1929 Standard Phaeton on BaT

[alexiskai]

Likely it "isn't" going to Start, Stop, & Steer reliably. Any one of those 3 areas can cause someone to lose interest in a collector vehicle very quickly. Pile multiple issues into the mix and the car becomes 'unfun' for the new hobbyist and his family, so he will dump it onto the market again and go find another type of hobby.

I had that conversation with a local acquaintance last month. Said he had just sold a Model A. I said I didn’t know he even had one. Said his wife had wanted one, so they bought it a few years ago, but because of mechanical problems that emerged, they rarely drove it. He had the budget to get it fixed, but it wasn’t the most important thing in his life, and they never got into the habit of driving it. And eventually they wanted the garage space back.

 

[rackops]

Using this Phaeton as an example, this vehicle will likely cause a lot of heartache for some new owner simply because of what it "isn't". Likely it "isn't" going to Start, Stop, & Steer reliably. Any one of those 3 areas can cause someone to lose interest in a collector vehicle very quickly. Pile multiple issues into the mix and the car becomes 'unfun' for the new hobbyist and his family, so he will dump it onto the market again and go find another type of hobby.

This is a really good point. It brings up one of my favorite Model A selling lines: "this Model A starts, stops, and drives as it should". This means..........what?

When I picked up my 1931 Victoria from the seller, this was exactly the case. The seller advertised the car as "better than new!" (no kidding!) When I got there, the first thing I noticed was the upper bushing on the steering column was gone. His comment: "Oh, I thought the steering was that loose on all of these". The radiator spat water when the car got running. "You know, Henry really should have developed an overflow tank on these cars. That would take care of the issue. My solution has always been to add another gallon of water any time I drive..."

Luckily, I had an idea of what I was getting into, but for someone who wasn't familiar with Model As? Good golly...that car would have been a disaster!

Model As are great, simple, and fun cars, but they do require a bit of knowledge to operate and maintain. For a car that's made up of "only" 5,000 parts, it can be a mind-bogglingly frustrating headache.

There's always the recommendation to "join a club!" but for a younger collector, going to a Tuesday evening meeting with a bunch of people who are old enough to be their (great) grandparents and who already have decades of established relationships can be daunting, or simply not worth it at all.

The videos and online information created by people like Paul Shinn are what's going to save the hobby for the younger collectors, and as a result, save the hobby in general. Being able to access technical information and how-to 24/7 is vital for people who live in a tech-centric world (we all do, some less than others...) and the more information that can be put out there "for the record" online can and will serve as the "IV drip" for the hobby as many/most of the older genrations phase out.