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Buying LBC's from dealership stories

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jsfbond

jsfbond

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I was along to drive the extra car home when we went to pick up the 1969 GT6+ my mother bought from our local Ford dealership. The salesman insisted on bringing the car around to the front of the lot personally. This normally would not be a problem except he was a short Frenchman, best described in shape as a "Weeble". How he got into the car is anyone's guess, but the getting out would have been an AFV winner (if there had been video cameras then). He pulls up next to us and opens the drivers door, then all normal activity stopped. He was wedged between the seat and the steering wheel, so he could not turn to exit the car. He ended up tipping sideways and rolling out onto the pavement, and away from the car. For a sixteen year old this was way too funny, and I can still recall the image all these years later.
 
I had the pleasure of watching "Mean" Joe Green try to get himself into the passenger side of Rocky Bleier's newly purchased Porsche 911 once... he gave up and went back in the Lincoln that brought them to the dealer.
 
It is always a funny thing to see someone tall getting into a GT6.

I have a friend who is 6'4" with shoulders that would easily fill a size 56 sport coat. He is only 250 pounds but is broad shouldered. Just to put it into perspective my thumb is smaller then his pinky finger.

He is a mechanic and I asked him the other day to take a ride in the GT6 to help me figure out a vibration. I took him a minute to get into the car. The seat was all the way back, and he had to tilt his head to get into the car with the door closed. His knees were about as high as the dash because he couldn't extend his legs under the dash because of his size 15 feet.

After the short ride he had to get out and that is when the fun happened. He couldn't get his feet out because they were pinned between the dash the rest of his body. So the only way out was for him to crawl out on his hands so he could extent his legs enough to get them out the door. He was on his hands and knees when he finally exited the car.

I still laugh every time I think about him in that car.
 
About 25 years ago I went to look at a Lotus Europa. The car was perfect until I tried to sit in it. I am 6' tall and the only way I fit into the car was to wedge my forehead against the roof, effectly looking straight up. I still wanted the car.
 
This says volumes about Little Car owners who keep them any length of time.Most of these were sold back in the days when Chiropactors were just shy of being a witch-doctor.
 
...also, though, those were the days when a salesman might just drive a demonstrator right out to your house to show it to you in hopes of making a sale. That's what this then-five-year-old remembers, back in fall 1958: a two-tone green Triumph 10 arriving in our driveway for my dad to test-drive. It worked; he ended up buying one!
 
A different direction, my father went to look at a new Spitfire back in '64. After deciding it wouldn't work out, he test drove a used '63 TR4. When pulling back into the dealership, they realized the car was on fire. Determined to get his first LBC, he passed on the burned car and bought a new one.

Another story...a friend of mine met a former salesman from a Triumph dealership of the day. He related that they always wanted to finalize the sale of the 250s at closing time Friday, so when the car broke down on the trip home, they wouldn't be around to receive the phone call and wouldn't have to deal with it until Monday.
 
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