This week we have a very special car in our workshops. The car has come in for some of her regular servicing and we are pleased to have her back. There are plenty of Bullitt replicas or “Clones” out there, as you have no doubt seen with the same colour etc. However driving this little lady is the closest you will ever get to the original Bullitt car, for handling, sound and look, especially here in the UK. Now we all know that Bullitt was a ’68 etc etc. This ’67 390GT in Acapulco Blue is true to the original spec Bullitt car. The car has a four speed manual with the legendary 390ci big block as you would expect. The car sounds incredible and not had the super loud exhausts on it (yet). She drives like an absolute dream and turns heads wherever she goes.

There is even a rumour that this car could be coming up for sale very soon. So, if the rumours are true, pay a visit to your bank manager and get your money ready. There is already huge interest in this pretty special car with the attention to detail as you would expect. If she is up for sale, the first person with the money gets her. An absolute classic car that will only ever go up in value.

Adam does his best Steve McQueen impression backing this car into her temporary home.

Watch This Space for news on this beauty coming up for sale.

Customers Cars:

The ’70 fastback is starting to have the back-end welded into place now. The rear quarters are dry fitted at the moment and will get some colour on the insides before the final welding up.

The rear axle has been treated to some paint and is almost ready to go back on the chassis.

News:

Adam and Yogi had an impromptu visit to the The London Classic Car Show on Friday. They decided to have a look round, the trouble is the look round ended up Adam reaching for his wallet. He did buy something and that something will appear here very soon. You don’t need to ask what it is just yet, but it’s pretty special. Adam even has some special number plates for it. As we said above – watch this space for news on that one!

Ford History Lesson:

Part 1:
When Henry Ford first set up the auto company in the 1900s he had 6 other investors and they all wanted to build expensive cars for the rich as there was more profit in such cars – like they were doing in Europe. Henry was strongly opposed to this strategy but was out-voted. He went on to developed and built a luxury car made using his skills to engineer it to extremely high standards. Once built, he decided to go his own way and to buy out his partners and start the Ford Motor Company. As part of the deal, the newly built luxury car was left with the remaining investors…..and it went on to be launched as the very first ‘Cadillac’ car!

Part 2:
Henry Ford is famed for inventing the ‘moving production line’ which allowed 50 cars a day to roll off the line. A much lesser known fact is that his grandson, Henry Ford 2 is responsible for creating the first ‘automated production line’ ……allowing 400 vehicles a day to be produced.
Part 3:
Henry Ford 2 loved the name ‘Maverick’ and wanted it for the now famous Mustang. Ford ‘owned’ the rights to the name along with 800 other names for possible future cars. But where did the name Maverick come from?
In reality there was a rich Texan cattle baron called Samuel Maverick whose claim to fail was he never branded his vast heard of cattle…as he thought the process of burning his mark into an animals skin was barbaric. So, if any cattle was found without a branded mark it was said to be a ‘Maverick’ – interestingly he lost very few cattle and had little trouble from ruthless thieves simply putting their brand on his cattle. His name became the definition of someone who did not act traditionally or conform to the rules of society in any way. So the Maverick was born….and Henry Ford 2 wanted to call the Mustang Maverick because it did not conform to any of the car rules that went before? He got his way later in the decade when Ford launched the all new Ford Maverick in the US. The name was given another outing in the 80/90s in the UK with the Ford/Nissan joint venture 4×4 – Ford Maverick and Nissan Terrano.

Thanks to Gary W. for the information.

The Pups

This week in the office customers have mentioned they like the idea of the pups being in the office. Now we can’t be sure if this is true or not, but the husbands wait for the their wives to be distracted by the pups while they pay for their parts or for the work on their cars! 😉

Mother Ellie and daughter Daisy