1912Staver

I think the problem would have been that the car was not officially imported to the U.S. It sounds like the Canadian just had the car in the U.S. as a visitor. If that was the case the car would have had to be returned to Canada, and then it could have been sold to someone from the U.S. and legally imported to the U.S. A somewhat common situation on either side of the border. That is, for whatever reason a Canadian visitor to the U.S., or a U.S. visitor to Canada brings a car with them. Then something happens and the car gets left behind. It becomes a real mess as the legal owner has to bring the car back to the correct country in order for it to be sold and transfered legaly to a new owner. Many such cars just end up as parts cars as often the owner can't be tracked down or can't be bothered to tidy up the mess. I hope you didn't pay too much Jack. The only way you could have sorted things out would to have taken the car back to Canada and go through the regular process like any other Canadian car purchase by a U.S. buyer.

carbking has several Rayfield catalogs and service documentation for sale on his website. But I believe Rayfield material is reasonably rare and generally rather expensive. I have been looking at swap meets for at least the last 20 years and have not yet found any Rayfield catalogs or service books. Quite a few Rayfield carbs however, they seem to show up quite frequenty .Prices all over the map.

I think he needs a 5/8 diameter , flat disk of glass rather than 5 / 8 glass tubing.

The RIV part is the Canadian side of the transaction. and on older vehicles rarely a problem for us Canadians. The U.S. Export requirements are what has stopped me in my tracks for any parts cars / project cars. U.S. Customs generally states a Title is a must for Export, and parts cars / project cars rarely have a Title.

They were factory on a few cars, but I believe most were sold aftermarket. As far as I know there is no way of telling which ones would have been factory installed . Mostly small volume, higher end makes, late teens / early 20's. Information in general about many of this sort of car is somewhat hard to track down. And not a lot of Rayfield documentation out there either from what I recall. Carbking has posted information about Rayfield from time to time on the forum. It might pay off to do a search.

Good chance that it a McLaughlin , especially given the Ontario location. But a bit before they teamed up with Buick to make cars.

Be very careful about removng a car from the U.S. There is now a very formal process for doing this, driving car or parts car. It's all in the U.S. Customs, vehicle export regulations . Available on line. It will make your head swim. Up to several years ago there was no problem and I brought several cars , and even more parts cars home to British Columbia. But that has all ended. Now any and all motorized vehicles { and not just cars and trucks , any , farm tractors , work site motorized things , all of it } need to be officially exported. It's all on line and it is a serious problem with serious penalties for non compliance. It's really messed things up for me. If only it was as simple as pulling out the engine . I had one U.S. Agent insist a bare frame needed to be documented and processed. Luckily it was a factory built for racing, race car frame { 1977 Lola Formula car } and I could show him that they were supplied as a spare part from the factory to repair crash damaged cars, and did not by itself constitute a " motor vehicle ". But if it had been a frame from a regular production vehicle with a serial number it would have been a " motor vehicle " in the eyes of that particular Customs Agent and I would have needed to go through the entire process.

Pfeil, that's a remarkable data base, thanks for linking it !

64's and 65's are generally quite similar cars. But I think if anything the 65's are even a bit bigger , heavier than the 64's. If you are looking at a car with a high HP engine option and a 4 speed I expect performance is at least part of your goal. Bigger and heavier always hurts performance. Do you have a specific low mileage 65 , 4 speed, 360 horse Wildcat in mind and are asking about an apples to apples comparison with the 64 ? Or is it just a " in theory " comparison. Low milage , 4 speed Wildcats don't come on the market very often. You might be better off to grab the 64 in any case rather than wait for a 65 that may or may not ever show up for sale. The cars are similar enough that I doubt you would find much difference between them. If the 64 really is a very good ccondition car , with the power train options you are looking for, and the price is in your eyes reasonable, I would grab it.

Make and model is reasonably easy on most of them, but exact year is a bit more difficult on quite a few.

This thread illustrates the dream I had for many years of my youth. To find a more or less intact , moderately significant car from roughly this time period or up to a decade earlier. I didn't have anything as truly historic as a FRP in mind, just a long time storage , slightly better than average , old car. But most of these cars were found early post war up to the mid 1960's so I am at least a decade if not two, too young. I used to leaf through 20 and 30 year old issues of the HCCA Gazette, Antique Automobile and The Bulb Horn in the 1980's and picture myself involved in some of the finds that made the pages of those publications from those already long ago days. . A bit like being on scene with Howard Carter in Egypt in the early 1920's. Thanks John for making this public !

Hi John, your statement that " some cars should just not be restored " strikes home with me. Over the 20+ years I have had my Staver Chicago project I have almost come to believe that it may fall into that catagory. It's a car that has been in hobby ownership since at least just after WW2. Two big problems, it is a very rare , and low production car, and it was very incomplete by the time someone decided to save it. It has had at least 4 previous car hobby owners before I decided to take it on. Each one seems to have found more pieces , and restored a few more components. But the car is still a long way from being a complete , starting point of a restoration. It's a car that is too interesting , and appears to be too complete to just give up on. And so it has been passed down from one owner to another, but has never had really substantial movement toward being a running car. But it appears to me that 1912 era parts have really dried up over the last 30 years. People on this thread keep talking about collectors with mountains of spare parts stored away , perhaps some day moved on to other collectors, perhaps some day scrapped. But if this is the case with pre 1915 , non- Ford or at least top 4 sellers of the era I sure have never found that person. I have come to the conclusion that in order to progress steadilly on a project like this a person has to be quite well off and able to attend all of the swap meets that are likely to include reasonable numbers of Brass Era parts. Hershey would be #1, but I expect others would be helpfull as well. When I first took on this project around the year 2000 I was still seeing a reasonable amount of parts from at least the correct era . Particullarly at the Portland Oregon meet , but also sprinkled around all the Pacific North West meets I attended. Fast forward to 2022, almost nothing seems to show up at either Portland or the other smaller meets. And even Ebad went from reasonably helpfull { year 2000 } to nearly useless { 2023 }. Horseless Carriage club has not been of much help either. Look on the parts for sale part of the HCCA forum and you will see lots of restored brass lamps and various accessories, but few actual parts from the cars themselves. The AACA ? just look at the Brass Era sub forum and you will see the traffic is very light indeed. Except for JV Puleo's Mitchell, Sloth and his pair of Brass projects ,alsfarms and his Locomobile and AHa and his Buick there only seems to be a trickle of pre even 1920 action let alone Brass Era. Where did it all go ?

My car is a 1918 6-45 Special. However it came with quite a bit of spare parts from a 1916 or 17 as part of the package, But almost all from 6 Cyl. cars.

An existing shop with consistent high quality output and a well established client base can exist in a relatively " high rent " area. But almost impossible for a new outfit to get going unless the overheads are reasonable regardless of the skill of the staff. Not the case with Clayton or your friends place. But posibly part of the reason why restoration shops in general seem to be becoming less numerous over time as the long time operators retire.

I don't have a parts book for the 4 's. It's possible the valve train parts are the same but I somewhat doubt it. From what I remember the 4 and 6 engines are very different designs. The control levers are almost always in poor condition on these cars . I have one pair of levers that are probably usable for my own car but no decent spares. The quadant is even more prone to damage. Even the best one I have isn't very good.

Body work almost looks English, but could just as easily be French or even Belgian or Dutch. I don't recognise the radiator shell. Wheels are most likely Rudge Whitworth. But lots of both English and European{ and even a few U.S. } cars used them. I don't think it is a U.S. make. About 1916 - 1924.

It's the heavy window tint that really puts me off the most. Look at any 1950's or 60's photo of cars like this and you are not going to see a heavy tint. It's a 1980's and up "celebrity culture " thing .

Reasonably sure it is a White steam car. But I don't know them well enough to pin down a year or model.

I might have a carburetor. I have lots of 1916 McL parts but almost all of them are for the 6.

This is a very unfortunate discovery. That's going to be a involved repair. But worth it in the end. 98% of the car still looks to be in very reasonable shape in my eye.

Is it just here for a restoration or has someone local bought it ?

I agree about standard GT 350's Terry. I made the comment specifically about the " R " models { 37 built in 1965 } . That is the GT 350's that were built ready to race. Almost all of them were raced and I expect there were many replacement engines. Still a very expensive car today. Not as much as this Corvette , but several hundred thousand dollars.

Looks like they make quite a few rims. They one style they don't make is the demountable / detachable , straight side rims that most of the better cars used circa 1908 - the early 1920's. The ones with a non split rim and a removable non split side ring retained with a thin lock ring. Firestone like on Ed's 1918 " Great White " is a good example of this style. But there were other brands of rims that were made in this general style and time frame. Most common in 25 ", 26" and 27 " diameter , x 4" and 4 1/2 " width. But other sizes were made as well. Coker tire did at one time supply some of the sizes of this style , but at a very substantial cost. Not sure if they are available anymore.

That's all that is on my potential future buy list. { North American production , 1916 - about 1960 } Actually I would also really like a Muntz Jet or a Nash Healey , but chances are those are not going to turn up in Canada either. And most likely not at a price I can afford regardless of where it comes from. What I currently own and what I have owned in the past is quite varied and diverse. Over the last 15 years or more I have only bought about 5 cars . And they have all come from Washington State , Oregon and one from Northern California. If I could find what I want in Western Canada I would surely buy on this side of the border. Last Canadian one I was serious about was in the Toronto area and when all the transport costs were added up it didn't make sense to buy. But I only buy cars that interest me. And typically for most of the last couple of decades that has ended up being a U.S. car. Not out of choice, that's just where they turn up. What I am in to is Brass era, previously mentioned upper middle class Nickel era, later 1930's - early 1940's trucks, postwar British sports cars, vintage small bore race cars. And still a fading interest in 1960's Muscle cars, was very involved years ago. The only thing that I don't have at least a project status example on that list is the upper middle class Nickle era car. I also really miss the 1953 Chevy 210 convertible { B.C. car all it's life } that I sold about 20 years ago. But at today's prices I doubt I would buy another even if I could find one. I am not sure how many 1953 Canadian 210 convertibles were made but I am reasonably sure it was not very many.

I had a 35 Maple Leaf about 20 years ago. If that's a 36 I think it is a early 36 as it looks like it is the cab that is typical early 1930's GM with lots of structural wood { 3 hinges on the door are a indication as well } . Many 36's have the new version cab { low cab, 2 door hinges are the easy way to I.D. } with far less wood than the previous model. 36's usually have horizontal hood louvers , 35's have the vertical ones like I see in your photo. Perhaps someone put a 1935 hood on it at one time if the data tag says it is a 1936 . But I suspect the one in your photo is most likely a 35 like mine was or a 36 high cab which used the 1935 style cab.. My 35 had the chrome grill and bumper. Great little truck { mine was from Sask , but before I owned it it came West }. It eventually needed a cab wood rebuild that was at the time beyond me, I sold it on to a person with more time and wood working skills that I had available at the time. I still have a 1945 GMC. One of a small number made available to non- military buyers later in 1945. And a 46 Maple Leaf 2 ton.