O Scale Motor Vehicle Chronicle Vol. XVI May 31

Wow, Richard!  You have a seemingly endless collection of very cool model cars! 

I have a lot of orphans on my layout - often they make the more interesting models.  But we're off on a brief vacation for my wife's birthday and I can't run up and take photos, so I have to work with what I have archived.  I've got some Hudsons, and Studebakers and Packards, along with cars I still can't think of as orphans Mercury, Pontiac, Plymouth, and Oldsmobile (I liked my father's Oldsmobile.) that survived the period I model and even until recently, then died. The photos below show some I do have: 

Mainline brands Long Defunct: Desoto, Nash (I think one of your cars is the same as my Maroon one, Richard).  

Many great sports car companies failed - they seem to drop like flies, others never really got started.  Here are just a few that were successful and are now org=phaned that I have - Triumph, Allard, Austin Healey (I owned five at one time in 1977), and Cisitalia, and then Borgward (center right) which really wasn't a sports car company as much (and made pretty lousy cars, actually).  

This thread is costing me a lot of money. I just purchased a 48 chevy areosedan as seen on last weeks thread.

You folks really have some nice stuff.  

That aerosedan is beautiful.  I'm envious.  I really wanted it but I have to cut back on ordering so many of these cars!

From 1951 to 1954 Nash produced the Nash Healey  They were built in England by Donald Healey with a Nash Ambassador 7 main bearing OHV six, overdrive transmission and rear end.
They did reasonably well at Le Mans placing 4th 5th or 6th from 1951 to 1954.
A member of the Buffalo Octagon Association owned The only one I ever seen.

Brooklin makes a model of the Nash Healey. I don’t have one in my collection yet.

I am often tempted to buy an English sports car like a MGB or a Triumph TR4. It would be an economical and fun car for the summer.

I've never seen a Nash Healey.  Would love to.

An MGB or a TR4 would be a fun car.  Not sure about economical, thougl.  Even with their small motors, light weight, etc., they got mediocre MPG by today's standards, their need maintenance and service like you can't believe, and they fail unexpectedly.  My neighbor has a TR6 that looks, literally, only a month old.  Flawless.  But he can never get it to idle right, or adjust the brakes so it will panic stop in a straight line without pulling to the side, or get the top to not leak in the rain.  What it does best is sit and look classic - so in the last ten years he's put, oh, 80 miles on it.  I really thought about buying an old Healey, but then thought about actually owning one: sobered up immediately!

Not a model car but you are talking about sports cars. I recently bought a 95 Honda del Sol, they only made 75,000 of them from 93 to 97, Ford sells that many F series pickups every 2 months. Mine has the rare DOHC engine with a 8,200 RPM redline and compared to old English sports cars mine has all the modern stuff such as 5 speed trans, electronic engine management, fuel injection, economy car type gas mileage, and Honda's famous reliability. It drives nice and is fun to drive, it is my favorite car. It was easy to restore compared to a really old car and I drive it regularly.

In college backk in the early 1960's a friend and I had several MGA's and I had a TR3 and later a TR4 all bought 'used' and with significant mileage. I had a blast with them however and remember them as fairly trouble-free. I'm not at all mechhanically inclined and don't remembr ever having to put any of them in the shop.

We were able to do brakes and minor things and even tackled rebuilding one MGA's engine with help from a third fella. I was surprised that two of us were able to actually lift the engine out by hand!

Here are some of the vehicles I owned in my youth - the red 53 Ford convertible was my 2nd car when I graduated high school in 1962.

Here are a few of my cars.

maroon 1941 Packard

white 42 Packard

green MGB

red Morgan

white Lotus Europa

black 1948 Ford

Here is my well worn Nash Rambler from Dinky Toys.

The Rambler is well worn but it's a good one.

Bob

I love the Rambler, Don.  Is that more or less 1/43?

C.SAM , Can you please tell me who did that 1959 black chev Impala?

Thank You. Casey

I love that Dinky Rambler, Don!  Wow - that is a treasure.

As to the reliability of sports cars, most modern ones are great.  Anything by Honda is bulletproof, if perhaps possessed of less romance and personality than some English sports cars.   Way back when, I did all my own work.  During the '70s I drove pretty much nothing but Austin Healey 3000s.  I got to where I could hear the flatness in the exhaust which meant the Lucas fuel pump was about to fail.  Literally, I could pull to the side of the road, jack the car up, rmove the passenger side rear knock off wheel, change out the fuel pump, and get on my way, in eight minutes! --I did it so often!!!

Remember the old joke: Q: Why do the English drink warm beer?  A: Because they have Lucas refrigerators!

Lee
Back in the mid-60s my sister had a MGB-GT. That car was a lot of fun to drive but was somewhat unreliable, especially during upstate New York winters. I originally considered purchasing one but I got a Mustang 2+2 instead.

I always liked the MG TF, but when an old girl friend test drove an MG B, I, aware of

the admonition about Lucas and Girling being the "Prince of Darkness" (for, purportedly, the headlights going out at inconvenient times), talked her out of it and we got her a 1978 six cylinder Camaro.  Before buying my first new car I test drove a Sunbeam sports car.  I opted instead for a super stock late 1960 Impala with a 348, 350 HP engine, four speed, three Rochester two barrels, and that would do 75 in

first, 95 in second, 115 in third, and in fourth, if you didn't run out of road, the

speedometer needle would go around to the bottom and then swing back and forth.

It would actually get 21 miles per gallon after a turnup, for maybe a week, but had

to be tuned every week, with dual point distributor and solid lifters.  Usually it would

just get 14 MPG.  I moved to Arizona from Kentucky in it, and then went on to

California in it before returning to Kentucky.  I had to tear the center carburetor

down on the back road to the Eagle Borax Works to get it running again in Death Valley, but made it out of there.  It was replaced with a four speed 383 1966 Dodge

Charger which is my favorite all time car, and was much more reliable.

Now those fastbacks were great cars. Particularly with the V8 (I actually preferred the 225-ish HP V8 to the 271 or the 306 HP Shelby for daily driving) and 4-speed, they were a dang good car.  I have to get a good model of one for my layout (even though it's mid 50s) - allowances have to be made for really great cars. 

Anyone who likes this thread would love this book - I just finished it.  Engines of Change - the American Dream in Fifteen Cars, talks about the Mustang, the Corvair, model T and other iconic cars - how they came about, the people such as Harley Earl, Zora Duntov, Lee Iacocca, etc., behind them.  Really fascinating about the 50s (and for the matter, the 60s, the 70s, the 80s, the 90s, and now).

Lee:
Thanks for the book recommendation.
My Mustang was a ’67 fastback with a 289 ci 225hp.  I think that was the best-looking Mustang ever.  I later traded it for a ’69 Mach I with a 351 Cleveland, very fast and much cooler but the basic lines were not as nice. I recently had an ’07 with a V6, Ford did excellent retro-styling job  It was surprisingly quick, and it handled like a cat on railroad tracks.

I still have a fondness for English sport cars. It started when I was 12years old. A school chum’s mother drove a Jaguar XK120 and his dad and older sister drove MG TCs. How cool was that? Their regular family car was an ugly Hillman sedan, not very cool at all.

Having worked as a mechanic on English motorcycles (my first job out of college, don't ask!), I cannot imagine owning an English sports car and relying on it for transportation. I used to be in a car pool with a guy who had a Jaguar sedan. The heater would regularly stop working in October and stay non-functional until May, when it came back with a bang and couldn't be shut off till it was disconnected. 

The story about the Mustang 2+2 also brings back memories. A long time ago I test drove a 2+2 with a 390 that was for sale. The guy had just put the rear end back together. I got it out on the road and stomped on it in second gear. KA-BLAMMO!!! And the car slowly coasted to a stop with the engine still running. The guy had put the half-shafts in on the wrong sides. The long one went in no problem, and the short one went in just far enough to engage the splines, but as soon as there was any torque on it, it stripped the tiny bit of engagement and spun freely. Fortunately we were only a couple of blocks from the guy's house, so we walked back and I got on my motorcycle and left. 

Now I have a Porsche 944 Turbo with an Autothority Stage II chipset. It's reliable, but it requires an excessive amount of obscenely expensive routine maintenance to keep it on the road. There's no excuse for having to change timing belts every 30,000 miles! Mine has about 200K on it and still runs well, but I need to take it in pretty soon for a major tuneup and some other things. 

BK
Who made the Packard models and what is their price range? They look to be an accurate model of a Packard 160 Limousine. I have an IXO model of a Russian ’47 Zis120 which is almost identical to the ’42 Packard 160

Casey,  I'm sorry but I do not know. Forum member Tom Shirey donated it to our layout and it had a white top. The one I had back in school was actualy a black hardtop but this was close enough - and the price was right! 

We also have a medium blue 59 hardtop that is fairly common but it's buried and I don't know who made it either...

Richard:  I gotta have one of those '49 Nash Ambassadors!  Man; I grew up in Milwaukee, the home of Nash and I thought that the "bathtub Nash" was really a neat car.  In fact, I had the use of a '49 Nash 2-door for some of my early dates when I was just 16.  (Now, remember, what Nash was really famous for and how it pertained to dating!  Yeah, right!  They had seats that converted to a bed!)

My wife bought me a Brooklin 1935 Nash Ambassador, which occupies a prominent place on my layout.  But it's the only Nash.  Packards. yes; lots of Chevies and Fords,  even a 1950 VW, but sure would like to see more Nashes on a layout that represents the Milwaukee Road, the RR that actually serviced the Nash factory.

Paul Fischerr

Richard E. the Packard is made for a Russian company based in the U.S. called Esval. The average rate on line is $98.00 + shipping.  These are well detailed cars but there is a downside to detail which is incorrect hood ornament.

If you or anyone is interested  The maroon is available for $97.00 shipped.

Have you ever seen the Packards made by Automodello? Those are beauties.

Bob

Vitesse and Road Champs both made diecast top-up versions. The Vitesse had overly wide whitewalls, so my guess is Road Champs.

Thank You C.SAM. I believe I have found it or one like it, made by Spark Models.

I am just having a little sticker shock @ $79.95. 

I also had one just like it, (all black). Thanks Again.