. The interior is black and mostly original, headliner and center carpets replaced. Car has 60K miles on it. I agree with you about the desirability of the '66 coupe. Enzo Ferrari said in 1961 it was the most beautiful car he'd ever seen and all that was wrong with it is that it didn't have "Ferrrari" on it. In its day it was an "exotic" at a price point.
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....... and, who would want to disagree with Enzo! A real beauty, and about as black as the 291H on my Pagoda. Love it! Congratulations on this addition.
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The Old girl:
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Another Series 1 coupe. Beautiful. Can't say I mind the building it's parked next to either.
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I'm jealous. I love these E-types! Looks great in gray.
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Lovely FHC, what year is it? I'm trying to figure out the color. At first it looks like silver and JohnK thinks it is gray. I'm wondering if it is sand. What color is the interior?
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Thank you gents for the compliments. It is golden sand (a sort of champagne metallic colour). Interior is biscuit leather. 1966, 4.2.
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I thought so! That golden sand color with the biscuit interior has been my very favorite combination on an E-Type FHC for a very long time. When my family lived on Taiwan in the 1960's there was an Air Force Colonel who lived just down the street. In the circular drive beside his house was the best pair of "his and hers" sports cars one could possibly imagine: a golden sand FHC with biscuit interior and a white 300SL with red leather interior and a black hardtop. I'd just stop and drink in their every curve and highlight each day on the way home from school.
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What a great sight that must have been: the FHC and the 300 SL! Thanks for sharing that .
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1956 New York International Automobile Show Standwagen
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A recent addition of the group of my Pagoda stablemates... '37 Cord S/C Cabriolet. My wife at the controls, supervised by our dog Cooper! :)
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A right hand drive Cord 812? That's a rare bird! ;^)
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I don't think I ever shared pics of my Daily (only when the weather is nice) Driver Sports Car. It is a 1990 and slowly (very slowly) becoming a "Classic" (sorry, Dan) also... 8)
While the car is not uncommon, the motor sort of is. It is one of the few Doug Rippie "Black Maxes"
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Here's a few of my non-daily drivers, some running, some defintely not running.
'55 Nomad - about 90% complete. Not running yet.
'99 Mini 40th anniv - running awesome (for sale)
'71 2800CS - runs, but going to restore it hopefully soon.
'70 Challenger Convertible - going to finish it someday
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Here's a few of my non-daily drivers, some running, some defintely not running.
'55 Nomad - about 90% complete. Not running yet.
'99 Mini 40th anniv - running awesome (for sale)
'71 2800CS - runs, but going to restore it hopefully soon.
'70 Challenger Convertible - going to finish it someday
Teahead
If that is your wife in the challenger rather than a picture model I can see why your cars are still in the "some day"stage!
John K
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Earlier in the life of this thread I posted pictures of my other cars. Over the last few weeks the thread has had renewed activity so I thought I would add my latest addition from early this year. It is a 1988 560SL shown here sans hard top with my Pagoda.
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After 30 years I am finally getting around to assembling a 1937 M.G. TA that I acquired as a rolling chassis basket case from a fellow "T" Register member.
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1950 Alfa Romeo 6C 2500 super sport
She’s so pretty 🥰🥰
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That looks like a hell
Of a cool project. Where do you look for guidance on how it fits back together?
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The photos were taken at the restoration shop of a longtime friend who has kindly allowed me to come in and participate in the work. His shop specializes in British cars and has done several post-war M.G. TCs, which are basically the same car in many respects, although there are a number of detail differences between an early, wide tank, TA like mine and even a later TA or pre-war TB.
I participate in a lively international forum that focuses on just the TA, TB and TC M.G.s, so advice and encouragement is freely offered (although the search function is not nearly as robust as ours!). There are a couple of members there who are original owners and quite a few more who are offspring of original owners of cars, the newest of which are nearing 75 years old.
Mine is a rather unusual specimen. The Army Air Corps officer who acquired it in Ireland at the close of WWII was reassigned to bases in England in the immediate post-war period and took the car with him. He participated in local motorsport events there in the immediate post-war period, mostly hill climbs. At Prescott, which venue is still owned by the British Bugatti Owner's Club, he came to admire the exquisitely details of the polished, chrome plated, front axles of pre-war Bugattis, and figured that if it was good enough for Bugatti, it would be good enough for his M.G.! So, when he returned stateside, he discovered that there was metal working, finishing and plating facilities at his Air Force base that could easily handle chrome plating at a very reasonable cost. He ended up chroming the entire front suspension, parts of the rear suspension, and choice bits in the engine compartment in the late 40's and early 50's. He even chrome-plated the leaves of the springs, which I still have (although they are unusable, as chrome plating can make spring steel a little brittle and a number of leaves in each spring set are broken in at least one place. I thought at the time that the car had a remarkably smooth, soft ride when the PO let me drive it briefly in 1978!) Other than the wire wheels, which are new, every bit of the chrome you see in the photographs is over 70 years old.
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John, that XKE coupe is exquisite. What a work of art.
How does the Jag's ride compare to your pagoda ?
jz
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Scroll to reply #11 and you will see two photos of a line-up of M.G.s in my Alexandria, Virginia driveway. The black car, second from the right in both photos is the subject of what appears below.
In 1979 I acquired a 1933 M.G. L1 Magna Salonette (that's a mouthful for such a small car!) from a fellow M.G. Car Club Washington DC Centre member. A native of Asbury Park, NJ, he had owned the car, chassis number L0565, for over a decade and used it as daily transportation while attending undergraduate classes in the New York City area. He dated for a time an unknown young folksinger he met at a coffee house up the road in Long Branch. His M.G. was ideal for running her up to Greenwich Village for weekend gigs, as the back seat was big enough for her guitars. Her name was Melanie (yes, THAT Melanie, who just passed away last month) and this was long before she became famous for her songs "Beautiful People" and "Brand New Key" or performing at Woodstock.
Those familiar with pre-War overhead cam M.G.s will know that their thermosyphon cooling systems relied exclusively on forward motion to force air through the radiator - there was no cooling fan. The six-cylinder M.G. Magnas and Magnettes had a "pump-assisted thermosyphon system," while the far more numerous four-cylinder M.G. Midgets relied on convection only to circulate the coolant, although the water pump from a Magna or Magnette could be fitted to some of the later engines.
Driving the Salonette in stop-and-go traffic on hot New Jersey summer days resulted in overheating and then a seized engine just before he was due to leave for graduate school in California. The car was laid up in the carport of his parents' home a block from the Asbury Park beachfront, where over the next decade salt air and humidity did a number on the coachwork. After grad school he ultimately settled in Arlington, Virginia. His parents were selling the family home and the old M.G. had to get out of the carport. Devising an A-frame towbar and using his Honda N600 as a tow vehicle, he dragged it home from New Jersey.
I was the only Washington D.C. area M.G. Club member who had a pre-war car, so seemed a prime candidate to take it off his hands. Soon thereafter I sold my '34 PA four-seater to finance the beginnings of what became a 25-year restoration project.
In corresponding with pre-war M.G. spare parts suppliers in the U.K. I was soon made aware of the rarity of my L1 Magna Salonette. Only 97 of these two-door, four passenger saloons were produced. Compared with the far sportier L1 open four-seat tourer and L2 two-seat sports car, it was an unloved model with a fragile body. When they reached the end of their useful lives, many a Salonette body was thrown away and the light chassis and powerful 1100cc OHC six-cylinder engine became the basis for many an M.G. racing special. Naturally aspirated via dual S.U. carbs, these engines put out a healthy 55 HP. With a crank driven supercharger fitted, running on the racing fuels available in the 1930's, these engines developed up to 140 HP! To put this in perspective the Ford 3.6 liter flat-head V8 was rated at 65 HP. Modified versions could put out as much as 100 HP in period.
One correspondent told me that he had only seen three or four Salonettes in the thirty years he had been in the M.G. spares business; another had only seen one but knew of another that had disappeared some years back and was delighted to discover that it might have now reappeared on the other side of the pond. It was likely that I had the only L1 Salonette in the Western Hemisphere.
News of the rarity of my M.G. made me even more determined to embark on my restoration odyssey. As funds permitted a Greek coachbuilder north of Baltimore recreated the wood-framed aluminum-skinned body, using the disintegrating original as a pattern. I paid him when I could and he worked on it when he received fresh funding, so it took more than a dozen years to complete. Then he started on the chassis, and I found a machine shop willing to take on disassembling and machining the seized engine. We couldn't afford it but one doesn't count the cost of a labor of love.
More than two decades and tens of thousands of dollars after embarking on the restoration I had a steerable rolling chassis with an assembled engine and transmission in place, a pile of spare parts, and a spouse voicing a concern that, if I continued, this project was going to end up costing significantly more than what we paid for our house. I reluctantly spread the word in the Pre-War M.G. community that my Salonette was for sale.
It took a while but eventually in fall of 2003 I was contacted by a pre-war M.G. aficionado in Japan, who said he had been searching for an F or L Salonette and wanted to know more about it. After months of discussion and sending photos of all the work, a deal was done. In 2004, twenty-five years to the month after I first acquired my M.G. Magna, L0565 was in a container on a ship heading for Kobe, Japan. The two photos in reply #11 were taken the day I loaded the Salonette on my trailer for transport to a warehouse in Baltimore to be containerized and shipped to Japan.
Two years later he sent me a couple of photos of the completed project. I did not recognize anything in the photos other than the radiator shell and steering wheel. At the urging of a paying client, he had tossed the Salonette body and full flowing fenders and created a boat-tailed, cycle-fendered, supercharged racing special!
To say I was saddened beyond words would be a vast understatement. Sleepless nights have visited me from time to time over the last nearly twenty years when I am reminded of the fate that befell a rare car that I spent nearly twenty-five years trying to resurrect.
Now comes the improbable part of the story:
During 2023 there were numerous events held around the world commemorating the 100th anniversary of the M.G. marque. A member of the New England M.G. "T" Register traveled to the U.K. to attend an M.G. 100 event at Silverstone Circuit and wrote a report highlighting what he thought were the most significant or unusual among a special time-line of 100 M.G.s on display. This article, complete with photos, was published in the NEMGTR bi-monthly journal "The Sacred Octagon" (Volume 61, Number 5 October 2023, pages 16-19). There was a photo of each subject car, but one car merited two photos: A duo-green L1 Magna Salonette! Naturally I skipped through the article to read the description of that car first. Its owner had acquired chassis number L0297, originally built as a Salonette, as a rolling chassis basket case fitted with the remnants of "bitsa" open four-seat body.
Imagine my utter shock when I next read that in 2005 he was able to begin to return the car to its original specification after sourcing complete Salonette bodywork - from Japan! I was looking at my old Salonette, completely restored, but on a different chassis by a different owner! The description concluded, "It is believed to be one of only two remaining Salonettes worldwide."
Skipping ahead, when a container arrives in New York next month and L0297 is loaded on my trailer and brought home, my Salonette body will have completed its circumnavigation of the globe.
The photo group below shows L0565 as it appeared when it arrived in Kobe, Japan in 2004 and L0297 after its restoration was completed using the body, fenders, bonnet (hood) panels, seats and interior wood trim sourced from Japan. The other photo shows the only two L1 Magna Salonettes known to exist worldwide side by side at a pre-covid international M.G. meeting in the U.K. The blue car lives in Belgium.
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:o
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Great story Mike, and what perseverance!
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Scroll down to reply #11 and ...
Mike (and everyone),
FYI: It is in the user preferences as to having the newest posts at the top or the bottom of the thread. So, to scroll down to a specific reply is not a universal statement.
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In the meanwhile I have these cars and this bike.
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Mike (and everyone),
FYI: It is in the user preferences as to having the newest posts at the top or the bottom of the thread. So, to scroll down to a specific reply is not a universal statement.
So true, I had forgotten there was a choice. My post has been edited to remove the word "down" eliminating any confusion.
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My others