Rich,
I can't quite remember the date, but I believe it was during the 80's that
learned about those heads and tried to find out what happened to them. I sought
out Sir Laurence. After a phone call or two in England, I discovered that he
had just moved to southern california, near me! My efforts turned local, and I
soon had a phone number for him. I found he was then living within 100 miles
of me.
I managed to get him on the phone. I told him how I had been a Triumph fan
since restoring my first car in 77. I asked about the heads. He said they
were for sale. Apparently he had made 10 of them and he still had them all.
When I asked about price, he first told me of all the modifications I would need
to make to my head. ...and he started rattling off dollar figures for what
each modification would cost. Before I knew it, he was in the tens of
thousands of dollars, and he hadn't even reached the issue of the cost of the
head itself which I seem to remember finally fell to $10,000 (for the head
alone). (I can't remember for sure.)
I had put this guy on a pedestal, but I found the conversation chilling. Even
then I respected that such custom things were expensive to produce and I wasn't
expecting a bargain, but he had a way of rubbing my nose in the idea that it was
so far beyond my reach monetarily that I shouldn't be wasting his time. He
didn't appreciate the effort I had made to find him. He didn't appreciate my
interest in Triumphs. He didn't appreciate my respect for him nor his work.
It was a one sided conversation that ended relatively abruptly and coldly after
rattling off all the extensive modifications and costs that would be involved to
make the head work.
Perhaps people all over the country were tracking him down, over the years,
about the heads, and he had just grown tired of the calls. I can understand
that. However, I never questioned his pricing. I gave him no call to be
offended. Later, as I digested the information I gleaned from Sir Laurence, I
did find it interesting that, at that time, approximately 2 decades after he
had made them, he still had all the heads. I wonder why. Did they ever
really work? Were the alterations required to make the darn things work so
incredibly intensive that it was just a ridiculous venture? What? Or was his
attitude in the way? Maybe someone here knows more to the story. All I know
is, I was so demoralized about Sir Laurence, that I scrapped all interest in the
heads.
Maybe the man was just having a bad day, but I was young and I felt gutted by
one of my heroes. I sensed the same sort of excitement in your post about the
cross-flow heads that I had all those years ago. Subsequently, I just wanted to
prepare you for the possibility, should you seek this particular Triumph holy
grail, that you may find that Sir Laurence plans to be buried with all ten heads
rather than sell them and he may not be interested in sharing a nostalgic
conversation about them with an enthusiast such as yourself... I could be
wrong, people change.
--Justin Wagner
Rikrock@aol.com wrote:
> Amici,
>
> I guess my head has been in the sand for way too long because I just became
> aware of this thing. I think I want one.
>
> I bought an old book at a swap meet last week, and saw this head, apparently
> made in England in the '60's. Anyone here ever use one?
>
> Rich Rock
> Pottstown, PA
|