My 2012 Scat spots round-up

[Jon]

Another of my threads that's had a long gestation period, though admittedly 95% of the upcoming content has been captured this month whilst on holiday with friends from the UK. Happily, I felt able to break the news to them of my intentions to snap away at dull old cars and on occasion, managed to rope them in for assistance as well. I was even getting suggestions from eagle-eyed passengers on our road trip but frankly , I'm getting way ahead of myself.

Let's start from the beginning, on a set I was working on at the start of the year. The film's not been released yet but I can't see any harm in putting up some spots, especially as there's no paparazzi shots of famous* people. It is set shortly after WWII and has a US and oriental basis, so look out for inaccuracies:



This thing was being lifted around the set by forklift to give the impression of more wrecks than we had available. Is this a 'jailbar' Ford? I'm thinking it's a little too new, anyway.




Nice us of set decorations here:



WHAT THE....?



No, this isn't a war zone, just Sunderland. I popped back to the UK in February to celebrate my Grandma's 100th birthday, so managed to catch this Chevette and CPT (possibly a Chevanne, since there was one in this garden years ago), just round the corner from one of my old uni houses.



Newcastle now and some Geordie fella thinks this is an acceptable tow bar set-up.



I think this deserves a close-up. Loving the self tapper number plate screws and lack of number plate lighting. Unless they tow one of those ex-army 1/2 tonne trailers on Land Rover wheels, I reckon the trailer would be towed at some comedy jaunty angle, too.



Back in the sun now and a bit more work on the film job. Here's our department's Japanese import hire truck with a slight addition....



....a 40ft x 20ft green screen, which we could drive around and use as a backdrop for actors to perform against, thus cutting out any inappropriate background stuff.....



....presumably like this German Opel Blitz



Big American car



Big American truck



Used to tow big American car. Anyone familiar with Hollywood actor's backs of heads may well find a scoop picture here but I'm sure that, as a group of fully grown men who chat about obsolete cars, we're all too highbrow to harbour such useless knowledge.

[Jon]

Actually, it seems like there was far too little scat content there, so hopefully this little post before bed time should make up for it.



I'm not one of those boorish Holden/Ford people (about the nearest comparison to football supporters we have here) so can categorically state that I think these XD Falcon wagons are ace.




And so are these Holden HQs. Still can't get my head around the whole model designations of these but at a guess I'd say it's a Kingswood. Since registrations are on a whole consecutive, this dates this as around 1979, so a few months off my Commodre wagon.




Our adopted cat (she refused to leave after we'd bought the house). CUTNESS ALERT!! [sic]




Something that's more common than it has right to be, in MK1 and Mk2 forms. I've never seen so many post facelift 1990-91 70sx ie models than I have here, so perhaps I should dig out the two unique-to-this-model Magnetti Marelli MED439(M) ECUs I have back in the UK and CLEAN UP from the MASS BIDDING WARS that would no doubt ensue.




Jaunty angle for extra interest here. From a local firm which use all sorts of rammel to cart their wares. Dates to around 1983/84 I reckon.




I'm sure you won't begrudge two shots of this beauty, since it ticks so many boxes. Love the louvres and the fact that it's a non-sporting model, so no awful stripes or bad wheels.




I had to wait about 20 mins pretending to avidly read a magazine to get these pics, since there were some youths hanging around and I didn't want to look like a sad old square. I'm so vein!

Anyway, to bed and then hopefully I'll post up some more in the morning.

[Seth]

SOme great looking cars there.

The pick up at the top is a '47ish Studebaker like this.



I'd obviously expect it to look like that in a film set when it was only a year or two old.

The 'big American car" with the backs of heads is a Chrylser also from '47ish.

The XD Flacon wagon is exceedingly angular. Looks very funereal in black.

[Jon]

Thanks for the vehicle IDs Seth, as I must admit that American cars of that era have a bit of a Farina effect on me whereby they all look the same, though the updated models each year no doubt help those out in the know.

On to December now (told you it had been a lax year until recently) and off to the local drag meet (again - sorry), held on the first Sunday of December. A mix of home-built hot rods and professional efforts, though mostly biased towards the former, since it's not a big strip. Actually, it's an air field most of the time.




Sadly not the ultimate sleeper, rather just a support ute. These L200s are still really common here but they do it for me, nevertheless.




Enterprising farmer uses his Holden Kingswood and field as an alternative to paying the entrance fee to watch.




On to the racing now and a strong selection of US and Australian contenders, along with a few 'Jappers' to mix things up. Sadly, you'll notice the Antipodean trait of nice car/horrid large modern alloys more often than not. Anyway, most of these don't need much mention, so I'll just bosh up the pics. Please excuse any unedited spots on the images, as I still haven't cleaned the sensor on my camera after almost 5 years of wanting to....

























This Mazda was very fast and well driven, unlike most rotary cars I see and hear. Still think they sound crap, though.




Not really that fast but something I very much coveted, hence the two images. Love the small rear side windows and the curve in the rear 'screen. Plus, look at those tail lights, tilted upwards for no other reason that it looks cool. Also, bravo for sensible wheels!









Seen before but it's just so well executed I had to re-post. Runs a Lexus V8 with nitrous IIRC and sounds excellent and is super quick. HERO.




Another tasteful effort and quite competitive also.




Wanted this to be good but it just wasn't cutting the mustard. Generally misunderstood, I think and was for sale for $6000 including a tow trailer, so may perform better on something with corners.







Despite this driver being a lady, the commentator neglected to make any generic sexist remarks, which was a little disappointing.




Perfect* wheel choice there.




Fast.




Really slow. Somewhere in the 18s I think but the guy turns up every year. Why bother?




Fantastic. Would like to own.







Nice jackets, lads.




????? in amongst the support cars. Saw a blue UK reg'd one in Queenstown about 5 years ago.




It wasn't really ice cream weather but part of me wanted to buy one just to congratulate the owner. The Yorkshire part of me overruled that idea quite quickly, though.




Supposedly this is potentially the world's fastest flat head V8 dragster and we were witnessing history on its maiden voyage. As such though, we witnessed the owner giving it about 60%










Nice.




Looks like one of those crap Hotwheels cars I was always disappointed to receive (always preferred the showroom models)




Like the period effect livery of this one.




UN peace keeping spec of this Supra, a Japanese car with muscle car power. Went well.




Brilliant interior of the orange T-bucket thing. Look at the angle of the steering wheel!






This rotary bike was understandably very rapid and at one point was racing a very ugly looking bike fresh from the UK. Sadly, this one was in the lead when its chain guard fell off, bounced along the strip and struck the UK bike rider on the top of his helmet, causing him to fall off and skid along the ground past the finish line at a terminal speed of 138mph. Unbelievably, he only suffered bruising but this and the rain put a dampner on things, so off we went home.




Final car park spot. You'll be glad to know that the owner was in his 40s, had long hair and wore a lot of black.

[Seth]

Really slow. Somewhere in the 18s I think but the guy turns up every year. Why bother?

He obviously needs to enlist more of the powers of Grayskull.

[Leonard Hatred]

Great photos, I like the drag action ones.

Spotting an Uno is a bit of an event for me, I've not seen a Mk1 model in years and just spotted one Mk2 in the past year.

It's unusual to see shonkily fitted towbars these days, at least you can see the number plate on the Punto - I spotted some modern car recently with a towbar obscuring the middle of the number plate.

[Jon]

Got to admit Len that the dodgy number plate set-up on that Punto reminded me of similarly shonky efforts of Mini Metros and Hillman Avengers back in the day, though in these situations the number plates were mounted to the right of the tow bar, sort of like a pre-emptive Alfa 156.

Anyway, last time I finished with a MkI Escort, so why not start off with another?






Modern scat here, a Mitsubishi 380, successor (minus the success part) of the popular Sigma/Magna over here and Australia, with it being manufactured in Australia. Think of it as a modern day Leyland P76 with c.30000 produced over 3 years and thus a 'make or break' model which broke. Seems like an OK car to me. Wikipedia page on it here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitsubishi_380




I have no idea how this statue was given space in a town centre but it provides me with lols each time I see it. At least it made the SD1 easier to snap.




Couple of drive-by shots of the house of the man who collects MkII Triumph 2000/2500s. That's my arm in the shot since I was driving, so this was the start of roping in my mates to document the dross.






Far too much of a regular sight to be really bothered about taking a shot of this but I thought the low spec, colour and louvres were positives, so what the hell.







Think these sold over here quite well, obviously appealing to farmers. I'm surprised they aren't still on offer as off-road farm vehicles, since Suzuki have just recently relaunched the second generation Jimny for farm use only and the start prices are north of $20000.




Bus pervs alert. Trolley buses nonetheless, which are still operational in Wellington, albeit boring modern jobbies.





Stagecoach livery looks incongruous over here.




UK plates but original registration number. Think I prefer the original sized black NZ ones.







Boringly popular back in the UK but I reckon this is the first I've seen here and once again the interesting colour made it worthy of a spot.







Apologies for the soft focus but these spots were taken from the passenger seat whilst on a road trip. If you think this is lazy spotting, it gets worse next time....

[Barrett]

Profuse apologies for the pic repeat, but are these things worth MEGABUX nowadays? They must be the best looking car to come out of the Antipodes and I would very much like one parked outside my house just to sit in and look at (I'm pretty sure I'd die instantly if I tried to drive it)

[Jon]

Aye Barrett, those Falcon coupés are pretty pricey now, probably worth about $25-30000 in that condition, I'd expect though cars over here vary so much in price that the pure guess of mine is probably waaay off the mark.

On with the lazy spottings from the passenger seat of a borrowed Isuzu Bighorn, though I reckon this wasn't a bad effort. Surprisingly thin on the ground here, unfortunately:






Revised model of the first Mazda 323 based Ford Lazer




And the earlier original version spotted in almost exactly the same spot the following day. These have a slightly strange front end, sort of similar to a MKIV Cortina mixed with a Ford Corcel.




Another common site though increasingly less so in un-wankered condition.







Any ideas what the little extension to the engine cover might be for?




Another set of lazy spots, all collected from my cafe seat whilst eating breakfast (many other interesting things eluded me during this 30mins). Usually I wouldn't have included this but I think these were a weird Mexican spec of bay window vans sold here, which came with the later rear lights but split screen era clap shut side doors. And now I'm boring even myself with these dub facts.




What was right behind the bus. Jury's out on the wheels, though an inch smaller would be fully acceptable. The same could no doubt apply to the owner's neck were this a British spot.







I reckon a standard one of these would stand out even further but begrudgingly I'll admit this has some nice elements.







Pointy trees and me looking like a tourist made this quality Escort van easy to snap. Incidentally, this was spotted at a car boot sale, something I really miss and a real rarity over here. Still bought nowt, though.




Late model Chrysler Valiant, produced at the time when Chyrsler Australia started producing Mitsubishis. I bet they made these look ultra outdated but they lasted into the early 1980s. Small boat in background.




One for Seth




That'll do for now, it's 10:30pm and way too hot here. Feel my pain.

[Jon]

Slight back-track here chronology-wise to start with, as somehow this imported Mirage Turbo missed being uploaded. Elderly lady driver probably explains why it still runs on steel wheels. No doubt Hirst or spottedlaurel have a brochure line up shot of the range of these:






The ladies fancied a quick tour of the wineries, so rather than do that I decided to covertly catch some chod instead. Pre 9-5 Saabs are a rarity here and this had a different set of alloys on each side, so I reckon the owner might be an enthusiast.




It's not too uncommon to see commercial vehicles rocking pre-'87 black plates, so a sign that stuff lasts when there's not so much of a rust issue. These Fords are a re-badged Mazda Titan but I like the grilles of these early versions, which remind me of the late D-Series lorries.






I saw a boxy shape in the distance so got a shot of this Honda but if I'd have known it was one of these Civics, I'd not have bothered. Like the NZ equivalent of spotting a fish face MKIII Fiesta or something.







I think this is about as near to banger racing as it gets here. HQ Holdens command coin now so I guess this has been a racer for a while.




A not uncommon rural scene.




Nice to see a Mini in daily use.




Another just round the corner.




These do nowt for me but thought it might interest someone.




See what I mean about old commercials in daily use? 1981/82 judging by the plate.













4WD one I think.




Early face Ford Telstar, aka Mazda GC 626.




Our favourite camping location of the trip. Borrowed Bighorn in shot here, which despite being 20 years old feels much more modern than any of our cars. I don't think there's much reason to go much newer than this tbh though the diesel engine would've coped better with a manual box.




Love these triple cab efforts though I reckon riding in one would be pretty depressing, as it's a sure fire sign you'd be on your way to pick litter off the side of the road, or shovel dirt etc.




OK, these Clubman Minis are getting a bit tiresome now.







Ditto 1970's Holdens.




That's better.








Long range Land Cruiser spot. Nice to see it earning it's keep.




Totally boring spot except for the plate, which was issued around 1986, before personalised plates became available. Seen a few MGs with these but this owner obviously got in early with the re-registration. Would be even better were it a 1964 model but I CBA trying to find out.