At some point, I would think that cars from a particular decade or era or year (like 1965, to pick a year at random) would be lost forever apart from the possibility of people taking it upon themselves to continually restore them. But even with the restoration of older cars, I would expect some of them to be lost to accidental damage or neglect, so that only a very few collectors’ cars would exist.
Argh. I’m probably not phrasing all of this well. The gist of my question is, “how long before it will be virtually impossible for the average person to find and buy a car made in 1965?”
If that doesn’t seem clear, blame my inability to articulate my question properly…
I’ve always thought the best source for 50s and 60s cars was Cuba.
Don’t car restorers whimper at the thought of the number of '57 Chevys
that are probably roaming around Havana? They aren’t in really good shape, but you just know someone has kept one in mint condition since '57.
My brother found a 53 Pontiac in as close to mint condition as possible, all original finish and not a spot of rust. Every piece of rubber had rotted away and the engine was seized, but there were only a few thousand miles on it, seems the owner had bought it, became ill and stopped driving, it wasn’t until after his wife died and they were selling off the estate many years later that it came on the market. It turned out to be a major project getting it running, but worth it in the end. Probably many more similar ones still out there. But as time passes the parts required become harder to find and as he discovered, things like door and window seals need to be replaced as they deteriorate. The major components can usually be rebuilt, like the engine and transmission. But the little stuff drives you nuts, especially if you feel the need to keep it authentic. As the supply of NOS (New Old Stock) parts dries up and no new ones are produced the less desirable specimens get canalized to maintain the better ones until only a few good examples are left. This process will take longer for some models than others depending on total numbers produced, but probably not more than a couple decades more for most, I had to abandon work on a 63 Alpha Romeo for want of parts.
The high-value cars (muscle cars, etc.) will always be around. Not only are people constantly restoring them, but just about any part can be purchased from 3rd party manufacturers. As an example, you can build a 1966 Mustang from almost 100% new parts.
I once heard that there are more 1932 Fords in existence today than were built in 1932, albeit a high percentage of them are street rods.
Well considering I saw a 1928 Model A Tudor Sedan in good condition parked on the street in my little Long Island Suburb just a few days ago, probably a long, long time for every car from the 1960s to disappear.
(Although there may not be examples of every given model/year in the future, particularly common cars like, say, 1966 Dodge Coronet sedans [A model my dad once owned, but which was totaled in the mid-1970s, so there’s at least one less of that model around])
As a child/teenager in the 1970s and 1980s, I remember seeing far fewer cars from the 1960s and 1950s on the road, than cars from the 1980s and 1990s today. I guess that means cars from that era were less durable than cars in following years, although I’m certain somone could disprove that.
I’ve also noticed that it seems like one year, all cars of a certain model just disappear, while the year before, they’er everywhere. The cars from the 1960s that seemed most numerous on the roads in the late 1970s and early 1980s weren’t muscle cars, but Dodge Darts and Plymouth Valiants. Seemed like all the Darts and Valiants disappeared around 1989 or so. It was rare to see a Chevrolet Vega or Ford Pinto make it into the 1980s, but early 1970s-era Novas were everywhere until the early 1990s. I haven’t seen any first generation 1980s-era Ford Escorts on the road in a few years, and it seems like they won’t have a presence on the roads at the end of 2004.
So long as there is a road or track upon which it is legal to drive one, I suspect you will be able to find 1960s-era vehicles on them. (And at the one lane bridge you can still leave the giants stranded at the river side.) As an extreme example, there were over a million Chevy Impalas sold in 1965. That’s a large pool of existing original parts suitable for refurbishing in the short term, even if no company offers remanufactured parts.
Furthermore, it’s not too difficult to predict that in the future it will be even easier to acquire new parts. The day may not be too far away when one can walk into a corner CAD factory with some data DVDs one day and drive out the following month with a truckload of parts which can be assembled into a brand new Yenko COPO. (Good luck passing emissions with it, though.)
It seems probable to me that the same methods will be applied to existing original automobiles, extending vehicle life well past, well, the life of the vehicle itself. Eventually, classic cars may present a Ship of Theseus sort of problem where some future enthusiast has to ask, “this vehicle has been continuously raced for 350 years, yet no original part remains–is it the same car?”
Chances are that many classic cars will last as long as there remains an enthusiast who wants one.
An oddly coincidental post, considering that we just had a visit from a relative who collects Model Ts. And who seems to have little to no trouble finding them. I don’t think many cars will ever disappear completely.
Or perhaps a very interesting side-OP would be: “Have any makes/years/models of cars or trucks ever completely vanished off of the road?”
Once a model of car reaches a certain age, the only ones left are in two categories: the collectors’ cream puffs, and barely running. It comes down to economics. Do I spend $500 to rebuild the engine on a $400 car, or do I scrap it?
There’s a strange kind of price warping, here. I once had a '56 Buick. It wasn’t a show car, but it looked nice, and it ran well. I bought it for $1500, and after 3 years, I sold it for $3000. I met a guy with a '57 Pontiac station wagon. We had a wry laugh over the fact that if our cars were Chevies, they’d be worth at least $10,000.
When I was in Cuba, I counted 13 1957 Chevys (210s mainly, a few Bel Airs) in the (small) parking lot of Jose Marti Airport in Havana. The problem is, just as there were no cars imported after 1959, so too were there no spare parts imported. Everything’s been bodged to keep it running.
I was kind of thinking along the lines of having the cars being at least 70% original equipment (again to throw an arbitrary number around) or something like that. As Crafter_Man mentioned, some of the classics can practically be built new from parts, which to me seems more like building a kit car or replica. (Not that I have anything against kit cars; I’d like to build one someday.)
And yes, I was thinking in terms of muscle cars. It is my goal to own at least one of the following cars before I die:
[ul]
[li] 1967 Corvette 427 convertible[/li][li] 1971 Hemi Cuda[/li][li] 1965 Mustang[/li][li] 1973 Pantera[/li][/ul]
…And like I said, like Frankenstein robbing the grave, there is no reason why you shouldn’t be able to assemble a 70% human version of your dream car–for comparatively cheap outside of goverment regulations.
Were it not for the fact of traffic congestion, stoplights, news helicopters, and Motorola, you could be able to outrun the cops indefinitely.
I can just see the streaming headline:
:::LACENTCOM PARKS ALL NONESSENTIAL VEHICLES… WHITE FORD BRONCO APPARENTLY OWNED BY BASTARD LOVE GRANDCHILD OF NICOLE BROWN SMITH AND BRUNO HOFFMANN… SIX NEWSBOTS DESTROYED DOWNLOAD NOW PREMIUM USERS[.U] WRONG SIDE OF ROAD… NO TRAFFIC FATALITIES LOGGED IN GREATER LA AREA SINCE INVENTION OF “TIPTRONITROL” IN 2085::::
I have a 1968 Chevy Camaro that I simply adore and after six years, three different engines and a complete frame reconstuction, I am almost finished with her. I may end up behind the wheel of many other cars in my life, but if I get my way, I will have my baby till the day I die
