A sad end for old friend (ZB Fairlane)

[OzJavelin]

Went to a clearing auction of an "old" car wrecker on Saturday. I was actually looking at a couple of old Ramblers there .. but walked past an old ZB also for sale. I've always liked ZA-ZB 'Lanes after my wife had a really nice one we sold about 3years ago. So I had a quick squiz. The Windsor was still in it, although only just as someone had pulled the auto so the motor was all over the place in the engine bay. The rocker-covers on the engine looked familiar? They were old-style alloy covers .... like the ones on my wifes old ZB. Hmm ..

I started having a closer look. This car was white with red interior, big twins, towbar, airhorn, remenants of a auto floor shifter, etc. Could have been the same car? Then I checked the dashboard, where some of the wood decal always peeled of in summer. Yep same car. I was sure of it.

What a sad ending for a nice old car. Other than the usual rust spots there was no damage to the thing. It was still straight and relatively shiny. They had pulled the auto, the wire-spoke wheels (not hubcaps), rear bumper, interior venitian blind, steering wheel, floor console and shifter, front buckets and centre armrest. Very sad.

What really threw me about all this was that the guy who we sold the car to said he loved it and "would never sell". And here is was in a wrecking yard, not wrecked, but stripped. I never thought I was really "emotional" about cars (despite enjoying a LOT of them), but this did upset me a bit.

A wrecker in Geelong ended up buying it (he was outbidding most people there for most stuff), so I suppose whatever is left will be wrecked too. I would have loved to buy it again, but I didn't want to get into a bidding war and I've got nowhere to put it.

Moral of the story is .. if you've got an old car you like keep it. You never know what their new owners will do with them ..

Rod.