How to tailor your garage door to suit your classic-steel

23 May, 2017

 

A classic car owner can find joy in two areas of what they do with their machines. First, the process of buying/restoring/owning their dream classic; and two, building/tailoring a garage to suit their taste. So when you have both of those pieces of the puzzle, there is one aspect to form the cherry on top — the perfectly suited garage door choice.

Auckland-based Prestige Doors and Gates has been designing, manufacturing and installing the very best options possible for clients since 1992. However the latest garage door product is something truly special for anyone looking for a garage door to both protect and highlight their vehicles — the plexiglass garage door.

Plexiglass is not only stronger and more durable than glass, it also offers a variety of colour options (including transparent) so you can enjoy viewing your vehicles outside the garage/workshop as well as inside. It also has the additional benefit of allowing in heat and light, but still offering privacy options.

The Prestige team can match your door with its laser-cut aluminium design for your aesthetic preferences, and any full custom design is possible. The aluminium sheet with the plexiglass backing is durable, strong and looks fantastic. 

You can also select from any number of options within the Prestige Doors and Gates range, with multiple flushmount, aluminum, steel, and timber configurations available.

For more information, contact Prestige on 09 638 9474, [email protected], or head to prestigedoors.co.nz.
 

Racing Mazdas

Both Rod Millen and Ron Kendall were rotary racing kings, emanating from the North Shore of Auckland, where I grew up. And the ultimate rotary techno guru was Bill Shiells, who developed the engine into a rocket ship while working out of Gulf Mazda in Takapuna from 1969, and later in his own business, Rotorsport. He began to extract some phenomenal horsepower from the enigmatic rotary engine. Bill was one of the first to race the Mazda RX-2 Coupe in 1971 and achieved immediate success, causing others to sit up and take notice, particularly the North Shore’s racing elite. They included Robbie Francevic, Rod Millen, Ron Kendall, John Woolf, John Le Feuvre, and Rex Findlay.

Range Rover CSK — the original SUV

The Range Rover, thanks to Charles Spencer King, went into production in 1970 boasting an iconic shape that would last until 1996. The vehicle that would create the SUV moniker came about because Rover decided it was time to add a bigger four-wheel-drive vehicle, one with a 100-inch wheelbase, to the model range. Land Rover made a 109-inch wheelbase model but the standard vehicle had a 88-inch wheelbase.
The new model would be more suitable for road use than the existing Land Rover, which was considered to be predominantly for rural use. To make sure it could cope on any road it came standard with the Rover 3.5-litre V8 engine. The body design was originally sketched by King and went into production with only a few minor touch-ups by the Rover styling team.
According to King, “The idea was to combine the comfort and on-road ability of a Rover saloon with the off-road ability of a Land Rover. Nobody was doing it.”