Buckley’s market matters
A CLASSIC I RESISTED THE TEMPTATION TO BUY…
I turned down a cheap Gamma this month, possibly for the first time in my life: a left-hand-drive Coupé in Ivory with brown velour, all supposedly good, no serious rust, but sporting Delta headlights. It could have been mine for £2000. The owner needed the space and was making noises as if he was going to weigh the poor thing in for scrap if someone didn’t buy it. I almost stepped in at the last minute, but had a word with myself, as it were, and resisted. The fate of the car is unknown, but who knows, I might be cured?
…AND SOMEONE I SHOULD HAVE CONVINCED TO BUY IT?
I went round the NEC show with John Worker, who in a former life worked in the styling department at Longbridge with Harris Mann. John is currently having a love affair with all things American and has replaced his 500SL with a Mustang. He loves his Lancias, though. His first was a Lambda, bought for £7 when he was a student, and he tells a great story about when he was running his own business in the late ’70s and had a fleet of Lancias as company cars for his staff: “I had a Gamma and did 120,000 miles in it with no problems, while everyone else had Betas. They were the most reliable vehicles we ever ran. Actually, the XJ12 I had after the Gamma was very good, too, but the 500SEL that I replaced it with was nothing but problems from day one.” TRY A DECENT EXAMPLE BEFORE YOU BUILD A MONSTER
I enjoy Jay Leno’s films on Youtube but I got the hump when he did a piece on the Icon Derelict Silver Cloud. Not because someone had rodded a Royce, but because of the number of times they took the opportunity to slag off the base car – an S1 that had been quietly mouldering for 40 years – aspersions being cast on the brakes, handling and even the rigidity of the poor old thing’s chassis. Surely a little unfair? For the first time ever I was almost moved to write a comment, but thought I would keep my powder dry for C&SC. If he would like to experience a real Rolls-royce Silver Cloud (rather than a freakish shed) that stops and handles very well, I have just the thing.