Greenwich, Meantime

This weekend will be the first in June, which means it's Greenwich time. Greenwich Concours d'Elegance, the brainchild of Bruce and Genia Wennerstrom, will make its 12th appearance at Roger Sherman Baldwin Park in Greenwich, Connecticut.

Showcased will be a circle of European cars with American drive trains; once called "hybrids" in this day of alternative energy hybrids perhaps they're better called multicultural motorcars. On show will be the 1955 Lincoln Indianapolis, a study by Mario Boano in search of Ford business. He was successful to the extent that Henry Ford II bought the only car produced. Other multiculturals expected include the Franco-American Facel Vega and Italian-American Iso Grifo, which shares with its sibling Iso Rivolta an engine room with Corvette power.

Greenwich is a two day show, with Saturday devoted to thoroughbred American marques like Pope Toledo, DuPont or Crane Simplex. Sunday is Concours Europa, celebrating European cars like Lancia, Bentley and Amilcar. Among the competitors will be this 1938 Delahaye with luscious coupe body by Saoutchik, shown by Dragone Classic Motorcars. Prizes are awarded for age-appropriate costumes, and the waterfront location on Greenwich Harbor gives rise to Concours d'Marine, a competition for vintage yachts.

A Christie's auction of automobiles will begin Sunday at noon, with viewing throughout the day Saturday and on Sunday morning. A multitude of prizes will be awarded each day, beginning at 3 PM. More than 300 cars are expected over the two-day event, which will also feature automotive art galleries, a book alley and displays of prestige automobiles from area dealers and manufacturers.

The Concours benefits disaster relief agency Americares and is open from 10 AM to 5 PM each day. Roger Sherman Baldwin Park is located at 100 Arch Street in Greenwich, Exit 3 of Interstate 95. C'mon down!

The Farmer's Porsche

Although purists dismiss the Cayenne sport utility model as an improper Porsche, it seems to be selling well enough. Actually it's not the first utilitarian Porsche. Porsche experiments with tractors started before World War II. After the war, the so-called System Porsche was taken up by Allgaier Maschinenbau of Uhingen, Germany, with a plant in Friedrichshafen. In 1955 the tractor business and Friedrichshafen plant were sold to Mannesman Corporation, and tractor production continued under the name Porsche-Diesel Motorenbau GmbH. Major redesign was undertaken in the late fifties; there were several sizes of tractors using one-, two-, three- or four-cylinder air-cooled diesels.

These included the single-cylinder Typ P111, built through 1956, and called "Junior" from 1957. A major redesign of the Junior was made in 1960. There was also a Junior S, a narrow tractor for work in orchards. The Standard, a two-cylinder model, came in many forms,including the Standard V and slightly less powerful Standard T. The line was filled out with a three-cylinder Super (this industrial model has a front-mounted air compressor) and four-cylinder Master.

In 1963, Germany was allowed to re-commence building military vehicles, armored personnel carriers, so the tractor business was sold to Renault, as a result of declining sales. Ironically, a Porsche tractor design of 1946, the four-wheel-drive 328, was deemed too radical at the time. A near clone is now being made in Mexico as the New Holland TN-A series.

I've come across a couple of Porsche tractors in my travels, a Super V-308 (at the head of this column) at Beaulieu Autojumble a couple of years ago, and a Standard V last year at Hanbury Steam Rally in Worcestershire, England. Although Porsche tractors have been out of production for over 40 years they're still trendy. Pedal Porsche toys for girls and boys are the latest fad from Germany.

Certainly not a sporting Porsche, the diesel tractor is the only Porsche to deserve the ultimate put-down from British motoring writers: agricultural.

I'm indebted to Don Chew of Colorado for tutoring me in the ways of Porsche tractors and for providing many of the illustrations in this CarPort.

The English Cousin

The General was in a pickle. The Volkswagen Beetle, and increasingly Renault Dauphine, were eating into his USA market share, and his reinforcement, the Chevrolet Corvair, would not be ready until the Fall of 1959. What do do? A well-equipped general reaches out to his legions, and that's just what General Motors did, bringing British Vauxhall Victors to Americans through their local Pontiac dealers.

Vauxhall Iron Works built its first cars in South London in 1903. Moving to Luton, Bedfordshire in 1905, the firm changed its name to Vauxhall Motors in 1907. Notable Vauxhalls were the Prince Henry tourers, built for the 1910 Prince Henry Trials in Germany and sold as replicas through 1913. A successor, the 30/98 was built until 1922.

Small but still moderately profitable, Vauxhall was taken over by General Motors in December 1925. This led to a gradual Americanization of the cars, and a general move downmarket. Stately models of the early 1930s became middle class by 1938, though the hallmark bonnet "flutes" from early models remained.

After World War II, Vauxhall took on more GM family resemblance with the Velox of 1948-57. New for '57 was the Victor, which, looking much like a miniature '55 Chevy, was expected to appeal to Americans. In fact, it had been designed in Detroit, with postwar American idioms like wraparound windshield, three-on-the-tree and a dashboard that mimicked the front grille. Power came from a 1507 cc (92 cid) oversquare ohv four, rated at 55 bhp.

A new Series 2 Victor, with modestly updated styling, appeared in mid-1959, available, like its predecessor, as a sedan or estate wagon. Interestingly, while the Victor was US-designed, its upmarket sibling, the Cresta, reminiscent of a '58 and '59 Chevy styling, was not. Vauxhall did well in the United States, selling more than 17,000 cars in 1958, nearly 23,000 in 1959, but never posed a threat to VW or even Renault. GM's other import invader, the Opel Rekord sold by Buick dealers, did comparably well, but that's a story for another time. US Vauxhall sales continued into 1962, but by that time all emphasis was on the new Tempest intermediate car, introduced for 1961. The only subsequent transatlantic Vauxhall connection was Luton's version of the T-body "world car," produced from 1975 to 1983. It was called, appropriately, "Chevette."

There are few reminders of Vauxhall's short but successful foray to the Americas. The car that heads this page sits among the roadside weeds near Mansfield Center, Connecticut.

Vauxhall is still GM's car for Britain, but most models are no longer built there. All Vauxhalls are now Opels under the skin, so all but the Astra are assembled in Germany.

Making Hash

Once Hudson Motor Car Company and Nash Motors went to the altar on May 1, 1954, emerging as Mr. and Mrs. American Motors, they decided to live in Ms. Nash's Kenosha, Wisconsin, home and raise their children there. Mr. Hudson's home in Detroit was deemed too costly and inefficient. So was the idea of building two entirely different lines of cars. And so it was that the basic Nash unibody skeleton was adapted to Hudson. The result is called, somewhat derisively by Hudson people, “Hash.” (If Nash people call it "Nudson," they've kept it very quiet.)

This was not an unnatural evolution. Although Nash and Hudson came from different quarters, with a bathtub-shaped unibody and hallmark “Step-down” semi-unitary design, respectively, by 1954 both Nash and Hudson had migrated to slab-sided, more modern-looking bodies.

For 1955, the two cars were given individual faces, Nash's adopting the inboard headlamps of the Nash-Healey, Hudson taking a new egg-crate grille design. Hudson cars continued to use the Hornet L-head six (still available with Twin-H Power), and Nash their ohv sixes. By then, though, any self-respecting American automaker needed a V8. AMC had none, so they bought one, the 320 cubic-inch ohv engine that Packard was using in the Clipper. By mid-1956, AMC's own 250 cubic inch V8 was ready, and debuted in “Special” models of the face-lifted ‘56 Ambassador and Hornet. Unfortunately, Hudson stylist Frank Spring was infatuated with a V motif, which didn’t blend well with the Nash body. For 1957 this was smoothed out a bit, while the Nash boldly fitted quad headlights still illegal in some states. The AMC V8 was now enlarged to 327 cubic inches, making the Packard engine superfluous. You’ve noticed that the CarPort proudly banners a ‘57 Hash on the masthead. Discovered in a junkyard, it once enjoyed headier times.

AMC founder George Mason died unexpectedly in October 1954, and his successor, George Romney, decided to kill off the “senior” cars, putting all his effort into Nash’s compact Rambler. For 1958, there were many sizes of Ramblers, but no Nashes nor Hudsons.

Did Hudson traditionalists take to the new Hash recipe? Well, yes and no. The Hashed Hudsons were not in great demand, but a rebadged version of the Rambler Cross Country station wagon was very popular, selling nearly twice the volume of any other 1955 Hudson. Romney’s little Ramblers proved to be just the ticket for the Eisenhower Recession of 1958, and actually elbowed Plymouth out of third place in sales for 1960 and 1961.

One-Horse Open Shay

Actually, it's 88 horses, but that doesn't have the right ring to it. I came across this automobile while walking down Bloor Street in Toronto a couple of summers ago. At first glance, at least to the uninitiated, it looks like a 1928-29 Model A Ford roadster. Closer examination, however, shows certain differences in detail from a real '29 roadster, although the overall proportions seem right. Most CarPorters know already that we are looking at a Shay Reproduction Model A Roadster.

Harry J. Shay, a former auto industry engineer, formed the Model A and Model T Motor Car Reproduction Corporation in February 1978. He had developed a prototype car over the previous six years and began taking orders for fiberglass-bodied roadsters that would use Pinto drivetrain and suspension parts. Taking advantage of a relationship developed with Ford Motor Company, the cars were to be sold by Ford dealers. With orders coming in, Shay opened a plant in Battle Creek, Michigan, and the first cars emerged in August 1979. Prices were to start at $5,950, then about the price of an entry-level Thunderbird. The following summer, 2,000 had been built, and Shay's company claimed to be the sixth-largest auto manufacturer in the US, but prices nearly doubled, encroaching on Lincoln territory. Cash flow problems, however, caused plant shutdown in March 1982, and liquidation that summer.

Shay Model As were reportedly reliable, and offered the impression of vintage motoring with modern comforts and service support. The cars fooled few, however, as the interior, particularly, was nothing like the original. The Pinto engine, too, while smaller yet more powerful than the old Model A unit, had a different feel and less low-end torque, though the shiftless could order an automatic transmission. Shay's careful replication of proportion, however, avoided pitfalls of the Glassic, an International Scout-based caricature of a Model A roadster built by Jack Faircloth's Glassic Industries in Florida from 1966 to 1972. Glassic also offered a two-door phaeton, no more faithful a reproduction than the roadster.

Shay Model As have a certain following, even now, and the Shay Owners Club International maintains a substantial website with historical and technical information. Glassic, too, has a web presence.

Both Shay and Glassic were later resurrected, briefly, by others, to no avail. Maybe this demonstrates that boutique manufacturing of automobiles is no longer viable. Or perhaps most people just feel as I do: If you want a Model A you're just as well off with a real one.