This last month there has been much global focus on the 236 lot Palmen Barnfind collection in Holland https://www.classiccar-auctions.com/palmen being auction by Gallery Aaldering in a couple of weeks’ time. Within this hoard are a few Daimlers and one, an SP250, is of particular interest to us, and from ‘our man on the ground’, Joep Osendrap we can shed (no pun intended) some light. It is chassis no: 101554 an August 1963 ‘C’ spec registered 99-62-UL. Mr Palmen himself bought the SP back in 1966 from Nico Aaldering who in turn bought it down in Italy and now it’s the turn of Nico’s son to auction this ‘find’. It’s the 1752nd unknown known, we crawl slowly to our target of 2000 UKKs.
No doubt you may recall that Dave Melton fancied a Felday hill climb car and in turn acquired the Felday 2 from Barry Thorne who had been shielding it from all eyes for some 50 odd years. Dave spent a year ‘full on’ restoring this remarkable 2 seater hill climb special which was shown in rolling chassis form at last years’ NEC Classic Car Show. It gain much notice from a former owner, racing driver, Mike King. Since the beginning of the year Dave again has been beavering away at its completion by restoring the bodywork, I am pleased to say ‘all done and dusted’ so after a little testing (not much) here it is in action up Prescott.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJV8r44T-Tk (skip any ads) – spot the rev counter needle hard against its stop as Dave takes off – an incredible journey in two years. Congratulations Dave.
The Felday journey does not end at the top of the Hill as Richard Newman the nephew of Peter Westbury, who conceived the series of Feldays, and heir and custodian of the Felday/Westbury archives has closed the circle himself buying a bespoke SP250 finished in the striking colours of Felday blue. I did say the circle was complete, well not quite as there has been a film in the making for some 2 years on the life of Peter Westbury, the twice hill climb champion who step aside from his promising formula 1 career to spent time designing the safety aspects of many racing circuits.
I need to make a confession as I head off to the SPA Classic weekend https://www.peterauto.fr/en/events/spa-classic/ I have put the top up on my SP, the first time for about 30 years or more. I am pleased to say there are about 15 SPs heading out for the weekend and the weather does not seem that pleasant, the reason for top up.
The next edition of pasSPort needs more funding of about £1500 to get it off the ground with a comprehensive print run, otherwise it will be sent just to those who have contributed to it. It is the one publication that binds together the global fraternity of SP owners, so please sent any donations or take an advert to promote your business to glynovery@talktalk.net – thank you. Let’s make it the continued success it is.
We had a very successful Drive-it-Day last month here in Essex as Alan Mason and Tony Cartwright provided us with a comprehensive 55 mile route to our destination at Kersey Mill up in Suffolk. https://www.kerseymill.net/copy-of-gallery Hero or I should say Heroine was Sandy Duker who had driven down from Wanstead (near London) in her SP to give it a ‘shake down’ prior to her solo drive to SPA.
Alan Mason has booked an SP250Club stand at the Britannia event on Sunday 4th June see:- https://www.brandshatch.co.uk/2023/june/brands-britannia (see top of next page for booking details)
Whilst https://connect.msv.com/DisplayCar/Register/BH-23-BRITANNIA?club=4000 is the link to book tickets, if coming along please asked to be sited on the SP250 Club stand
Looking a little further ahead we have the ‘Les Belles Anglaises this year on the 23/24th September. http://sablanim.com/ more details later, this is the classic car event when the French take over the resort in their English Sports Cars for a long weekend, and the easy way to do it is a leisurely ferry crossing Newhaven/Dieppe then on via Le Mans to the resort making a 5 day event.
Currently we have a rare phenomenon where the used car trade are chasing the values of second hand cars and in some cases prices have risen between 75 and 90% of their values from a year ago. What is causing this, two aspects the recently introduce nightmare ULEZ scheme in London and the diminishing interest in the EV market. Not only have Tesla have been slashing the retail prices of their cars but most misguided EV manufactures also in the unthinkable view that EVs will save the planet.
Continuing the series of improvements from the workshops of Bill Holland and Steve Sannett at Petra Motorsport https://pentamotorsports.com/daimler-sp250/
The attached photo shows both the OEM and the custom pistons that they have had made to their own specs and they are more than happy share with you as they are with all their improvements – Needlessly to say, they have significantly upped the compression, plus the pistons are coated and are gas ported to aid ring sealing.
What a shame that such beauty is hidden out of site
And finally……
……… hidden…amongst 236 other vehicles in the Palmen Collection is chassis no: 101554
Thought for the day
A woman who has never seen her husband fishing doesn’t know what a patient man she has married!
