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New Zealand Classic Car 373, January 2022 is out now!

13 December, 2021

Beach Buggies might be 60s years old but their perky charm is even more fun today. Get the vibe, the history and the how-to in New Zealand Classic Car 373


 

 

As modern cars get softer, the cute curves and the raw dak-dak-dak beat of classic Beach Buggy blasts you with raw sensation — and the smiles per mile go through the roof. We check out this timeless classic and its 60-year-old creation myths and legends. We also look at a 1906 Cadillac, and preview the Jaguars that were going to race in Jaguar’s centenary Historic GP in Taupo, now postponed to 2023, thanks to Covid. So, if you want to see them all in one place now, it has to be NZCC! Sticking with the Dune theme, we’ve also got a pristine Holden Sandman that’s also now precious Kiwiana. It’s as ‘westie’ as a mullet —  all business in the front and party in the back!


What to expect in the January 2022 issue of NZCC


McLaren M8? No it’s Mirage…


Taupo Historic GP’s Jag centenary cancelled
Classic racing Jag lineup now only in NZCC


Before eight is enough, one was enough
Cadillac’s 1906 single-cylinder workshorse

Plus lots more in New Zealand Classic Car 373!

Almost mythical pony

The Shelby came to our shores in 2003. It went from the original New Zealand owner to an owner in Auckland. Malcolm just happened to be in the right place with the right amount of money in 2018 and a deal was done. Since then, plenty of people have tried to buy it off him. The odometer reads 92,300 miles. From the condition of the car that seems to be correct and only the first time around.
Malcolm’s car is an automatic. It has the 1966 dashboard, the back seat, the rear quarter windows and the scoops funnelling air to the rear brakes.
He even has the original bill of sale from October 1965 in California.

Becoming fond of Fords part two – happy times with Escorts

In part one of this Ford-flavoured trip down memory lane I recalled a sad and instructive episode when I learned my shortcomings as a car tuner, something that tainted my appreciation of Mk2 Ford Escort vans in particular. Prior to that I had a couple of other Ford entanglements of slightly more redeeming merit. There were two Mk1 Escorts I had got my hands on: a 1972 1300 XL belonging to my father and a later, end-of-line, English-assembled 1974 1100, which my partner and I bought from Panmure Motors Ford in Auckland in 1980. Both those cars were the high water mark of my relationship with the Ford Motor Co. I liked the Mk1 Escorts. They were nice, nippy, small cars, particularly the 1300, which handled really well, and had a very precise gearbox for the time.
Images of Jim Richards in the Carney Racing Williment-built Twin Cam Escort and Paul Fahey in the Alan Mann–built Escort FVA often loomed in my imagination when I was driving these Mk1 Escorts — not that I was under any illusion of comparable driving skills, but they had to be having just as much fun as I was steering the basic versions of these projectiles.