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Club Corner: Rolls-Royce and Bentley Club of New Zealand

10 February, 2016

 

The Rolls-Royce and Bentley Club of New Zealand (NZRRBC) exists to enable those people who enjoy these wonderful cars to get together from time to time. Club members help each other with information about the cars and their upkeep, and sources of reliable servicing, but mostly they just have fun. Club members meet for summer picnics, for Sunday lunches in the winter, and weekends away to interesting places. There are several opportunities during the year to join in longer touring rallies organized by this club, or others which invite the NZRRBC to join them.

You do not have to have a Rolls-Royce or a Bentley to join the club, but it is a good idea to join if you fancy buying one, so that the experience of the members can help you to buy a suitable car, as its history and ownership will probably be known to them, and a wise purchase can be made. The club maintains a technical library, and has a technical officer to assist with requests from club members.

The club is enjoyed by families and is not only the province of the male of the species, in fact the present chairman of the Northern division is a keen motoring lady who, along with her partner, has driven their 1930 Rolls-Royce from Auckland on car rallies to the bottom of the South Island on two occasions, and also their 1952 Bentley Mark VI during the five-yearly International Vintage Car Rally of New Zealand which last time was based in Wanganui for two weeks.

At present the club numbers around 200 members with mostly, but not exclusively, older or period cars — although vehicles owned by the members range from 1920s to the present day, with the great majority from 1940s to 1990s. The website gives the information needed to join the club, which has three regions to cover all New Zealand — Northern, Central and the Southern regions, with bases in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. Many events are held in areas outside these main centres, so that all members can join in at some stage. For example the National AGM for 2016 will be held over ANZAC weekend in Napier, while the 2103 AGM was held at the Chateau Tongariro. 

If you are interested to come and join one of the club’s outings, you would find a friendly group that would love to see you.

Join the club

nzrrbc.co.nz

This article was originally published in New Zealand Classic Car Issue No. 297. You can pick up a print copy or a digital copy of the magazine below:


ROTARY CHIC

Kerry Bowman readily describes himself as a dyed-in-the-wool Citroën fan and a keen Citroën Car Club member. His Auckland home holds some of the chic French cars and many parts. He has also owned a number of examples of the marque as daily drivers, but he now drives a Birotor GS. They are rare, even in France, and this is a car which was not supposed to see the light of day outside France’s borders, yet somehow this one escaped the buyback to be one of the few survivors out in the world.
It’s a special car Kerry first saw while overseas in the ’70s, indulging an interest sparked early on by his father’s keenness for Citroëns back home in Tauranga. He was keen to see one ‘in the flesh’.
“I got interested in this Birotor when I bought a GS in Paris in 1972. I got in contact with Citroën Cars in Slough, and they got me an invitation to the Earls Court Motor Show where they had the first Birotor prototype on display. I said to a guy on the stand, ‘I’d like one of these,’ and he said I wouldn’t be allowed to get one. Citroën were building them for their own market to test them, and they were only left-hand drive.”

Tradie’s Choice

Clint Wheeler purchased this 1962 Holden FJ Panelvan as an unfinished project, or as he says “a complete basket case”. Collected as nothing more than a bare shell, the rotisserie-mounted and primed shell travelled the length of the country from the Rangiora garage where it had sat dormant for six years to Clint’s Ruakaka workshop. “Mike, the previous owner, was awesome. He stacked the van and parts nicely. I was pretty excited to get the van up north. We cut the locks and got her out to enjoy the northland sun,” says Clint. “The panelvan also came with boxes of assorted parts, some good, some not so good, but they all helped.”