A friend who is a Porsche aficionado tells horror stories about the
overzealousness of club members in pursuit of their club's Manhattan
Trophy. Apparently one individual won it by making a deal with his local
dealer to inspect every new 993 that came through his dealership and hold on
to the car he thought was a prime candidate. After the right car was in his
possession he proceeded to completely tear it down and rebuild it to
"concourse "standards. We are talking about a new car here! The car won the
trophy. Another story is of an acquaintance who lost serious concourse
points on his pre-A 356 because the handles on the tools in the original
factory tool kit were gray, not black. You can imagine that, in the early
days of Porsche when the cars were literally hand-made, that tool kits were
gathered from whatever the local Ace hardware had on the shelf that day.
And then there are the numerous discussions at Porsche shows about the
correct shade of cadmium plate on suspension bolts. No thank you. To their
credit, the Porsche Club recognized the problems and has canceled the
Manhattan Trophy. They have also initiated a "preservation class".
Karl Theis
'67 GT6 not concourse, not even a good preservation candidate, but a driver!
'68 GT6 on way back to 'showroom condition'
> ----------
> From: Andy
> Reply To: Andy
> Sent: ë± 6:35 AM
> To: Kevin O'Driscoll
> Cc: Triumphs@autox.team.net
> Subject: Re: ...a thing of beauty....
>
>
> That piece is at
> http://search.nytimes.com/search/daily/bin/fastweb?getdoc+site+site+34261
> +0+wAAA+overrestoration
> hopefully it'll show up for you all there.
> Andy
>
> On 08/14/98 09:01 AM Kevin O'Driscoll said...
> >
> >An interesting piece on the overrestoration of antique autos appears in
> >the New York Times today (Friday Aug. 14). It echos an editorial which
> >recently appeared in Moss Motoring by Bill Piggot on the need for a
> >preservation class in judging of vintage car shows. The NY Times article
> >by Michael Lamm reports on the Pebble Beach Concours where the trend
> >toward overrestoration was begun by a personal rivalry between JB
> >Nethercutt and Bill Harrah in the mid '70s. Apparently, in a backlash
> >against yuppified restorations of everyman's car, nowadays
> >the Ford Model A folks actually deduct points for better than new
> >restorations. The preservation class is alive and well among Porsche and
> >Ferrari clubs according to Mr. Lamm.
> >-Kevin
>
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