Vintage Auto and Truck Parts

An Antique Car is generally defined as a car over 25 years of age, this being the definition used by the Antique Automobile Club of America and many other organizations worldwide. However, the legal definition for the purpose of antique vehicle registration varies widely.

The term Classic Car is often used synonymously with antique car, but the formal definition of that term has it as applying only to certain specific high-quality vehicles from the pre-World War II era.

Classic car is a term frequently used to describe an older car, but the exact meaning is subject to differences in opinion. Some are very inclusive, considering any older car in fine condition a classic. Others, including the "Concours d'Elegance" and the Classic Car Club of America maintain that 1948 is the last year for the true classics.

A Vintage Car is commonly defined as a car built between the start of 1919 and the end of 1930 . There is little debate about the start date of the Vintage period-the end of World War I is a nicely defined marker there-but the end date is a matter of a little more debate. The British definition is strict about 1930 being the cut-off, while some American sources prefer 1925 since it is the pre-classic car period as defined by the Classic Car Club of America. Others see the Classic period as overlapping the Vintage period, especially since the Vintage designation covers all vehicles produced in the period while the official Classic definition does not, only including high-end vehicles of the period. Some consider the start of World War II to be the end date of the Vintage period.

The Vintage period in the automotive world was a time of transition. The car started off in 1919 as still something of a rarity, and ended up in 1930 well on the way towards ubiquity; in fact, automobile production at the end of this period was not matched again until the 1950s . During this period, most industrialized nations built a nationwide road system, with the result that towards the end of the period; the ability to negotiate unpaved roads was no longer required.

Cars became much more practical, convenient and comfortable during this period. Car heating was introduced, as was the in-car radio. Antifreeze was introduced, allowing water-cooled cars to be used year-round. Four-wheel braking from a common foot pedal was introduced, as was the use of hydraulically actuated brakes. Power steering was also an innovation of this era. Towards the end of the Vintage era, the system of octane rating of fuel was introduced, allowing comparison between fuels.

During this period, as well as the car adapting, society began to adapt to the car. Drive-in restaurants were introduced, as well as suburban shopping centers, and motels began lining major roads in the United States.

Owning, restoring and collecting antique cars are popular hobbies worldwide .

Some consider such collectables be a form of investment. Buying a particular antique car is then done primarily in view of profit in a future sale and not of enjoying a drive or taking pleasure in restoration work. As with art collecting, antique car collecting is another form of gambling. The market for antique cars fluctuates wildly over the years. There have been periods, like the 1980s, which have seen strong and continued increase in price, but other periods (e.g. the early 1990s ), which saw precipitous declines.

Experts in antique cars such as Jay Leno give the same advice as serious art dealers and professionals in the antiques trade: Collect what you can enjoy above all because the future monetary value of any craft or art object is completely unpredictable. Still, the other opinion and plan exists: People who live in naturally dry areas, such the South Western Desert region of the United States, can approach this as a potential long term investment, due to the lesser chance of destruction of the bodies by rusting.

One strategy requires that you buy a car that is in good condition, with original paint and chrome in good order. It should be purchased for less than $500 in good running condition, with no broken glass and low mileage. The car should be at least 20 years old. This seems to be the time when the value of the car "bottoms out". A person needs to have at least 20 of these $500 cars, parked on blocks, and with the glass masked to prevent wind/sand damage. No more than $100 per car per year should go to provide the outdoor storage in the first year. The cars should be started up once every 3 months . Twenty cars would cost $2000 the first year in storage. By waiting 20 years, the cars might be worth in adjusted dollars, 20 times or more than when parked. Constant dollar $500 cars might become constant dollar $10,000 cars after 20 years, if long-term trends continue... as 99.9% of the same models will be junked, under all normal uses... Rarity is a key basis of value, and the rest is about the innate charm of the car, and its reflection of the era it represents. A 20-fold increase in constant value is much better than most 20-year investments.

As with all collectible antiques, current value has everything to do with current supply vs. demand, and very little else, certainly little to do with the car's price when new or any objective standard. Thus, rare cars that are highly desired are highly expensive, while vehicles that are not fashionable to collect can be very cheap. Condition, of course, influences value . At the present time, the variation in purchase price between a poor condition and good condition vehicle is generally much less than the cost of restoring a poor condition car; thus it is cheaper in the long run to buy the better vehicle.

In some instances, professional restorers can, through economy of scale and performing the work in-house, realize a profit from buying an un-restored car and performing a restoration. This is normally only possible when the car is in high demand and either very rare (e.g. old Ferraris) or quite common (e.g. classic Ford Mustangs). Amateur restorers who are highly skilled may find it cheaper to restore than buy in good condition, but this is through considering their labor as enjoyment rather than as a cost.

Realizing much long-term profit in owning an antique car is mostly about attempting to anticipate future changes in taste, which is highly speculative. Most cars go through a period of being considered merely old and undesirable before becoming valuable, and a car bought then might drastically increase in value. However, a car is a large object that is expensive to store and must be maintained, which cuts into such profits.

The Pre War Classic Cars

The pre-war part of the classic era began with the Great Depression in 1930 and ended with the recovery after World War II, commonly placed at 1948. It was in this period that integrated fenders and fully closed bodies began to dominate sales, with the new sedan body style even incorporating a trunk at the rear for storage. The old open-top runabouts, phaetons, and touring cars were phased out by the end of the classic era as wings, running boards, and headlights were gradually integrated with the body of the car.

By the 1930s most of the mechanical technology used in today's automobiles had been invented although some things were later "re-invented", and credited to someone else. For example, front-wheel drive was re-introduced by Andre Citroën with the launch of the Traction Avant in 1934, though it appeared several years earlier in road cars made by Alvis and Cord, and in racing cars by Miller (and may have appeared as early as 1897).

After 1930, the number of auto manufacturers declined sharply as the industry consolidated and matured.

Exemplary pre-war automobiles:

1932-1948 Ford V-8 - Ford introduced their powerful Flathead V8 in their mainstream model, creating a now-legendary car that dominated the world market much as the Model T and Model A had done in previous eras.
1934-1940 Bugatti Type 57 - A high-tech and refined automobile for the remaining rich of the time, the Type 57SC has become the singular classic car.
1934-1956 Citroën Traction Avant - The first mass-produced front-wheel drive car, built with monocoque techniques, was a technology masterpiece.
1936-1955 MG T series - This sports car for the masses came to represent the European motoring experience, especially for American soldiers fighting in the war.
1938-2003 Volkswagen Beetle - Perhaps the most-famous automobile of all time, it was a pre-war design that lasted through the modern era.
1940-1997 Oldsmobile - General Motors introduced the first fully automatic transmission, Hydra-Matic, with the 1940 Olds. This option was an instant hit, and within ten years, virtually all American automobile manufacturers offered automatics, which soon would become almost universal among buyers. Oldsmobile, along with Cadillac , also offered the first modern high-compression, overhead-valve V8 engine starting with the 1948 models.

Post War

Automobile design finally emerged from the shadow of World War II in 1949, the year that in the United States saw the introduction of high-compression V8 engines and modern bodies from General Motors' Oldsmobile and Cadillac brands. The unibody/strut-suspended 1951 Ford Consul joined the 1948 Morris Minor and 1949 Rover P4 in waking up the automobile market in the United Kingdom. In Italy, Enzo Ferrari was beginning his 250 series just as Lancia introduced their revolutionary V6-powered Aurelia .

Throughout the 1950s, engine power and vehicle speeds rose, designs became more integrated and artful, and cars spread across the world. Alec Issigonis' Mini and Fiat's 500 mini cars swept Europe, while the similar Keicar class put Japan on wheels for the first time. The legendary VW Beetle survived Hitler's Germany to shake up the small car market in the Americas. Ultra luxury, exemplified in America by the Cadillac Eldorado Brougham , reappeared after a long absence, and GT cars, like the Ferrari Americas, swept across Europe.

The market changed somewhat in the 1960s, as Detroit began to worry about foreign competition, the European makers adopted ever-higher technology, and Japan appeared as a serious car-producing nation. General Motors, Chrysler, and Ford tried radical small cars, like the GM A-bodies, but had little success. Captive imports and badge engineering swept through the U.S. and UK as conglomerates like the British Motor Corporation consolidated the market. Eventually, this trend reached Italy as niche makers like Maserati, Ferrari, and larger companies acquired Lancia. By the end of the decade, the automobile manufacturing world was much smaller.

In America, performance was the hot sell of the 1960s, with pony cars and muscle cars propping up the domestic industry. In 1964 the Ford mustang hit the markets. The Mustang was the hot ticket and was one of the most popular car of the early 1960s. In 1967 Chevrolet released the Camaro to compete with the Ford Mustang. In 1967 Chevy came out with the Camaro Z28, so in 1969 Fords competitiveness went into gear and they came out with the Mustang Boss 302 and the Mustang Boss 429. But everything changed in the 1970s as the 1973 oil crisis, automobile emissions control rules, Japanese and European imports, and stagnant innovation wreaked havoc on the American industry. Throughout the decade, small imported cars outperformed large American ones, and the domestic auto industry began to fail. Small performance cars from BMW, Toyota, and Nissan took the place of big-engine cars from America and Italy.

On the technology front, the biggest developments of the era were the widespread use of independent suspensions, wider application of fuel injection, and an increasing focus on safety in the design of automobiles. The hottest technologies of the 1960s were NSU's Wankel engine, the gas turbine, and the turbocharger. Of these, only the last, pioneered by General Motors but popularized by BMW and Saab, was to see widespread use. Little Mazda had much success with their "Rotary" engines, but was critically affected by its reputation as a polluting gas-guzzler. Other Wankel licensees, including Mercedes-Benz and General Motors, never put their designs into production. Rover and Chrysler both produced experimental turbine cars to no effect.

 

 

 

Source:Wikipedia