The most eyebrow-raising results during the final Brightwell sale of the old buying season at Leominster were a cosmetically exhausted 1963 190SL Mercedes in right-hand drive from 20 years storage take on for £93,500, which would have bought a well restored example in the summer, and the £63,800 handed over for an ex-Fixed Head Coupe 1972 E Type S3 Roadster chop.
The most eyebrow-raising results during the final Brightwell sale of the old buying season at Leominster were a cosmetically exhausted 1963 190SL Mercedes in right-hand drive from 20 years storage take on for £93,500, which would have bought a well restored example in the summer, and the £63,800 handed over for an ex-Fixed Head Coupe 1972 E Type S3 Roadster chop.
Again, a factory-built open V12 E could have been landed for less at the start of the year. While contestants from as far away as Australia, Canada and Qatar had tried (unsuccessfully) to secure the 190SL project which was won by a clearly most determined bidder from the South West of England for £63,500 more than the estimate!
By the end of another well supported afternoon, and after the first wave of provisional bids had been invoiced, 119 or 82% of the 146 classics on the menu had been consumed for £1,123,755 with premium, an average of £9443 per car being spent on a Wednesday afternoon in Herefordshire.
The vital statistics were also re-assuring for market makers and watchers alike last Saturday in the multi-floor Mercedes World showrooms at Brooklands, where Historics had wisely set up their rostrum on the marble-floored mezzanine rather than under canvas on potentially soggy ground in the Museum car park next door. For although the computer said 38 of the cars on display had failed to find new friends, 92 or 71% of the 130 possibilities in the glossy book did seduce clients to part with £2,429,020 with premium, a within the M25 average investment of £26,402 per classic acquisition.
The Gullwinged 300SL Mercedes three-pointed star of the show with £925,000-1,125,000 ambitions failed to flap away to a new nest and the £300,000 or more suggested for a 1966 Silver Cloud III Rolls Drophead by MPW was also not achieved. But the sale gross had surged strongly from the previous Historics at Broooklands sale total in August and the near £2.5m spent on old motors this time eclipsed the figures at the same venue a year ago.
Unusually at auction these days, the top performer under the gavel was not a relatively modern Ferrari, but a pre-WW2 Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 Turismo by James Young, which had been first registered to an Inverness trawler owner in pre-quotas 1929, and which found the next keyholder with a spare £165,000. Whilst the going rate for Testarossa stock here was £82,500 for a 1987 left hooker with 51,430k on the odo and £64,350 for a 1990 Texan serviced lefty. Qualms appeared to be absent and bidding was brisk for a 1998 550 Maranello with a Category D record which cost the next policy holder £71,280. A 1983 308GTS Quattrovalvole fetched £70,400.
There was much Mini interest in some Wood & Pickett cars, which were being shed by present ‘custodian’ of the historic coach-building company, Michael Standring. £18,700 was handed over for a 1986 Austin Mini Mayfair, which became the try-out prototype for the engine conversions that John and Michael Cooper would eventually offer customers from 1999 onwards. £11,000 apiece was paid for a 1990 Rover Special Projects Mini Cooper S, a 1981 Austin Morris era Mini 95L Pick-Up and the 1963 Wood & Pickett Mini Delivery Van. A half-timbered 1969 Morris Mini Traveller picked up £7370, while an ex-Nick Mason 1990 Cooper S from another source went for £10,000.
Still to turn their microphones on are Coys Westminster tonight Tuesday, CCA Warwickshire Event Centre Saturday, Bonhams New Bond Street Sunday, H&H Droitwich next Wednesday, Bonhams Hendon next Thursday and Barons Sandown Park the following Tuesday, all before the nation’s gavels are briefly mothballed until January. There will however be no Christmas break for the likely to be imminently scrambled RAF this year and one can only hope that all leave will be cancelled for those essential listening and surfing operatives in Cheltenham.