Our new friend has provided some information on his Airline that I think
all of us would be interested:
Thank you for your mail to me regarding my PB Airline.
I was looking for an Airline Coupe for a long while. One day in around 1992
or
1993, I became to know late John Shute, a famous MG collector in South England
and owned more than 20 MGs. He had an MG PA Airline in his garage as well,
which
had been restored by MG Enthusiast Magazine before. I visited him several
times
and talk about his PA Airline, but I couldn't afford to buy it at that time.
Then John sadly passed away and his collection had been auctioned. But his PA
Airline was bought by a German directly from John's family just before the
auction started, so the PA Airline was withdrawn from that auction catalogue
(I
still have a copy of this catalogue).
By the way, soon after I gave up John's PA Airline, I got a call from Terry
Bone, MMM specialist in Sussex, England. He wasÂ@excited to tell me that he
had
discovered an extremely poor conditioned PB Airline with alloy body in some
shed
in Scotland in the Autumn of 1994, and asked me to buy it.
I bought it soon and found it was impossible to restore it by myself because
the
body was totally collapsed. I have no skill to make ash frame and body
skinning!
Then I asked Colin Tieche, MMM engineer and owner of NA Airline by himself, to
restore it. He finished the chassis completely and his friend Keith Portsmas,
owner of NA Allingham Coupe, made a couple of body ash frames referring to
John
Gouch's spare Airline body. First body frame was sold to Luxembourg where
someone was restoring a PA Airline. The second frame was much well made and
used
for my car.
By some reasons, Colin become unable to continue to restore my Airline, so we
asked his good friend David Cooksey, C-type owner, to finish the rest of the
job. He was so enthusiastic to work on the car, now alloy skin has been put on
the ash frame and got a Dublin/Ulster Green paint.
Now interior trims are made, then within a few months, the car will complete.
Hence I plan to participate MMM register 40th anniversary week held in England
next June by my Airline.
The car was manufactured in Abingdon as a PA Airline with alloy body, but it
was
converted to PB by the factory, maybe in 1936. Chassis number is PB0608 and
engine number is 699APB, carrying original UK registration number DBB36.
Fortunately some early history is known, and original period catalogues (some
P-type catalogues and a special Airline catalogue) I have, so I will make a
full
file for the car after completion.
Best regards,
Hiro Nishio
General Secretary / Kobe MG Car Club
A Japanese member of MG Car Club (UK)
Address : Nishiokamoto 7-8-21, Higashinada, Kobe 658-0073 Japan
TEL/FAX : ++81 78 441 2409
E-mail : tnishio@adv.mei.co.jp
and some more interchange:
Hello Terry,
Thank you for your information about ex-John Shute's PA Airline.
Kobe MG Car Club was established in 1987 by myself and carry 45 enthusiastic
members now. Please try to visit our homepage at
http://lalabsd.shiga-med.ac.jp/kmgcc/index-j.html
If you think my PB Airline story interesting, please post it to the whole
list.
Best regards,
Hiro Nishio
Kobe MG Car Club
P.S. 1) There is another MMM mailing list available, do you know that?
2) There is another P-type Airline in Japan (possibly PB). I have
never
seen it but was imported from USA I think. I attach the list of
MMM
cars existing in Japan which I make for the record.
Cheers
Terry, admirer of the Airline styling, in Oakland
British Cars Web: http://www.team.net/sol
MMM list subscription info: http://www.team.net/cgi-bin/majorcool
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