Flambouyant cars..

G Luxel

I am interested if these cars were ever sold new in this country?

Facel Vega
Bugatti ( any model)
Ferrari 250 GT
Mercedes 300 SL gullwing
Delahaye (any model)


I never saw any on these roads or seen any reference to anyone famous owing one here......?

junkyard

I'd be very surprised if anything like the above were sold new here, some of them might have spent some time here but weren't sold here new. I know of a 300SL that was found in a shed in Kerry but its long gone now. There was a Ferrari 250 GT down around Waterford for a while a few years ago but I haven't heard of it recently. There was a Delahaye around the town where I live in the 60's and a few Aston Martins.

2cv

I don't think that there was ever a Facel Vega sold here.. I'd even doubt if there was ever one in the country. Even in France, they're extremely rare and fetch the same price as a small villa on the Cote d'Azur :-)
They were magnificent cars though!

green-blood

you coud add a few to your list

Delage
Hispano-Suiza
Pigasso

all finely crafted

2cv

How about the Minerva... This was Belgium's answer to the Rolls-Royce.. Very few of them around these days....

zuutroy

Theres a 300 SL gullwing owned by one of the estate agents Sherry-Fitzgerald (not sure which one). It was at the Terenure show last year.

Edit: Re-read your post, didn't see the 'new' part. I doub ANYONE in Ireland had the money for one in the '60s!

junkyard

2cv wrote:

How about the Minerva... This was Belgium's answer to the Rolls-Royce.. Very few of them around these days....

There are two in Cork.

2cv

junkyard wrote:

There are two in Cork.

what???? where??? i want to see....

Blue850

I have a photo of one at home, its 1904 and I took it at Killarney in 2005. It took the owner 22 years to find an engine for it

2cv

I can imagine... They quite rare...

G Luxel

zuutroy wrote:

Edit: Re-read your post, didn't see the 'new' part. I doub ANYONE in Ireland had the money for one in the '60s!

I purposely put in the NEW part. In the last year I have seen countless NEW
Aston Martins and Ferraris and Maybachs...... well one or two... so my thread concerned anything new but along similiar lines.

Others i want to add to the list are

Mercedes 600, - one I did see was sold new here in the I960s
Cadillac Eldorado/Fleetwood. -
Maserati - any?
Jaguar E types? there were a few sold here new.
Opel Diplomat/Admiral?
Rolls Royce Phantom or any of the special bodied Silver cloud series


basically any vehicles that wasnt a typical Morris Minor/mini/beetle/Anglia/Mercedes Fintail.

green-blood

well those are big and rare but not flamboyant

Dusenberg

8~)

Well, if the focus is on large cars, as opposed to exotica, I imagine the majority of large cars in from the 50s-70s were owned by the state.

I'm too young to remember... but I like to watch RTE archive footage for the cars. Seems to me state cars in general were the larger (but poverty spec) Mercedes', Humber and, in the 70s, the odd XJ Jaguar.

Ballykine43

Don't be fooled into thinking that the Irish couldn't afford big and classy cars before the country finally took off in more recent years. Brown Thomas' customers in the early 60s when i was a student were if anything much more affluent than they are today. There was a furrier at that same end of Grafton Street who arrived each morning with his Rolls absolutely crammed with his wares. Meath farmers also had a reputation for being able to afford large American cars.

I remember in the mid 70s going to see a 1930s Hispano Suiza which had turned up as a barn find in Enniskillen. Then I thought it was a pile of scrap, but now I would know differently. Don't know if anyone saved it.

junkyard

There was a local garage owner where I live had a 1937 Hispano Suiza soft top, I never found out where it went. He had it up until the late 70's, it was a beautiful looking car and very rare by all accounts. There is a Mercedes 600 in Cork, it was an original Irish car owned by O'Flaherty's the importer for Mercedes. Its sitting in a shed in Douglas for the last 20 years or so and needless to say its in bits now, a pity really considering its such a rare car here and was owned from new here.

G Luxel

Mercedes 600, it must be one of 2600? built. This car had the misfortune to be associated with military dictators and other despots. I remember seeing an original irish one on a display stand at a car show in the RDS in I994. It was on show by a mercedes specialist. He had also a Mercedes 300 SE, the original S class, that he had restored, sitting next to it. Lately Ive seen a lot of these S classes appearing but they all have had previous overseas owners .

I am inclined to agree with other threaders that there were a lot of exotic cars here in the 50s and 60s or even earlier. I believe that there are two Rolls Royce hearses still in service in Dublin after 30/40 years. So too are many Austin Princess Limousines.

MercMad

There is a Mercedes 600 in Cork, it was an original Irish car owned by O'Flaherty's the importer for Mercedes. Its sitting in a shed in Douglas for the last 20 years or so and needless to say its in bits now, a pity really considering its such a rare car here and was owned from new here.

........I'd love to find out more about that one, where is it ? O'Flaherty's had a few of these cars, I once saw a grey metallic SWB one which they had lent to a customer but he never realised it was leaking oil badly and didn't react when the oil light came on so he did in the engine. It was taken off the road then and I havent seen it since, that was about 10 years ago ! The do currently have a dark blue long wheelbase one in perfect condition, which their service manager at the time (he looked after all their classics) took to the show at Trim once. Again haven't seen it since. That was about 1992 !

I remember seeing an original irish one on a display stand at a car show in the RDS in I994. It was on show by a mercedes specialist. He had also a Mercedes 300 SE, the original S class

I was at that show, it was Tony Canning's stand, havent seen the car since, although the 300SE is belong to a friend on mine in the Club.

BTW not to be pedantic but the first car refered to officially as a n "S-Class" was the W116 which came after this car in 1972, although Mercedes-Benz or more correctly Daimler-Chrylser have now applied the term "S-Class" retrospectively to their W108, W109,W111/W112 saloons and Coupes !

2cv

MercMad, you seem to be in the know here about Mercedes :-)
I'm currently looking at a 1977 280SE auto in the UK. How much should i spend on a car like this?