Truth or story?

[BJ8Healeys]

Maybe Steve Byer's interest in the valve cover was in an effort to try and establish when it did/did not have riveted tags. I just remember he requested pictures/details of several areas of the car (even though the owner had registered the car with Steve prior to my involvement with it).

My interest in the valve cover configuration was in support of the Concours Registry. The committee was trying to establish the change point for the valve cover riveted plates-to-decals change. I sent out a survey question to every BJ8 owner who had an e-mail address on file with the registry and whose car was in the apparent neighborhood of the change. As with so many of the detail configuration changes, there was no "clean" cutoff point - either by chassis, body, or engine serial number. Most cars up to chassis 38370 (engine 12985) had riveted plates consistently, and most after 38622 (engine 13302) had decals. But between those endpoints the configuration could be either one, and there are several outliers at each end.

 

[BJ8Healeys]

This is all very interesting. I have a '67 BJ8 that came with the front wings in all silver/chrome. Never realized this was original, I just thought the red had worn off over the years. My car when we purchased it back in the late 80's had a MGB/XKE type of rear view mirror (adjustable up and down on a rod). Lots of other "wrong" details, like sunvisors, etc.

Although I have no proof either way that "all chrome" nose badges were or were not original, I believe that the badges originally had centers that were either cloisonné or painted. The red paint would naturally have been far less durable than cloisonné, and there would have been ample time over the last 45 years for the paint to deteriorate to an unattractive condition. I've seen many of them in that condition. Achieving an acceptable appearance by stripping off degraded paint completely to leave "all chrome" would be much easier than re-painting the badge by hand and making it look like a non-homemade job. I've seen a lot of "repaints", too.

 

[BJ8Healeys]

I took an original 11,000 mile late BJ8 to a concours event in the late 1970s to have the judges insist the rear view mirror was incorrect - it was the earlier type. The tonneau had never even been out of the bag, and the knock-off hammer was still in cellophane. Valve cover had stick-on labels, but front wings had red paint. Bob

Another example, I believe, of factory practice misleading Concours judges. My '66 BJ8 came to me in 1984 with an early-style all-chrome/stainless rectangular mirror that was obviously original to the car. Besides, photos from 1969 show it had the mirror then.
The parts manual illustration shows only the early mirror, but the parts list indicates a change to the black oval type mirror at body 73214 (corresponds to chassis 28247). So, all cars with body number higher than 73213 should have got the later mirror. But according to BJ8 registry data, documented from personal observation or photos, the early mirror was installed on cars as late as 42504. My car is 36666. There are 11 cars with chassis 36XXX documented with the early mirror, 7 with chassis 37XXX, 5 with 38XXX, etc.

 

[Steppenwolf]

Hey Steve,

Nice to see you pick up on my email and come here to answer the questions the i raised a few days ago.

I'm not sure if I mentioned how this whole thing started but after I got my BJ8 it was suggested that I joined the club. I lived in San Francisco and I think the club was called GoldenGate or maybe bay area AH club. In any event the newly voted president of the club had a little British repair shop in downtown SF. I called before I joined and he invited me down to the shop. We talked for hours. I was surprised tht he was interested in my Vin. At the time he stated that it was the highest vin he had ever seen. Later he told me it was 13 from the last one made and that it was technically a 1968 car but because of new regualtions it had to be registered as a 67.
I bemoaned the fact that it had the octagon and the chrome nose wings; that is when he told me the story about " The Last 100 BJ8's "

But all of us car nuts have heard stories. So i have no attachment to the story although if it was true it sure made my care notably different.

I purchased my car from a das station parking lot where I noticed it when I first moved to CA and noticed that it was collecting dust for months. I decided to stop and ask if it was for sale. As the story went, the original owner who was moving east and before he left he had the engine rebuilt by Huffacre Automotive who were well know at the time for racing British cars. Instead of breaking it in before he left to go east he just got in and drove. Something happened and he had it towed back to his local gas station to see if it could be repaired. The Gas station owner told me he though it over heated and blew up. The whole top end of the engine was in a couple of milk crates. He also told me that there was one other person ahead of me but whoever got the money there first would get the car. I went back everyday until he told me: The Owner said to sell it AS IS for $1700.00. I opened my wallet, gave him $100.00 cash, went across to the bank and got a bank check for the whole amount so he could return my cash.
I asked around about someone who might be able to put it back together. Had it towed to a couple of brothers in San Fran who had a great reputation. They moaned when they saw the milk crates but told me that every nut and bold was there. They charged me $600.00 to recondition the head and change a few valve. They had assessed that the bottom end was recently rebuilt. I later checked with Huffacre who veerified that they rebuilt the car and modified the cam in some way.

It had a dent in the real right fender along with dogleg rust.

Maybe i can save that for another story if anyone is interested. It was not a normal Healey. I got to drive some of the other club members cars and everyone agreed that my car had a different feel. It was VERY FAST!

 

[Steppenwolf]

I have a copy of the "pink slip" which is being sent to me.

I also had one of those unusual gold ones. I may have a copy of that title too. I sold that one to a guy in Oakland California who wanted to change the color and recover the seats with "cow" hide ( patterned ) i almost begged him not to do that.

If you have the registration of every one of those cars Steve you must have the gold one. I think I sold it in 1987

 

[Randy Forbes]

... In any event the newly voted president of the club had a little British repair shop in downtown SF. I called before I joined and he invited me down to the shop. We talked for hours. I was surprised tht he was interested in my Vin. At the time he stated that it was the highest vin he had ever seen. Later he told me it was 13 from the last one made and that it was technically a 1968 car but because of new regualtions it had to be registered as a 67...

By any chance, do you remember the year, name of the shop, or the owner?

Was the shop downtown, on an alley-street named "Shipley" (between 3rd & 4th, Folsom & Harrison streets)? And the guy's name Ray Caivano, sometime between 1978-1980?

I bought my Healey from Ray (technically, it was in his wife Jo-Anne's name) and coming up on April 1st will mark thirty-four (34) years since I used my (1977) tax return as a down-payment to buy it. I wound up working at Austin-Healey West later that year, and stayed on about a year before going back into skilled labor tradesman work. Ray died (cancer) sometime around 1995, but I still maintain contact almost weekly with Jo-Anne. Ray was indeed a character and plenty likeable, but I rarely believed anything he said... :wink:

 

[Steppenwolf]

... In any event the newly voted president of the club had a little British repair shop in downtown SF. I called before I joined and he invited me down to the shop. We talked for hours. I was surprised tht he was interested in my Vin. At the time he stated that it was the highest vin he had ever seen. Later he told me it was 13 from the last one made and that it was technically a 1968 car but because of new regualtions it had to be registered as a 67...

By any chance, do you remember the year, name of the shop, or the owner?

Was the shop downtown, on an alley-street named "Shipley" (between 3rd & 4th, Folsom & Harrison streets)? And the guy's name Ray Caivano, sometime between 1978-1980?

I bought my Healey from Ray (technically, it was in his wife Jo-Anne's name) and coming up on April 1st will mark thirty-four (34) years since I used my (1977) tax return as a down-payment to buy it. I wound up working at Austin-Healey West later that year, and stayed on about a year before going back into skilled labor tradesman work. Ray died (cancer) sometime around 1995, but I still maintain contact almost weekly with Jo-Anne. Ray was indeed a character and plenty likeable, but I rarely believed anything he said... :wink:

Yes Randy that's the guy. Did you join the club? If you did we were members at the same time. I no longer have my girl but I still have membership material and may even have a few pix from a meet in the south bay. What car did you buy from Ray? Seems like we were hanging around the shop around the same time.
Did you possibly know the name of the shop that i mentioned out on Clement St or maybe Geary way out west? It was a secod floor shop owned by two brothers. The started with British cars but may have broadened their base in the 80's Tom was one of the brothers. He is the one who worked on my car. Not sure of the brothers name but it may have been Bob.

Do you have pictures posted here?

Thanks for the reply Randy.

 

[Steppenwolf]

Darth Vader

I still haven't established if you live/lived in the SF Bay Area but if you purchased your first AH from Ray you probably did.

I worked for two Ferrari dealers in SF: Ferrari of SF which as over on Green between Polk and Van Ness.

Most of this story is unnecessary for what i'm wanting to ask you. Living IN the city and doing a lot of walking I would see cars that became familiar to me and then i would see them all the time; kind like recognizing an old Friend in a crowd.

Anyway, there was this beautiful all BLACK 308 GTS Ferrari owned by this rich kid from the east bay with a personalized license plate <span style="font-weight: bold">V A D E R</span> and if you know what a 308 GTS circa 77 or 78; it kinda looks like a streamlined Darth Vader helmet

Maybe you saw the car around town. i was so tuned into cars at that time that i could hear it coming.

[ i know i mentioned it before about my BJ8 was that she sounded like no other Healy i ever heard. i think it happened as the result of two things. One i know for sure because i did it: took the resonators off. And the second thing i think had to do with the Huffacre cam. )

Joining this forum has been a good thing and a bad thing. The good thing is reading all of the stories about all of the British cars some that i know first hand about and some i don't. There are also some that i never heard of.
The bad is that i am thinking far too much about getting another one. That wouldn't be so bad if i get rid of at least 3 vehicles

There is this interesting aspect that i just realized about myself now vs then. Besides some of the obvious ones like more silver hair, and i'm missing ( REALLY MISSING! ) MY GIRLS:
The British Racing Green one and the Tall Blonde one.

Is it fairly easy to post pictures here or do we use a program like photobucket?

Looking forward to hearing more.