...with a hemi 440 ?!?
My guess is that Rich privateer constructor Peter Montverdi got a hold of
the car and used it to prototype his "Montverdi Hai 450" as written up in
Automobile Quarterly sometime in the early 70's :(
Of course, with all the bits being available....
Might we take up an international collection and get this car into the hands
of Jonmac at Gaydon to sit alongside that last spit?
Dave T
Winnipeg
PS: Silver is fine, and bathed clean now. As I told earlier, I
surreptitiously idled the car to the carwash and brought it home clean on
the outside last Thursday. Over the weekend I got into the floors and boot.
The ONLY rust of consequence is confined to the very low edge of the rear
right wing under the finisher piece. There is evidence of a slight tap in
the rear end as evidenced by bondo oozing from two pilot holes - but that's
it. After a scrub, all the interior surfaces came back Valencia Blue (
blee-yech, not my fave) except the floorpans.
After extracting the carpets which had been glued to the sound pads which
were in turn glued to the floor, I found surface rust. An evening with a
3M surfacing wheel revealed only ONE tiny pinhole. I expected worse. The
true repair of the rockers was discovered; The PO's body guy bent a piece
of plate steel into a 90 deg. seam and brazed it to the floor about 2" from
the inner sill - quite likely stronger than the original and very well done.
The outer sills appear to be Steelcraft repros from the 70's as they still
have the 3/8" holes (or so) in 3 places along their lower edge. No goop
could thus have been trapped, and it will make rustproofing very easy for
me. The driver's floor was clean and needed no attention. The original
sound deadening pads were intact and in E.C. under the rear seat area... the
gas tank is clean and rust free... everything but the seats was re-trimmed
in leather and it cleaned up BEAUTIFULLY with some Mother's leather
conditioner.
I discovered a pair of concave lensed "Raydot" H3 driving lamps in the box
of spares, two complete sets of boot tools (one in red and another in a
blue vinyl embossed case) and a jack that appears to have been used about
twice. Original Lucas spare points and condenser were there too as was a
tune up bill from 1975. Then, the car had 45,000 miles and the clock now
reads 49k (yes, it works). I now believe that Silver DOES have 150,000
miles, making it's condition all that much more remarkable as it is
extremely "tight". The motor (now running on all 6 since the plug wire
swap) starts and idles better than my daily driver. Hmmmmmmm.
More later.
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