Praises for the Goodwood Revival

I've only seen coverage of the Goodwood Revival in British magazines like Classic and Sports Car and Thoroughbred & Classic Cars, but I've no doubt it's a spectacular event. It features a combination of a special locale, a historical back story, a compelling set of participants, support from automotive manufacturers who celebrate their past, and thousands of British and European participants. 

Randy Nonnenberg wrote this terrific piece for Autoweek and Bring a Trailer. 

And, of course, Goodwood features spectacular automobiles such as this one...

 

The Monza Returns

So let's say you're a German automobile manufacture not named Audi, BMW, or Mercedes and you're not imported into the US market. Before GM's bankruptcy you found yourself sold by [gulp!] Buick dealers as a captive import. 

You made awful little cars like this Kadett


 But you also made fabulous cars like the Opel GT, an startling French-German car that made the Corvette look silly.



By the mid-1970's Opel had produced the Manta, a terrific sports coupe, which really showed up its Buick master. 



Opel ceased to be imported but it always remained an important element of GM's European operations. It also provided components and innovation to GM's corporate efforts to produce better handling, more compact sized sports sedans. When GM faced bankruptcy in recent years divesting itself of Opel was considered an option but GM found another way to retain its investment. Today Opel actually owns Vauxhall, GM's British stepchild, and has close tie in with Peugeot (PSA) of France.

As part of GM Opel must have the "right" to piggyback onto the Monza nameplate, last used in a rather awful Vega offshoot in the '80's, but used to perfection [if to the annoyance of F1 fans] in the Corvair.

So there's a new Monza, a concept car, introduced by Opel this week at the Frankfurt Auto Show.

It's quite handsome, in the sculpted, overdone way of a 2013 vehicle. Of course, I do prefer the lines of my Monza.

Testify!

I bow in recognition of the brilliance of James Ruppert's essay in Hemmings, "Why You Must Be a Nut to Own a Classic."

 

Enjoy it here in its entirety.

 

Fair Dinkum'

The Corvair made its second 715-round trip in April, 2013 to take me to cover the New York Auto Show for Rovers Magazine. Sure, the Land Rover could have been the vehicle of choice, but the "Noise, Noise, Noise," to quote The Grinch, and the vibration and 18 mpg have been painful in the past. So I called upon the Corvair again.

I did very little maintenance on the car other than replacing the batteries on the portable radio [the stock AM radio for the entire trip - no way!], checking that I had extra oil and a coffee mug. I did think this through and decided to make certain I had spares of the sort that I could not find at an auto parts story in a hurry: fan belt, fuel pump, oil cooler and alternator. All are unique to the Corvair and while available through a specialists like Clark's Corvairs, I didn't have the extra time to wait for an overnight delivery.

Despite the near-record amounts of snow last winter the roads were dry and I sailed along rather comfortably until I turned off onto the Merritt Parkway in central Connecticut. I noticed quite a number of blown down trees along the side of the road and saw evidence of crews at work. So I didn't think that the odor of something burning was anything but men at work - wrong! I rolled down the driver's window to figure out the source of the smell and realized that nothing changed. In fact, the smell came from inside the car, as did the traces of white smoke.

I pulled over onto a grassy verge and turned off the motor. Upon opening the trunk I watched some smoke billow out and smelled burning rubber. At least the engine wasn't covered in oil! I started up the car again and then returned to the rear to watch the carnage. What I found was the smell was the fan belt melting; I could see the smoke rising from above the alternator. 

Removing the belt I noticed it was warm and gummy. To my delight, the fan appeared to turn without bad noises, as did the idler pulley, but the alternator made a raspy sound as I spun the pulley. Could that cause all this fright? 

What to do? Well I had tools and a spare alternator, and while it was chilly outside, it wasn't raining and it was still mid-afternoon. I called Clark's on the cellphone to find out where Chevrolet had hidden the alternator bolts [they were hidden from view underneath] and figured it was worth a try. That's when a Good Samaritan named Greg pulled over in his minivan to see if he could help. Well, actually, he couldn't as he didn't work on cars himself "but I liked watching my grandfather work on them." 

So I got out the socket set, the replacement alternator, the spare fan belt and the Never Seize. Within 45 minutes I'd swapped everything out. I held my breath while I restarted the car. There were no untoward noises, no smoke, no odors. I drove off and an hour later arrived at the home of summer friends here on the island.

The Auto Show experience was, as always, amazing. Land Rover pulled out all the stops to introduce the new Range Rover and I found myself at their "private" party for 600 + people.

A benefit of covering the Auto Show is the chance to meet up again with Land Rover's delightful group of "product specialists," such as Renee Hermitz, who appeared in the Rovers Magazine article on the event. 

The drive home to Maine really showed off the Corvair's capabilities. It wasn't long into the trip north that it began to rain - hard -and then sleet and/or snow. In fact, the miserable driving conditions continued through Massachusetts, New Hampshire and into Maine. Every truck that passed me threw off sheets of water that buried the car. Yes, it leaked under the dashboard and onto my feet, but the car never lost its composure at 65-70 mph, barely wavered as the extreme crosswinds slammed against its side, and it still returned 25 mpg on the trip. 

Fair dinkums' to mention the breakdown, as Connecticut friends were astounded that I carried a spare alternator, but really, if you're using your classic car on a trip set to a schedule, you should carry parts like this with you.

715 Miles in a '66 Corvair

Last week I completed a 715 mile round-trip from Maine to southwestern Connecticut in a 46-year old car notoriously labeled as "Unsafe at Any Speed."

 p

Yes, it's the little maroon one buried in the snow in this photo.

The decision to drive the Corvair on a work/vacation trip was not made lightly. I'd completed the trip in years past in my '66 Land Rover II-A and my '80 Triumph TR-7 Spider. Driving that same seven hours in the Land Rover had left my ears ringing, my body vibrating and my wallet lighter due to its 18 mpg. 

The same distance the following year in the TR-7 made for 25 mpg, less vibration, less assurance [it is a TR-7 after all] and a feeling that I'd sat in a space capsule for 6 hours. It also left me with a December dilemma at a Portland, ME motel one morning - how to get the door locks thawed out? The only successful method was to heat the key with the room's hair dryer so hot that it popped the circuit breaker in the dryer, then to run down two flights of stairs to insert the key into the lock before it cooled down. The second time was a charm.

So this year I felt the Corvair should do the honors. Work schedules meant that I could not allow myself an extra day [in case of breakdowns]; I would absolutely, positively have to get there on time on Saturday. My hesitation was based on the car's annoying habit of these past two years of wanting to die off on the side of the road when underway for an hour or more. No mechanic or Corvair expert had been able to figure out the source of this problem.

I booked the Corvair into the island's garage for the mechanic to check under the car. All the suspension pieces, steering components and wheel bearings seemed tight. I did the usual tune-up of points, condenser, rotor, distributor cap and spark plugs, and checked the timing. An oil/filter change had been done in October. I ordered a spare fan belt and fuel pump from Clark's and bought a used oil cooler from Maine's specialty shop, Maplewood Motors, in Cape Neddick. I packed tools, charged the cellphone and said a prayer.

On Friday I boarded the ferry for the 90 minute ride to the mainland and then started on my way south. I made it to Portland late that afternoon, booked myself into an inexpensive motel and then joined a group of Land Rover friends as the Sebago Brewpub in nearby Scarborough.  

Saturday morning I packed up again and headed out on the Maine Turnpike, to I-495 in Massachusetts and then onto the Mass Pike towards Connecticut. After stopping for fuel and water [for me, not the car], I started the car and noticed it did not want to accelerate out of the rest area. Just as it had done in the past it began to bog down instead of going faster. As I approached the turnpike entrance I wondered about proceeding ahead at all; you could not turn around and go back on the highway. Instead I plowed ahead and suddenly the car seemed to run on all 6 cylinders and both carburetors. This would happen again at a rest stop in Connecticut but other than that, the car ran flawlessly. Oh, and I got 28 mpg at 60-75 mph.

The car received a few odd stares and one memorable moment. On I-91 between Hartford and New Haven I drove in the center lane when I noticed a Mazda sedan, driven by a young guy, close to my rear bumper. I pulled over into the right lane and he followed me. When I looked in my rear view mirror I saw the passenger with a camera and noticed a flash. The car pulled up alongside me as they continued to take photos of the car from a few angles. Less surprising but equally pleasurable was a time when a new Corvette, with a man and a woman aboard, passed me as the the driver gave the Monza a "thumbs up."

Seat technology, particularly for "compact cars," had not advanced far in the 1960's. Add to this the reality that my driver's seat consisted of some crushed foam and a sheepskin seat cover and you wind up with an uncomfortable perch for a 6 hour drive. Also, as is often the case with rear engine cars the pedals sit a bit skewed towards the right; you feel as though your right leg is stretched out rather far to hold the accelerator towards the floor. This really became an issue on the trip home - more about that later.

While in Cos Cob my hosts noted they had seen a Corvair for sale and we visited it, right near Greenwich's public beach. A '68 convertible it looked good from a distance but showed some minor rust bubbles and mismatched paint up close. Nonetheless, it was still fun to see.

The late model convertible always looked terrific and in this light color, especially entertaining. To my dismay it had the s-l-o-w Powerglide 2-speed transmission and an aftermarket Edelbrock 4-barrel carb [instead of the 4-carb 140 hp setup implied by the air cleaner].

Still the two Corvairs looked pretty good together - they were clearly an unusual sight in this upscale village of Greenwich. 

 
My hostess told me of her cleaning woman's reaction to seeing the car in their driveway. The young woman, a recent immigrant from Poland, stared out the window to ask "whose car is that?" When she was told it was mine [we had met last year] she asked "he really drove it here?" "Yes,' my hostess replied, "from Maine." This astounded the woman, "he drove all the way from Maine? In that?" On the many winding residential streets of Cos Cob the Corvair really strutted its stuff.

The drive home to Maine really demonstrated the Corvair's capabilities. On the Friday I chose to drive home a powerful storm hit all of New England: heavy constant rain with winds from 40 - 55 mph. Rear-engine cars can tend to yaw in high crosswinds like this and, of course, any required repair in the pouring rain would be most un-fun.

As I drove northeast on the highways I came to realize the weather would not improve throughout the entire drive, that any truck passing the Corvair would engulf it sheets of rain and mist. Visibility would become a problem; as the car leaked a bit around the windshield, so, too would defrosting the windows.

I also realized that I had never driven this car in a significant, long-lived storm. I had no idea if the windshield wiper motor would run for 6 hours or whether the heater motor would function for that length of time. I found I had to open the vent window to assist in airflow the clear the left edge of the windshield. I stopped for fuel in Charlton, MA, along the Mass Pike, and then made it to New Hampshire and finally, Maine. The car, however, never faulted in speed or handling. While I could certainly feel the gusts of wind slam against the car, their shoves were handled easily by the excellent suspension. Everything worked the entire trip.

As I approached Portland I realized the winds had only strengthened and that I should find out if the Rockland-Vinalhaven ferry would even run that late afternoon. A quick phone call indicated "no" so I stopped in Portland for a break. Stepping out of the Corvair the wind shot rain onto my face with such force that the water drops hurt when they landed on me.

I continued on to Rockland and booked a motel room for the night. My right leg now felt like I had stretched a ligament or tendon around my right knee. I could not bend it very comfortably, whether seated or lying in bed. That's the aftereffect of the driver's seat - it should be reupholstered one day.

I know that many classic car owners avoid driving their cars in inclement weather - at times, myself included. This work/vacation trip showed me that the Corvair could be used as a daily driver in any weather. I still don't know the cause of the "bogging" [vapor lock?] after long drives but I now feel much more comfortable about jumping in the car and relying on it.

Oh, it passed the 130,000 mile mark during the trip.

Le voiture parfait

I'm an unapologetic fan of the Citroen 2CV, a simple yet elegantly engineered car that - like many classics - outlived its intended lifespan.

 

 The 2CV became Citroen's answer in post-WW II France to the Renault 4CV, but it many ways, it's closer to my beloved Land Rover than the Renault competitor. Aimed largely at the farmer the Deux Chevaux needed to be simple, rugged, adaptable and capacious. It met this charge and also became an enduring icon of French life whether on the continent or in France's postwar colonies. 

As with many French cars America never took to it. The top rolled back to open its occupants to the sky; it windows did not roll or slide, they flipped up and latched in place. The gearshift stuck out from the metal dashboard. With barely 40 horsepower you move from Standard Time to Daylight Savings Time before you reached highway speeds. 

Like Rover, Citroen manufactured far more luxurious sedans but found itself "stuck" with the 2CV right through the early 1980's as its artful shape, essential rightness and uniqueness kept it in the public eye for generations. It's small engine can be maintained by any interested enthusiast, too, and the word in European publications is that these little gems last forever.

Just like my Land Rover it's also nearly hand-manufactured, and thus, eminently rebuildable. There's a restorer in New Jersey who does nothing but 2CV's, as noted in this recent New York Times article.

Internet commerce has made parts supplies for these cars a doodle and given their international standing, it's quite likely that a strong parts presence will continue for quite some time. To me, it represents one of the perfect cars for daily classic car driving. 

A Pioneer in Turbocharging

When Chevrolet decided that the Corvair, its 1960's "economy car," didn't really fill that niche, it reacted rather quickly. By 1962 the Chevy II appeared and the Corvair variants, such as the station wagon and the black rubber mat-no chrome-underpowered "fleet models," should disappear.

The engine's design and the car's overall dimensions really meant the engine size could not grow much beyond the 140 - 164 cu. in. of the flat, aircooled 6 cylinder. To get more horsepower, the Corvair's engineers increased the number of carbs from two to four, and even more spectacularly, created the first American turbocharged cars.

 

Long before Saab, even before Porsche, turbocharged their cars, you could buy a Corvair Spyder, and later, Corsa, with a long-lived turbocharger. No automatics allowed; all those models came with 4-speed transmissions only.

Here's an overview of the Corvair's turbocharging from Carbuzz.com.

 

Land Rover and Aston Martin?

 

Might this storied nameplate join the Leaping Cat and the Green Oval under Tata? That's the report published yesterday in AM, an online UK resource for automobile dealers. 

Their report states that the current majority owners, a Kuwaiti investment group, would like to sell their stake in Aston Martin and that Tata, Land Rover and Jaguar's current parent, might be a possible suitor.

It would certainly be a cost-effective way for Aston to get the all wheel drive and/or four wheel drive technology it might require to remain up to date in the luxury car market.

Here's the full report from AM Online.

 

 

The End of Lancia?

I'm not upset about the departure of Suzuki from the US market but losing Lancia would hurt.

 

As reported in Hemmings and elsewhere, Lancia's parent company, Fiat, now wonders aloud whether it cares to continue this manufacturer renown for its engineering excellence. 

 

At present Fiat handles Lancia as GM once did Saab, using it as excuse to re-badge boring cars that don't sell well so as to increase sales volume. Here's hoping that Fiat can see the value of re-energizing this marque.

 

 

A Life Well Led

Word came today of the death of John Fitch, age 95, in Connecticut. His influence on the classic cars I admire and the sports car racing I enjoy, cannot be underestimated. We're a lesser world without him.

For Corvair enthusiasts John Fitch took the early model Corvair and created the Fitch Sprint. You could order the parts and install them on your own, or drive your Corvair to his garage near Lime Rock, CT and have his crew modify your Corvair to do everything Chevrolet should have done from the start. 


 
When the late model Corvair came out in late 1964, Fitch created an even more special Sprint, taking advantage of the improvements built into the new model.




Seeing the success built into the '65 Corvair he set his sights on using that platform to become the underpinning of the Fitch Phoenix.

 

His considerable talents also included sports car driving and engineering. Autoweek summed them up best in an obituary posted today, which I've reprinted here:

Dan Klein, Autoweek, October 31, 2012



We lost more than just one of our own early Wednesday. We lost a national treasure. At age 95, American John Cooper Fitch--the first Sports Car Club of America national champion and a star in European sports-car racing in the 1950s and '60s--died at 1:20 a.m. from Merkel carcinoma, a rare skin cancer, at his home surrounded by family in Lime Rock, Conn.

Fitch, who went on to become a pioneer in racing safety, was born in Indianapolis on Aug. 4, 1917. After his parents divorced, his mother married an executive at the Stutz company who introduced his young stepson to racing at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. But the boy wasn't impressed by what he saw.
“A bunch of cars going around in a circle. What's the point?” was a question he posed often, even later in life.

His first passion was airplanes, not cars, so it is not surprising that when World War II broke out, he volunteered to become a pilot. He was in England at the time (1939) on an extended trip to “see the world” and tried to join the RAF, since the United States hadn't yet joined the war. When this proved impossible, he returned to the U.S. and, in 1941, volunteered for the Army Air Corps. Fitch took easily to flying, and attained the rank of captain quickly, serving in northern Africa before entering the battle in Europe.

Based in London, Fitch flew many successful bomber escort missions. On one, he achieved elite status by shooting down a Messerschmidt ME 262 jet fighter. “We couldn't catch them in the air because they were simply too fast,” he recalled, “but I was lucky enough to come upon one that was taking off. It was relatively easy.” Whether it was modesty or bravado, Fitch often dismissed his heroic feats that way.
But shortly before the end of the war, it was Fitch who became the target. After three attempts to strafe a Nazi supply train--“When we scored a direct hit, the boiler sent up a magnificent plume of steam!”--his P-51 Mustang was hit by enemy fire. He survived the crash but was captured quickly. 

A mere seven years later, he became the first--and to this day the only--American to race for the Mercedes-Benz factory team. People asked Fitch often if that transition period seemed short to him, but it didn't.

“During the war we were soldiers. By the early fifties, we were drivers. No problem.”

When Fitch returned to the U.S., he was among the many young pilots who'd developed the need for speed during the war. He had also developed an awareness of road racing, having witnessed an event at Brooklands in the U.K. while on his grand tour. Unlike Indy's “roundy round,” this form of motorsport appealed to Fitch, so road racing became his logical outlet.

Like many of his contemporaries, he started out campaigning an MG-TC, primarily at nearby Bridgehampton, N.Y. But unlike many of his contemporaries, Fitch was good. So good, in fact, that he caught the eye of Briggs Cunningham, the wealthy racing enthusiast who encouraged Fitch to enter the 1951 Grand Prix of Argentina. Fitch couldn't afford a competitive car of his own, but he was able to borrow an Allard that had been wrecked in a previous race. This is a story Fitch loved to tell.

“The frame was bent, so I secured it to an oak tree with a chain and kept backing up till it was reasonably straight. Well, I won the race and was awarded a trophy by Eva Peron, who gave me a kiss . . . and died shortly thereafter!” With that victory, Fitch clinched the first SCCA National Championship.

He also clinched the support of Cunningham, whose financial clout allowed Fitch to race cars that complemented his considerable skills. Notably, Fitch scored a number of impressive victories in the early '50s in Cunninghams at then-fledgling road courses like Elkhart Lake and Watkins Glen. But Cunningham had bigger plans: He had his sights set on Le Mans. His goal was to win the world's most demanding endurance race with an American car and driver, and Fitch was to play a leading role in that quest.
In 1952, Fitch came close to making Cunningham's dream come true. After setting fastest lap in his C-4R roadster, he was forced to retire late in the race because of bad fuel provided by the sanctioning body. Although others have questioned this “coincidence,” Fitch always accepted it at face value.

Ironically, the Cunningham's failure gave him the opportunity to take his career to the next level. During the race, Fitch was impressed by the new Mercedes-Benz 300 SLs. Similarly, Mercedes team chief engineer Rudi Uhlenhaut was impressed with Fitch's performance in the Cunningham. So when the American approached the German to compliment him on the new car, Uhlenhaut reciprocated by offering the opportunity to take a few laps in the innovative roadster after the upcoming Nürburgring race. Fitch knew that while Cunningham would probably wind down his eponymous Le Mans efforts in the near term, Mercedes-Benz would likely do the opposite. So he capitalized on the invitation to develop a relationship with the man in charge. The Nürburgring courtesy laps would be his audition to join the vaunted German race team.

Team manager Alfred Neubauer exhorted Fitch to take it easy, but the determined American's agenda was more aggressive: He drove his two allotted laps with the knowledge that his career depended on it. Neubauer's response? Do one more to prove they weren't flukes. Fitch complied by shaving a few seconds off his previous lap and the session ended with the proverbial, “We'll be in touch if something comes up.”

However, patience never was Fitch's strong suit; he decided to create his own “something” and doggedly pursued a reluctant Neubauer to enter a team of 300 SLs in the upcoming Carrera Panamericana, a race that wasn't even on Neubauer's radar. Fitch's persistence won out, and on Oct. 26, 1952, he was invited to Mexico City to pilot one of team's roadsters. He didn't win the race, but he did win Neubauer's respect, and that set the stage for his eventual invitation to join the likes of Juan Manuel Fangio, Stirling Moss and Karl Kling to race for Mercedes-Benz in 1955, the greatest season in the company's competition history.
Two of the most significant events in Fitch's racing career happened that year. The first was his astonishing best-in-class, 5th overall finish in the Mille Miglia at the wheel of a stone-stock production 300 SL coupe, whose suspension was so bad, “we had to stop and tie down the axle with our belts.” Yet Fitch screamed into Brescia just one hour and 22 minutes behind overall winner Moss, who was piloting a full racing version of the 300 SLR. The only cars between them were Fangio's 300 SLR, a Ferrari and a Maserati--all dedicated race cars. Moss's navigator was journalist Denis Jenkinson, who will always be remembered for the famous “scrolling map in a box” he used to guide Moss through the treacherous course. But in fact it was Fitch who conceived and built the device, and he always treasured the note of gratitude that “Jenks” sent him for providing it.

The second landmark event, of course, was Le Mans. Fitch was waiting in the Mercedes-Benz team trailer, just behind the pit wall, having a last-minute cup of coffee before taking over from teammate Pierre Levegh. But he never got that chance. A crash involving Levegh's 300 SLR, Mike Hawthorn's D Jaguar and Lance Maklin's Austin Healey resulted in what has remained the worst disaster in the history of automobile racing. The crash killed more than 80 people, and changed Fitch's life forever. It was then that he realized something had to be done to improve racing and highway safety, a challenge that became an overriding pursuit for the rest of his life, leading to, among other innovations, the development of the ubiquitous yellow, sand-filled Fitch Inertia Crash Barriers--the yellow crash barrels seen on racetracks and highways--that have saved thousands of lives around the world.

But Fitch's racing career didn't end with Le Mans. At the end of 1955, Chevrolet's Chief Engineer, Ed Cole suggested that he help develop the Corvette into a world-class race car. The two hit it off, and in early 1956, Cole asked Fitch to develop and manage a team of Corvettes he planned to enter at Sebring, just six weeks hence. Corvette father Zora Arkus Duntov had already turned down Cole's request, claiming that it would be impossible to make the slow, overweight production two-seaters competitive in such a short amount of time, but in typical Fitch fashion, Fitch rose to the occasion.

Four cars were entered, but different engines put them in two different classes: B and C Production. Against overwhelming odds, the team won both classes, giving them the team prize as well. Years later, Corvette Racing's present-day manager Doug Fehan led his drivers in a standing ovation for Fitch, remarking that he had almost single-handedly achieved in six weeks what today would take an entire dedicated organization years to accomplish.

In 2010, Fehan again led his drivers in a salute to Fitch, this time at LeMans, where, at age 93, Fitch reunited with the 1960 Corvette that he and Bob Grossman co-drove to give Corvette its first significant international victory 50 years earlier (Autoweek, Aug. 16, 2010).

Fitch's motorsports achievements have been immortalized by numerous awards, including his induction into the Corvette, SCCA (inaugural class), Sebring, New England Racer, and Motorsports of America Halls of Fame. In June of 2012, he was inducted into the Bloomington Gold Great Hall.

Although Fitch and his self-designed Phoenix sports car remained a common sight in the Lime Rock paddock until shortly before his death, the Le Mans reunion marked his last major public appearance. Close friends noticed a marked decline in Fitch's vitality after his wife, Elizabeth, died in 2009. But he was insistent upon remaining in their 1700s “homestead” in Lime Rock, which they purchased in 1956, when Fitch was named the track's first general manager. Despite his on-going soil contamination issues with the state of Connecticut (Autoweek, April 14, 2008), he did his best to go it alone at home, even at the expense of his declining health. To no-one's surprise, Fitch remained fiercely stubborn and independent to the end.

Read more: http://www.autoweek.com/article/20121031/alms/121019873#ixzz2Ati6NTgl