SUPERBIRD & SKYLARK GS
Dear Classic American,
I know of the Superbird featured in last month’s Letters page: It was owned by Ian Frankland who lives in Rochdale. The Superbird was in bits when Ian first saw it and after a long drawn-out time, a deal was struck to purchase it from Steve Williams. It arrived in two transit vans, plus the car body arrived on a ‘dolly’ towed by a Granada. Even then, Ian had to collect more parts later on. The nose cone was damaged, along with some bodywork. The seats in white were badly ripped and torn and had to be replaced with ones imported from the US. Ian then had to rebuild the engine, as it had been trashed by the use of the wrong camshaft, then rebuild the rest of the car, over many years.
As the years went by, Ian sold all of his collection of Mopar cars, the last being the Superbird and this was to a guy in Jersey in the Channel Islands, who drove it to the ferry, then home. It is now registered in Jersey and has a new registration plate.
I rooted out a photograph of the Project Buick featured last month also; it’s a photo of Lawrence Millett’s Buick GS400, taken at the Billing Show. I’ve attached photos of Ian Frankland’s Superbird taken at the Tabley House (AACNW) Show many years ago Reg No VBY 207M along with Paul Mimmack’s Superbird (the Orange one) which was a manual.
John Smith Bolton Lancashire
Thanks for sharing these images John and for filling in the blanks – more information on the Project Buick is featured in this month’s news pages on pages 8 and 9. And if you have a full library of Classic Americans you can also read about it in the July 1996 issue!