I guess it all boils down to one simple choice.
Is it for racing cars that are vintage race cars or for cars that are from
1972 and before?
The first, they must have been a race car; the other allows you to build new
race cars from old street cars.
This dilemma isn't immediately apparent as to its effects. The same sort of
dilemma is in Corvette restoration circles today. It mainly concerns
stamping the VIN and engine codes in engines to "restore" the car.
Traditionally, this has been the means to tell a real car from a
counterfeit, i.e, a real fuel injected '63 or real 435 hp '67 vs. the ones
someone counterfeited. (Cloned seems to be the polite term today.)
However, many argue this is just a stamp, no different than decals, painted
stencils, etc. when it comes to restoration and thus they should be allowed
to stamp these in to complete a restoration.
The dilemma comes in this: An original motor car can be as much as $20,000
difference in price, or more from a non-original motor car. A real L88 '67
Corvette can be $100,000; a fake L-88 can be $20,000. We are not talking
pocket change.
Now you are into moral, ethical, and legal implications. One is real, the
other isn't, and as long as the restorer says "it is fake and I made it that
way", we are ok. But if the owner, or the next owner, decides to say "it is
all original", you have all those problems. And it is extremely hard, and
impossible in some cases, to know if it is real or fake, unless the car is
very famous or all 5 (or 20, or 75) are accounted for.
The same will be true with vintage race cars. The value isn't always money,
but what they mean to the sport and to history. Some of these "created"
vintage racers are now into 10 years of competition. To many, they appear
to be real race cars. Ten years from now, they will appear even more so due
to wear and tear.
And as hard as it is to determine history on a car today, due to SCCA
regions not having records from the '60s and '70s, it will be even harder in
ten years. So how many will buy cars thinking they really burned up the
track at Riverside when in reality Riverside was a shopping mall long before
that
car ever saw a race track?
In Mike's case with the Morgan, I'd go for the original. It is his dad's.
It is still there. If it was gone and destroyed, I'd go for a replica, but
the original still exists, so the answer is obvious.
Because in 20 years, someone will find the replica, and know some of the
story, and then think he has a car that one man raced, then was restored,
and then his son found it and raced it again. A very colorful and full
history. Except that it won't be true, because it is a replica, not the
same car.
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