Posts Tagged 1962
1962 Triumph TR3B
Posted by rariccardi in Old Cars Weekly on February 26, 2010
Another great car of the week story by Brian Earnest for Old Cars Weekly.
Triumph-1
By Brian Earnest
Rena Valentine knows that it might sound a little strange to serious car guys, but her first priority when it came to shopping for a Triumph sports car was color. The car had to be baby blue with a white top — not necessarily because those are Valentine’s favorite colors, but more for sentimental reasons.
“The attraction is because when I was about 7, maybe 9 years old, I found pictures of my uncle’s car. It was a 1959 TR3, powder blue convertible with a white top,” recalled Valentine, who splits time living in both New Jersey and Connecticut. “In the pictures were all these trophies, and he raced the car, and it was just so cool. It looked like a baby Jaguar. I always knew I wanted a car like that. I didn’t know exactly what year of car it was, or exactly what model, but I knew I wanted a car just like that.
“For some reason growing up I had this affinity for that powder blue car. Little did I know that very few cars were made in that color, let alone left now in Britain or in the U.S. That’s a specific color for a TR3B. They only came in 3 or 4 colors.”
Valentine decided that she needed a little help before she took the plunge and bought a Triumph, so she joined a local club a full two years before she got her first car. It didn’t take long for her to find out what she up was up against in her search for a powder blue Triumph with a white top and a dark blue interior. “I went to the first meeting and figured, ‘Hey you guys will help me find one, right,’” she said. “You’ll sell me one, right?’ They said, ‘Good luck!’”
“It took me three years to finally find my car. I found one each year for about three years. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack.”
Valentine was too late to buy the first two cars she pursued — they had both been sold by the time she called on them. The third one she found, in Texas, was priced too high. So she kept looking, and hoping.
Triumph2
A year after passing up the third car, however, Valentine found it up for sale again, and this time she couldn’t resist. The car, a rare 1962 TR3B with 90,000 miles, had been owned and completely restored back to show-winning condition by Triumph restorer Ron Harrison, who operates Ron’s Vintage Auto Restoration in Salado, Texas. The shop specializes in restorations on Triumph, MG, Austin Healey and Jaguar. The car was then purchased by a second owner in Ohio, who never even got the car registered.
“The guy had it shipped up to Ohio and parked it up next to a 1959 TR3A that he was restoring,” Valentine said. “But when he decided to sell his ’59, his wife said ‘No, we’re keeping that one and putting the ’62 up for sale.’ So he never did anything with it! He just owned it for a while and flipped it. He sold it after putting no miles on it! He told me the car had never been driven outside of Texas, and I knew he was telling the truth because of the mileage and because I had tried to buy the car before.
Triumph3
“The guy told me it was probably the best one in the country. I told him I didn’t want the best one in the country, because I couldn’t afford it. I had just been looking for a driver in maybe the $10,000 or $12,000 range, and that’s what the other ones I found were. But he said, ‘You might never find another one,’ and I just decided I had to buy that car.”
“He never did a thing with it after he bought it, so officially I’m the second owner of the car.”
The TR3B was as a two-door, two-seat roadster offered only in 1962. The car was really a one-year extension of the TR3 line designed to overlap the introduction of the new TR4, which some dealers were worried would not sell well when it was launched in 1962. The TR4 was wider, heavier and a much different animal than the TR3 series cars, which lasted from 1957-’62, if you include the 1962 TR3B. Not everyone was high on the TR4 as a replacement for the TR3A, but the cars did last four years before spawning the next-generation TR4A in 1965.
Triumph4
Early production TR3Bs were identical to the TR3A, but the later, and more desirable examples, carried the TR4’s larger engine and its new all-synchromesh gearbox.
The 3Bs had all the other typical TR3A trademarks, including removable side curtains and a snap-on top. The cars rode on 15-inch wheels with solid axles. They had front disc brakes with drum binders in back. Spoke wheels were optional, as was a heater.
Late-production TR3Bs, like Valentine’s, were powered by the 104-hp, 2,138 cc four-cylinder. Earlier cars had the TR3A 1,991-cc, 100-hp four-cylinder. All cars carried a four-speed manual transmission with an optional overdrive.
Triumph5
Only about 3,331 TR3Bs were built for 1962, and they were only available in the U.S. “But it’s actually less than that,” said Valentine. “That’s how many chassis were built, but some of those chassis were sent out to build other cars. I think 2,804 is supposed to be the real number.”
Most of those cars didn’t survive the last 47 years. Valentine said Triumph aficionados have estimated that less than 300 of the TRBs are still around, and Valentine can attest that only a handful are dressed in factory-correct baby blue with a white top.
Some of the pieces on her car were replaced during its ground-up restoration a few years back, but Valentine still has the original parts that were part of the deal. She even got the trophies that the car won. “He told me I was getting every trophy that went with the car. So the trunk was loaded!”
Triumph6
“It has the original radio, and it has some other pieces that were period correct,” she said. “He gave me an extra set of carburetors, manifolds, the valve cover, valve cover gasket … I have the old side curtains. It has a rare ashtray. It has a rare map light. Optional rear seat… The car originally came with whitewalls and mine doesn’t have those. And it originally came with disc wheels, which mine doesn’t have. I have the spoked wheels.
“But everything works in this car, that’s why I feel like I’m driving in the past when I’m in it.”
Triumph-engine
So far, Valentine has only put about 150 miles on the car, but they have been eventful. She is assimilating into the British car crowd when she takes the car to shows and is soaking up as much Triumph insight and knowledge as she can from “old guard” collectors. “At the Touch of England Show at Hermitage in Saddle River (N.J.), I won first place in the TR3 division, and one of the older retired guys came up and was ribbing me,” she said. “He said, ‘Let me know what shows you are going to. I used to win and I’m not going where you’re going.’ But we’re best friends now.”
Valentine is also enjoying the driving thrill she hoped would come with a roadster of such vintage. “It’s like I’m driving … geez how do you put it? It’s like I’m driving a piece of art. Even though I wasn’t born then, I feel like I belong in that car. It’s just a blast from the past. It’s like going back in time.”
Triumph-main
1962 Chevrolet Bel Air Sedan
Posted by rariccardi in Old Cars Weekly on January 18, 2010
Brian Earnest, at the Old Cars Weekly Car of the Week website writes about the history of a vintage American icon, the 1962 Chevrolet Bel Air Sedan. thanks for another great story!
1962 Chevy Bel Air Sedan front
Even if tomorrow it were trampled by elephants, or run over by a train, or entered into a demolition derby, Frank Keller’s 1962 Chevrolet Bel Air four-door sedan has still lived a charmed life.
Somehow, the lovely red Chevy has survived life as a daily transportation during its early years, avoided being pounded into the ground by a college kid who apparently didn’t even like the car, and lived through a major tornado that tore the roof off the garage it was in. To top it off, against all odds, the 47-year-old car is almost as rust-free today as the day it rolled off the assembly lines, even though it has never been restored and sat untouched and unloved in a garage for about 16 years.
“We found chips in the metal, but no rust at all!” said Keller, a resident of Chetek, Wis., who bought this week’s OldCarsReport.com “Car of the Week” last summer. “There was no discoloration of any of the chrome or aluminum. Nothing.
“We can’t figure out what is going on with this car. It just defies logic.”
Frank and Diane Keller run the Shady Grove Resort in northern Wisconsin and found out about the car through a customer. The Kellers are a horsepower-loving muscle car clan — Frank has a ’71 Chevelle SS 454, Diana rolls in a ’69 GTO convertible, and their kids, Scott and Wendy, own a ’68 4-4-2 convertible and ’68 Charger, respectively — but Frank liked what the customer told him about the Bel Air. “He told me about the car and gave me a price, and I thought, ‘Well, it might be worth playing with,’” he said. “The man was meticulous about things, and if I believed what he said about the car, I figured it would be pretty nice.
“The car belonged to your typical little old lady, and the guy had bought it from her back in about ’91 for his son to drive to college. Well, the kid only drove it for about two years and then he garaged it. I guess he didn’t care too much for it. It started with 41,000 miles on it when he got it, and it had 45,000 when he parked it.”
62-Chevy-BelAir-rear
And then the car sat, untouched, at least until things got exciting with Mother Nature in 2001. In April of that year, an F4 tornado rolled through the small town of Hoisington, Kansas, where the car resided. The twister tore a huge swath through the heart of the town and destroyed or damaged about 400 homes and a number of businesses. The storm put Hoisington on the map, for the wrong reasons, and made national headlines.
The storm claimed the roof of the Bel Air’s garage, according to Keller, and knocked the adjacent brick home off its foundation, but the only damage the Chevy suffered was a small ding near the center of its hood. “There were only two real dings in the car and that was one of them,” Keller said.
The car then sat for eight more years after the tornado before Keller came for a visit. “When I saw the car, it had about two inches of dust on it,” he said.
62-BelAir-Benchseat
Keller said he and his son typically restore one car a year for fun and profit during the winter, but it didn’t take him long to realize that the Bel Air didn’t need a lot of work. In fact, aside from having some new OEM-style seat covers made and replacing the carpeting, he’s basically kept the car as he found it. Aside from the seat covers, all of the interior is new, and all of the body panels are original.
“I had intentions of building it up and fixing it up, but I was thrilled it came back naturally on its own terms,” he said. “Could it be fixed up perfectly and have the little nicks and scratches fixed? Yeah, but to me, that’s character. I’m going to leave it just the way it is.
“The engine compartment — we cleaned it up, but that’s about all we did. I thought somebody must have painted the valve covers and intake, but they didn’t. It’s never been painted, and all the decals are in place.
“The car had been sitting so long that we had to flush the tank out four times. Then we pulled the carburetor. Those cars were very touchy with gasoline. They used pure gasoline, not the garbage that is out there today.”
The Bel Air lineup occupied Chevy’s mid-priced niche in 1962, and sedans were the most popular. The Bel Airs came in two- and four-door sedans, a two-door hardtop coupe, and six- and nine-passenger station wagons.
Bel Air standard equipment included foam front and rear seats; color-keyed carpeting; foam backed luggage compartment mat; and a specific steering wheel hub. Interiors were higher-grade cloth and vinyl combinations. A full-length upper bodyside molding was used, with Bel Air script appearing on the rear fenders, just below it. A stainless bright gutter cap molding and four taillights, arranged two on each side, were other distinguishing features. A bright rear cove molding added a touch of distinction.
Also standard were a heater and defroster; dual sun visors; crank-operated ventipanes; directional signals; parallel action windshield wipers; front door armrests; ashtray and coat hooks.
62-engine
62-engine2
The Bel Airs came standard with either a 170-hp 283-cid V-8 — which Keller’s car has — or 135-hp, 235-cid six-cylinder. Racier 327- and 409-cid engines were also available. Keller’s car is also optioned with full wheel covers, whitewall tires, AM radio, power steering and two-tone paint.
“It’s got a few chips in the metal, but no rust at all, even underneath,” said Keller of his ’62. “The paint was faded, but I spent two days buffing it out and I could comb my hair in the reflection. I was absolutely amazed. I started buffing one panel, then another… It was amazing the luster and shine that came back.”
The Kellers took their sedan to a couple of car shows not long after it got back on the road, and happily claimed trophies in both shows. “Both times it lost to fully restored four-doors,” Frank said.
The trips also gave Keller a chance to experience the fun of traveling in a full-sized “old school” family sedan — something he hadn’t done in a while.
“They’re a boat,” he said with a laugh. “Hey, they were Chevy’s full-size vehicles.
“The cars today, the technology is just astronomical. Back then, they were just put together! We laugh, my son and I, at some of the workmanship. It was not the greatest. But it’s like being out being out in a big old 20-foot Chris Craft on a lake. You could get seasick in one of these.”
62-profile
Keller plans to sell the car if the right buyer comes along, but he won’t feel bad about having a nice, big red sedan around for a while if he has to. Clearly, the car is growing on him.
“I do buy some cars for investment, but I’m in no hurry to sell it,” he said. “I don’t want to see this car hacked … Somebody out there is going to love this car, and I hope they find it.
“You just don’t see these cars. They didn’t survive. And four-doors never got the respect they deserve, but they were the cars we were all raised with.”