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nzcarnerd

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Posts posted by nzcarnerd

  1. 10 hours ago, JACK M said:

    Is this car running over a fence post?

    Kinda looks like he might be running ga slalom coarse.

    Yes, that white post was the marker for the left side of the course. The event is a trial based on the system run by the VSCC in the UK although with local variations.  The idea is to get as far though each course as possible without stopping. There are numbered markers and the last one you pass is your score. Where the UK event travels to several properties our one is run one just one farm, which means we can run cars which are not road legal. Most of the competing vehicles are much modified small English cars - Austin 7s and Ford 10s. We run the Pontiac just for fun. It is mechanically completely stock - engine never rebuilt as far as I can work out - although it is getting quite tired. The engine has never been out of the chassis and the engine and gearbox have never been separated. It did break an axle a few years ago and while fixing it discover the axle that broke was an old time replacement and had a longitudinal crack in it. We also discovered the car had 3.82:1 Chevrolet rear end gears instead of the original Pontiac 4.10:1 gears.

     

    The event is usually run in July - our winter - and most years it is not too wet but in 2023 it was so wet we didn't bother going.  The last photo was taken while packing up after the 2022 event.  We first got the car running in 2011, when my two sons were still at school, and I did the driving but after a few years I let them take over the driving. Both sons learnt to handle a crash gearbox on that car - see photos.

     

    There was thought that one day the Pontiac might b come a street legal speedster but there are too many projects in the queue in front of it so it will remain as it is for now.

     

    The Pontiac makes a couple of appearances in this video - 

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

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  2. This Empire was imported to NZ from Australia in 1999. It is registered as a 1913 Model 31.

     

    The Standard Catalog says for 1913 there was a Model 25 (25hp) on a 104" wheelbase, and a Model 31 (23hp) on a 108" wheelbase. Both models only came as touring cars. Maybe those quote power figures are developed, rather than the more normal for the time nominal horsepower. I would expect a 20+hp engine to be more than 3 litres.  I have no information on engine dimensions but from the photo it is not very big.

     

    This 1913 roadster was presumably copied from photos of the 1910 roadster in The Standard Catalog.

     

    My photos from 2016.

     

    Note the very distinctive hubcaps.

     

     

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  3. On 1/24/2024 at 8:15 PM, wayne sheldon said:

    For whatever it is worth? My first glance at the photo, my brain said likely Nash. However, something also said to me it didn't look quite right for a Nash. As I didn't have time to look it up in any of my references, I said nothing. (And that golf bag door was bugging me?)

    Oakland is an interesting marque, one which has some background causing me to notice them on the rare occasions I see or hear of one. And over the years, I have known a few people that owned one of some year or another. And I have actually ridden in a couple of them. Year models I have had close contact with have included 1912 (a longtime friend has toured with it for years!), 1918 (I considered buying that one), and a few from the early, mid, and late 1920s. They tend to be a car one doesn't often think about.

    As the discussion here progressed, and photos and opinions were shared, That golf bag door kept bugging me. A lot of cars, coupes and roadsters, during the 1920s had golf bag doors. My first real prewar car when I was still in high school was a 1929 Reo Flying Cloud coupe with a golf bag door. So I tend to notice golf bag doors on cars of the 1920s. Most of them are more or less rectangular in shape, often but not always with slightly rounded corners. Sometimes they have a corner notched out around the rear fender? Often they do not. Still, usually basically squarish in shape. RARELY are they askew as is the subject car. 

     

    The era picture of the Oakland sport roadster shared by keiser31 above may not have as nice a square view of the side as the OP car, however, it does appear to also have an askew golf bag door. That golf bag door, coupled with the details of the windshield frame, location of the cowl lamps (also a bit unusual), and the not quite clear enough but very close hub caps pretty much conveniences me that the OP car is most likely an Oakland roadster.

     

    As for the steel disc wheels. Those are a bit unusual for General Motors. Most General Motors marques did offer steel disc wheels as an option, with Chevrolet selling a lot more cars with steel disc wheels than any other GM brand. Chevrolet and most other GM brands used Jaxon steel disc wheels which most years had their own distinctive look to them. The disc wheels on this Oakland don't have the typical Jaxon Wheel look to them. However (and I don't offhand recall the details of this?), there was a merger between a couple wheel companies including Motor Wheel and Jaxon in the early to mid 1920s. Part of that process resulted in a couple GM brands using different steel disc wheels for awhile. I recall seeing a couple GM brand automobiles including Oldsmobile using this particular distinctive style wheel in the mid 1920s.

     

     

    That is my opinion.

     

    Welcome Old Crock to a wonderful discussion forum for antique automobiles!

    Our 1926 Pontiac is on Motor Wheel discs. It was assembled in New Zealand, and at a guess, was originally a two-door coach. Going by the parts book contemporary Chevrolets used Baker disc wheels,

    which were also available for Pontiacs. I must try and dig the relevant parts book out.

     

    The other photo is a 1928 Pontiac in New Zealand back in the day. I think the photo is not really clear enough to say for certain which disc wheels it is on.

     

     

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  4. It appears to be a lower price American six from circa 1922-24. It might have wood felloes which would date it to earlier, though the drum lights suggest not before 1922.

     

     

     

     

    Finland taxi.jpg

    • Like 1
  5. On 1/6/2024 at 2:39 AM, edinmass said:

     

    Has anyone ever heard of an "English yacht trunk", its new to me.

     

    My answer to the question is no, and what defines an English yacht trunk I don't know.

     

    More common are what were generally referred to as steamer trunks which were quite common back in the day. I think construction methods varied. 

     

    This one came with my Studebaker, and probably dates from the post WW2 era. It has obviously seen quite a lot of use. Sitmar Line was an Italian operation that ran a fairly frequent service between Europe and New Zealand. The label inside is almost comical. The trunk is not really automotive but has been used once so far - on an event in June 2023 which included some back roads. The suitcase strapped on top is from the same era.  It will likely be used in a few weeks when we take the car up to Napier (about 400 miles away) to the Art Deco festival being held in the town where the car began its NZ life in 1930. The pic is a photographer's proof.

     

     

     

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    • Like 4
  6. On 1/1/2024 at 2:24 AM, alsancle said:

    Studebaker truck.   Anyone have an idea which auto show this is?   LA?

     

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    From Richard Quinn - "The truck is a '37 model J20M. The trailer was custom built by Shelbro of East Peoria, Illinois for the K-M company (Knapp-Monarch) of St Louis, MO. Shelbro was short for Shelm Brothers. One of the Shelms was the head custodian at East Peoria High School that I attended in the 1950s. The observation compartment in front could sleep four and the unit was manned when on the road by a chauffeur and cook. K-M made electric irons and various other household items."

    • Like 2
    • Thanks 2
  7. On 1/1/2024 at 2:29 AM, alsancle said:

    Singer.

     

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    There are I think only two known survivors of this model. One is in a museum in the UK, and one lives here in NZ, not too far from me.  It was recently made mobile after a long term in storage and the guy who wrote the article in our club magazine about it reckons he is likely to be the only one of 'our' generation to have driven one.  The body is pillarless which makes entry and exit easier.

    • Like 1
  8. This one just turned up on a facebook page. Midday Saturday here and I am about to head to work and don't have time to clean up the photo at the moment but figured I would post it anyway. Something to ponder over the New Year break.

     

    Not that many American cars of that style to choose from. Not Croxton-Keeting.

     

    Distinctive three-quarter elliptic front springs.

     

     

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    • Like 3
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