Larry Price recreates the car of his dreams

17 October, 2016

Larry Price still clearly remembers the excitement he felt as he heard the news — live — of the D-Type Jaguar crossing the finishing line in second place during 1954.

Fast forward three-plus decades, and, right from the start, Larry has done his best to replicate the ’56 and ’57 long-nose winning cars. Although he knew his car would never be an exact replica, he enjoyed doing the research and building details that were non-functional facsimiles, such as the wiring and fuse boxes in the passenger compartment.

The car was finally painted in colours as close to the Le Mans car as possible, and the number four is a nod to the Ecurie Ecosse car number that crossed the line in 1956, driven by Ron Flockhart and Ninian Sanderson. The single stripe across the nose was also on the original car, and represented the fact that it was the Ecurie Ecosse number one car.

We’ve put together a gallery for you to get a sneak peek at what makes Larry’s car so special:

Check out our full story in the November issue of New Zealand Classic Car (Issue No. 311).


A second dose of Dash

When the car arrived in Wellington in December 2018 it was duly taken along for entry certification. Vehicle Inspection NZ (VINZ) found some wrongly wired lamps and switches — not too bad — but, much more significantly, some poor welding repairs. As the structural problems were probed more thoroughly, we realized the previous owner’s restoration would not do and we needed an upgrade. Dash had made it into the country but it would take some time and money before he would be free to explore any of New Zealand’s scenic highways.
We took the car to our new home in Johnsonville in the northern suburbs of Wellington and I pored over the car in detail to figure out what was next. There were lots of new parts on the car and a very perky reconditioned drivetrain but the chassis needed serious work.

Lunch with… Jim Palmer

In the 1960s, Hamilton’s Jim Palmer won the prestigious ‘Gold Star’ four times and was the first resident New Zealander home in the New Zealand Grand Prix on five consecutive occasions. He shared the podium with Stirling Moss, Jack Brabham, Bruce McLaren, Graham Hill, Jim Clark, Denny Hulme, Jackie Stewart, and Chris Amon. The extent of his domination of the open-wheeler scene in New Zealand will probably never be matched or exceeded. Yet he’s always been modest about his achievements.