Forbes article 2 2

[VintageComics]

6 hours ago, vodou said:

Uh huh, it's often not the purchase price but the upkeep that ruins The Ferrari Experience (or any exotic brand). I first garaged mine long term and then eventually just sold because routine maintenance like replacing the cam belts (note: not chains, which don't age over time!) required the engine to be pulled, something like 8-10k* licensed shop job...back in the mid-90s. Naturally, little shops wouldn't touch it and, really, did I want them to anyway? Similarly, I can work on cars - but not monkeying around myself pulling a Ferrari engine! IIRC.

Another memory was picking up an amazing condition (CGC 9.4?) 1982 Maserati Quattroporte (basically Italian Rolls Royce of the day) for $6k and then, this many years before it qualified for grandfathering out of state inspection smog requirements, required new exhaust, cats, etc, from the header all the way back. Hey, no problem, I can bang that out myself over a weekend, just need the parts. Oh well - $5k just for 'the parts', all the way from Italy. N O B O D Y domestic had stock. Trust me, pre-internet days, smaller world, I called everybody in the US that stocked Italian exotic parts before giving up and putting that one up on blocks too.

 

* It's been 25 years, memory could be off, but the lesson isn't

I was an automotive technician on exotic cars so I know all of those cars all too well and yes, many cars back in the day were 'cheap' but impossible to maintain.

I've worked on everything from Ferrari, Lotus, Jag, Rolls, Porsche and even a Maserati Quattroporte and our biggest problem was always that most customers couldn't afford to maintain their cars.

We had customers who tried to work on their own cars (like one guy who almost set his own Jag on fire) and then we had to undo the damage.

I also used to hotrod and turbo charge Watercooled VW's back in the late 1980's and early 1990's and yes, those pre-internet days were wild to find stuff. It was always from advertisements in automotive mags that you sourced stuff. Fascinating to go back and remember all that stuff again after forgetting about it for over 20 years. This was a great trip down memory lane!

[AnkurJ]

I nominate you as the worlds most interesting man! I think @vodou would agree!

Edited July 16, 2020 by AnkurJ

[vodou]

11 minutes ago, AnkurJ said:

@vodou would agree!

Yep!

[vodou]

1 hour ago, VintageComics said:

from advertisements in automotive mags

The Bible:

[VintageComics]

Just now, vodou said:

The Bible:

Yep. Also the DuPont registry, which came a bit later.

Kids these days will never know what it's like to sit on your bed at night and look through a book or a magazine and then fall asleep and dream about that stuff.

I had my whole bedroom lined with a band of pictures around it, about 1 food from the ceiling. All were one page pictures of cars. My favorite was always the 1986 Porsche 911 Turbo although I did also love the Ferrari Testarossa, 288 GTO, Porsche 959 and the Lotus Turbo Esprit.

[The-Collector]

On 7/11/2019 at 6:16 AM, Captain Canuck said:

I don't know if there is any truth to this statement, but could this whole speculation market and everyone wanting their piece of the pie be decreasing interest in some Superheroes for future generations? As in, when I attended cons several years ago with my nephews, their eyes would lite up when they would get free sketches of their favourite characters from some artists and would drive their interest in said character.  In recent years, those free sketches are hard to come by or nonexistent. When they walk by a booth and they see $50+ for a sketch, it does more to disinterest them, then continue promote their interest in the genre. They love Spongebob, but wouldn't dare drop $30 for the signature of the voice actor who does Spongebob. I even offered to pay for them, but they didn't see the value in spending that type of money. Could this whole capitalization by everyone involved, i.e. artists, writers, cons, facilitators and so on, doing more to harm, than good to promote the industry to younger individuals? Nothing worse than overpriced sketches, charges for signatures, $5 comic books, super long lines to dissuade kids. I used to love meeting my favourite baseball players and getting free sigs on a ball, once they started charging big bucks, that's when my interest disappeared in buying items to get signed. Maybe there should be a 2 tier model, 1 price for adults and another for kids, to help get them into the hobby and maintain their interest. Personally, I am starting to lose interest in attending cons because of the long lines, cost of tickets and rising prices for a quick sketch or sig. I love CGC, but also love getting a non-verified sig on a current book I am reading. What maintained my interest was meeting and interacting with the artists and writers, which is becoming harder and harder to do. That connection at cons promoted my interest in their work. Now they have less and less time to interact with the general fan. Which is prompting me to lose interest and reconsider why I am collecting.

When I was a kid the fact that I couldn't afford an IH 181 made me want it more. 

[Rick2you2]

17 hours ago, VintageComics said:

Yep. Also the DuPont registry, which came a bit later.

Kids these days will never know what it's like to sit on your bed at night and look through a book or a magazine and then fall asleep and dream about that stuff.

I had my whole bedroom lined with a band of pictures around it, about 1 food from the ceiling. All were one page pictures of cars. My favorite was always the 1986 Porsche 911 Turbo although I did also love the Ferrari Testarossa, 288 GTO, Porsche 959 and the Lotus Turbo Esprit.

I remember them well. I always wanted a Darrin bodied Packard convertable, preferably a 1940-41 on a 180 Chassis, in champaigne yellow.

Failing that, a Jaguar C-type. Oh, and a Pantera GTS as a runabout.

[sfilosa]

I actually wonder if the internet will eventually make "less" collectors than more. While it is much easier to collect because of the internet, some of the thrill (treasure hunt) is missing. I stopped collecting comic books, not because CGC graded them, but because they were graded and there are so many auctions/dealers, almost every book is just a commodity. If you have the right amount of money, you can sit in your house, never even talk to a person (just click and win) and amass a huge, high grade collection. And then, sell it all and figure out what else you would like to collect.

Art is one of kind, so that stops the "commodity" concept. But my real point is "collectors" in general, not what they will specifically collect.

 

 

 

[adamstrange]

On 7/15/2020 at 9:04 PM, VintageComics said:

Just for you. I saw one on the road today. I'll probably never see another.

 

 

 

I love this car!

It's one of the few diecast model cars that I have on display.

[VintageComics]

12 hours ago, Rick2you2 said:

I remember them well. I always wanted a Darrin bodied Packard convertable, preferably a 1940-41 on a 180 Chassis, in champaigne yellow.

Failing that, a Jaguar C-type. Oh, and a Pantera GTS as a runabout.

I had a customer in Toronto back in the early 1990's (Mr. Maxwell) and he owned about 15 or 20 vintage Jags (they were Vintage back in the 90's!) and they ranged from (going from memory here) the 1950's to the 1980's. C type, D type, E types, you name it he had them. He loved his mid 80's V-12 Vanden Plas so much that he actually had it in his will to be buried in it, sitting in the driver's seat with a smile on his face. True story.

I also used to work on Conrad Black's cars (wealthy Canadian who owned the National Post for a while and I think he owned Purolator Courier for a while and tried to buy Labbatts beer back in the 90's.

He had a fleet of cars ranging from the oldest vintage models to the latest and greatest. I worked in a mid 90's Porsche 993, a mid 80's Rolls Royce, we installed brake locking hardware on his 560 SEL so that his chauffeur / body guard could perform 'Rockford style' turns and evasive maneuvers if he needed to and the body guard himself had a 1922 MG TA (with a wooden frame and mechanical brakes) along with other cars.

Restored a Jaguar E Type for Alex Liefson of Rush and also an older Mercedes SL for Geddy Lee (delivered it to his home myself)

In the late 1980's I worked for a repair shop that specialized in hot rodding Porsche 911 Turbos and my boss at the time lost his license so I got to pick up and drop the cars off. It was my 1st time feeling the lengendary Turbo lag that the 911 Turbo was famous for and then the blistering acceleration that followed. There are faster cars today, but in the 1980's there was not a faster car once that Turbo was spooled up. It would almost life the front end off the ground.

For a young man like me, it was a wonderful time to be a mechanic and I happened to be in the right place at the right time for a few years.

 

[Rick2you2]

7 hours ago, VintageComics said:

I had a customer in Toronto back in the early 1990's (Mr. Maxwell) and he owned about 15 or 20 vintage Jags (they were Vintage back in the 90's!) and they ranged from (going from memory here) the 1950's to the 1980's. C type, D type, E types, you name it he had them. He loved his mid 80's V-12 Vanden Plas so much that he actually had it in his will to be buried in it, sitting in the driver's seat with a smile on his face. True story.

 

Given the reliability of old Jaguars’ electrical systems, burial sounds like the highest and best use for the Vanden Plas. He could enjoy sitting in it, while dead, without worrying whether it would start.

I once met an owner who loved her old XK-140, but she had to keep a battery charger in the trunk because no matter how much she spent on mechanic repairs, it was the only way she could assure it would start. Naturally, the car was for sale. I passed. 

[VintageComics]

18 minutes ago, Rick2you2 said:

Given the reliability of old Jaguars’ electrical systems, burial sounds like the highest and best use for the Vanden Plas. He could enjoy sitting in it, while dead, without worrying whether it would start.

I once met an owner who loved her old XK-140, but she had to keep a battery charger in the trunk because no matter how much she spent on mechanic repairs, it was the only way she could assure it would start. Naturally, the car was for sale. I passed. 

Pretty sure Mr. Maxwell owned an XK-140 and a 150.

I worked with a mechanic once who worked for an independent shop that specialized in English cars. He said some of his customers would take delivery of a new Jaguar and drive it straight to his shop to re-do the pre-delivery inspection...the car would then proceed to have about 3 days worth of work on it to make it problem free.

Adjust wood trim pieces to align, getting electronics to work, getting windows to go up and down.

Yep, they were a nightmare but as Mr. Maxwell said, when everything was working properly there were not enough O's in the word smooooooth to describe how the care felt.

And there's a reason we called Lucas (the name of the electrical company that was responsible for all the electrics on British cars) the Prince of Darkness.

[Rick2you2]

2 hours ago, VintageComics said:

Pretty sure Mr. Maxwell owned an XK-140 and a 150.

I worked with a mechanic once who worked for an independent shop that specialized in English cars. He said some of his customers would take delivery of a new Jaguar and drive it straight to his shop to re-do the pre-delivery inspection...the car would then proceed to have about 3 days worth of work on it to make it problem free.

Adjust wood trim pieces to align, getting electronics to work, getting windows to go up and down.

Yep, they were a nightmare but as Mr. Maxwell said, when everything was working properly there were not enough O's in the word smooooooth to describe how the care felt.

And there's a reason we called Lucas (the name of the electrical company that was responsible for all the electrics on British cars) the Prince of Darkness.

Nothing like going to an old Jaguar show, seeing a field of non-running Jag’s, and realizing that's their natural state. Not everyone can afford to rebuild a car, or wants to undertake the effort. I basically went through it with my old MB 280 SL. Now, I only want reliability (although, I still get the urge for a 1967 [not 1966] Olds Toronado, which I think is undervalued in the market).
 

Still surprised the Jag XK- S type, convertible doesn’t get more love, even if the 12 cylinder version is supposed to be a hellish repair bill down the road.

[vodou]

3 hours ago, Rick2you2 said:

Nothing like going to an old Jaguar show, seeing a field of non-running Jag’s, and realizing that's their natural state.

Since you guys are doing Jags now, my father is an old school Jaguar guy. His first was in college, early 60s - driving them in NJ winters (!) and parking them curbside overnight too (!!) and trying to get off-street before the morning plows came out (!!!) He's never paid anyone to work on a car in his life, does it all himself. Many have come and gone from his garage but the one he kept is the 1948 rhd Mark IV dhc that I will inherit someday. He picked it up in 1974 for less than $1,000 and fully restored it. God knows if it runs now though, it hasn't been started/driven since the 80s . So that will be my burden but it's otherwise showroom mint and is one of those family heirloom type things. Evidently it's pretty rare too, but my memory is people flipping out as we rode slowly through town on nice summer days, when I was a kid. I was sitting on the driver's side but he was actually driving it -rhd. Irreplaceable memories. He also took a total 'basket case' (literally a full bike in boxes -all parts broken down to smallest components including engine) 58 HD shovelhead on for $500 and rebuilt/improved it from the ground up over a long NE winter. Unlike most vintage HD, his idles smooth like an Italian 12 cylinder, then you twist the throttle and windows up and down the street rattle in their frames

It's to his absolute disappointment that the "mechanical gene" seems to have skipped a generation in my case. Oh and he hates English cars too, any and all of them, for their electricals.

[Rick2you2]

1 minute ago, vodou said:

It's to his absolute disappointment that the "mechanical gene" seems to have skipped a generation in my case. Oh and he hates English cars too, any and all of them, for their electricals.

Bet he's not too thrilled with their rust, either.

[vodou]

1 hour ago, Rick2you2 said:

Bet he's not too thrilled with their rust, either.

Yes. Every summer when I still lived there, that's what we did - torch out rusted rockers and weld in new metal. I should add - we ran through a lot of cars, not a lot of rockers on the same car! The only one that didn't share that fate was the Mark IV. I'll have to ask him where he got that one, no rust anywhere. Cleanest of the clean that one, from purchase.

[VintageComics]

5 hours ago, Rick2you2 said:

Nothing like going to an old Jaguar show, seeing a field of non-running Jag’s, and realizing that's their natural state

Don't hold back!

5 hours ago, Rick2you2 said:

I basically went through it with my old MB 280 SL

Pretty sure this was the car we restored for Geddy Lee. A White one with red trim. It was 30 years ago so I start to forget the details. I still have a pic of it buried somewhere.

1 hour ago, vodou said:

Since you guys are doing Jags now, my father is an old school Jaguar guy. His first was in college, early 60s - driving them in NJ winters (!) and parking them curbside overnight too (!!) and trying to get off-street before the morning plows came out (!!!) He's never paid anyone to work on a car in his life, does it all himself. Many have come and gone from his garage but the one he kept is the 1948 rhd Mark IV

I think Mr. Maxwell had a Mark 4 as well. You're jogging my memory with these stories!

Interesting thing, I worked for a Welshman in the early 90's and I learned a lot about English cars with him. One thing he said to me is that many of the problems that we experienced over here with English cars they did not have over there in England apparently. I don't know if it was true or just selective memory on his part but he maintained that back home the weather was much more fair and the cars faired better and that the climate in North America was the real problem for the cars because before globalization they weren't engineered for this harsher weather.

But working on English cars was unlike anything else. They had shims for everything. We shimmed interior wood trim panels, ball joints, brake discs. It was the weirdest world to explore compared to German cars where everything was built for precision and fit!

[Timely]

My dad has been a mechanic for over 50 years now. He owned his own gas station and service station. He has worked on literally everything, even a Vector! He’s retired now (sort of), but works exclusively on Lamborghini Miura’s built from the late 60’s - early 70’s. He’s THE best there is as many of his clients ship their cars across the country so my dad can work on their cars. Here are a few pics of the 12 cylinder motor he is fixing/restoring.

Edited July 18, 2020 by Timely

[Rick2you2]

1 hour ago, VintageComics said:

Pretty sure this was the car we restored for Geddy Lee. A White one with red trim. It was 30 years ago so I start to forget the details. I still have a pic of it buried somewhere.

Mine was cream colored with brown accents and a brown pagoda roof. Three weeks after I got it, I drove through a snow storm but got it home. Next morning, it wouldn't start. I apparently had fried the entire electrical harness. That's when I also got a list of roughly 18 significant repairs that were needed (valve job, structural rot, replacing brake system, etc.). But, it did have its offsetting advantages. Did you know a woman could fit her head between the top of a car seat and the bottom of its steering wheel--without an adjustable steeing wheel! She was looking for her glasses, of course. 

[VintageComics]

On 7/18/2020 at 3:35 PM, Timely said:

My dad has been a mechanic for over 50 years now. He owned his own gas station and service station. He has worked on literally everything, even a Vector! He’s retired now (sort of), but works exclusively on Lamborghini Miura’s built from the late 60’s - early 70’s. He’s THE best there is as many of his clients ship their cars across the country so my dad can work on their cars. Here are a few pics of the 12 cylinder motor he is fixing/restoring.

Wow. WOW.

I'd love to chat with your dad one day. I've never worked on a Miura or even seen one up close for that matter, but that is a special car.

Most people don't realize that it was the car that was the predecessor to the Countach / Diablo line. And it is a gorgeous machine.

I worked my last 11 years with Mercedes Benz and we used to do this national competition Canada wide for mechanics. I'd routinely place top 10 but one year I got Bronze or Silver (I can't remember) and even argued that I should have gotten Gold because the test question / answer was incorrect but they didn't allow appeals.

The apprentice that I trained got Gold routinely and he ended up going to Germany (8 times, I think) to represent Canada and compete internationally against other countries. He went so often that he got tired of it and stopped competing.

The main reason I became a comic book dealer was so that I could spend more time with my children as they were growing up and be there for them when they needed me because in the last few years of me working in the trade I was commuting a lot and pulling long hours and I wanted to make sure I was there for them before they became adults.

I haven't turned a wrench in over 10 years professionally but it was a living and a way of life for over 2 decades. My how times change. Glad your dad is still doing what he loves.