A biweekly roundup of automotive news, good, bad and just plain weird:
North Van shop wins big at Pebble Beach
It can be hard to wrap your head around the cost of the rolling artworks shown at Pebble Beach, perhaps the premier concours event on the planet. Rarities glide out onto the grass in glittering perfection, each one essentially invaluable and irreplaceable.
You’d never be able to afford one, of course, and as most are relics of a bygone age, it’s not like you’ll see one in traffic. However, if you’d been driving around on the Upper Levels highway a few weeks ago, you might actually have seen this year’s Pebble Beach winning Alfa Romeo 8C roaring past on its shakedown runs.
Restored by RX Autoworks in North Vancouver, the stunning Alfa Romeo took top honours at this year’s Pebble Beach show, winning its Los Angeles based owner the coveted trophy. But accolades are to be showered too on the small team of Rob Fram, Ian Davey, Mike Taylor, Jeff Parker, and Duncan Dickinson, whose collected craftsmanship is responsible for the win.
The judges at Pebble are among the toughest in the world, and even the slightest flaw will send you to the back of the pack. RX didn’t just polish the Alfa, they hand-made panels using lost technology, made sure every detail was period correct, built the twin-supercharged engine to roar, and then road-tested it all. It’s not just art, it’s a real car.
And all made in a humble little shop just off Lonsdale by a bunch of true car guys. The glitter around Pebble Beach might not be real. The cars are.
Ferrari sets price record at auction
Monterey’s Car Week is, of course, more than just a collection of car shows. It’s also the place where the cream of automotive art comes to be auctioned, often commanding the kind of prices that take your breath away.
It can often get a bit silly. Take, for instance, an accident-damaged Porsche 959 that crossed the block with a front end crumpled and riding on only three wheels. The car was the victim of a weird crash that saw it get hit while being transported by trailer, the 959 still hit a cool half-million dollars at auction.
That’s pretty ridiculous, but nothing compared to the pinnacle of the auction results this last week, the 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO that sold at the RM Sotheby’s auction on the weekend. Most recently purchased in 2000 for $7-million, this is the third of the 36 cars produced, and had both extensive racing history in-period, and the must-have numbers-matching powertrain.
Bidding opened at an eye-watering $35-million, and ran all the way up to $48-million, a new world record. Needless to say, that’s a lot of money. Why, you could have 100 crash-damaged 959s for that kind of scratch.
However, at this end of the market, a 250 GTO is like artwork, where the value of the piece doesn’t really have much to do with reality. Things cost this much because people with very deep pockets want them, not necessarily because the car is so special.
And, it should be noted that the previous owner wasn’t selfish with his machine, but often took it out for both display and to participate in vintage events. Here’s hoping that, despite being the most expensive auctioned machine ever, this Ferrari continues to be used and shared in some way.
Porsche returns to air-cooled cars
Stuttgart doesn’t have many dummies. Having seen what’s been happening with the air-cooled 911 market, Porsche has been content thus far to mine their past from a heritage standpoint, showing off previous models when releasing new cars like the 911 Targa or the 718 Cayman.
Now, however, the values of the really rare stuff have reached levels that even Porsche can’t ignore. The last-of-breed 993-chassis 911 Turbo, for instance, has gone from a valuable collector car to being worth more than the brand-new 911 Turbo.
Seeing that Land Rover and others have jumped on the continuation model bandwagon, Porsche has evidently decided to follow suit. Their Project Gold (what, was “Project Profit” too obvious?) is a 1994 911 Turbo built to 1998 Turbo S standards.
No expense was spared, no detail overlooked. Porsche sourced a period-correct sewing machine to get the stitching right, brought back workers from the original 993 line, and even hand-fitted Turbo S intakes so everything would look right. They then painted this one-of-one machine a similar colour to the current 911 Turbo Exclusive, and the plan is to auction it off for charity. Hmm. Perhaps I will retract the Project Profit crack.
All the work was done by Porsche Classic, which will doubtless now have well-heeled customers lining up to have a similar treatment for their own classic 911 Turbos. But perhaps Porsche could go even further and examine what is missing from the modern 911 that makes people want to spend so much money chasing the past.
Watch this space for all the best and worst of automotive news, or submit your own auto oddities to [email protected].
