SCZZEC Magazine May 2003

This last month we have had plenty of activity�the Invercargill International Convention over Easter, 100 years of Ford display and parade at the Fairlie Easter show.
Also the club has its own Zephyr calendar which we can sell to members and those interested. These are pretty unique as all the cars featured are club members� cars. Be in quick as they are going fast.
This will be my last report as president. I�m standing down and letting the club have a new face for 2003. The club is in very good heart with interest growing, as is the membership. So have your say at the AGM and if nominated give serious thought to standing, as it�s the members that make the club.
Many thanks to Bruce, our vice president, who has filled in for me very ably when required; Carol, our editor; Glenis, our secretary; John, club captain; Wayne, treasurer; Garey, the social convener; and our committee for their help during the last two years.

Happy Zephyring
Bob Stevens

With some restructuring I made myself available for the position of club captain for the year just past. Yes� well� where on earth did it go? Our car has been off the road for about 12 months, but over the next few months will be tidied up ready for Southern Connection and a holiday Easter 2004. When we/I attended a club run it was either in our road car or with someone else.
Considering what else is on in everyone�s lives including work commitments, club runs were relatively well attended�thanks very much to the organisers and participants.
Again our club has functioned very well and maintained a very high membership, although I believe it may be a little light at the executive level with the same people picking up most of the positions with some shuffling.
Our magazine has maintained a very professional publication and always out on time, placing it up with the best, co-ordinated by a very enthusiastic editor.
Glenis and I will be standing down from executive positions within the club, but will be there when we can. Should I be required and as time permits I will gladly lend a hand.
All the very best to you all

Five club members: Russell Paul, Mk I convertible; Reg Stokes, Mk II consul; Laurie Spillane, Mk III Zephyr; Ron Thompson,
Mk III Zodiac; and Peter Hunter, Mk III Zodiac Estate attended the 100 years of Ford celebrations in Fairlie on Easter Monday.

We took part in a parade of Ford vehicles from the 1903 Ford Model A, Ford T Model A 1928, Prefect, Anglia, Mustang and Lincoln Continental followed by road trucks and tractors from 1920 to 2003. Many members of the public showed interest in the cars, remembering when they owned one.

Friday: Several members joined forces for the trip to Invercargill, some leaving from Timaru and some from Dunedin.
By Balclutha there was a small Timaru convoy of two Mk Is, two Mk IIs and two Mk IIIs.

After registration there was an optional trip to Bluff, taking in the paua house, Bluff Hill and Stirling Point.
The evening function at the Invercargill Workingmen�s Club, the venue for all function events, included a welcome, a very entertaining address by Invercargill mayor Tim Shadbolt, and an oyster opening competition, won (to our shame) by an Aussie. As a consolation we got to eat the oysters.
There were 305 adults registered, plus children, and with 132 cars. A brilliant turnout!

Saturday:
Cars assembled at the Invercargill showgrounds for the show �n� shine and judging. Members inspected each other�s cars and the Model A nationals in the adjoining show-ring, took a bus to town for shopping and lunch or joined forces for trips further afield.

IIn the afternoon, at the conclusion of the display, we took a ride to Teretonga Park raceway for a few laps.
Who was it in a green car that spun out on the track and who was it in a blue convertible that missed a corner???

Prizes were awarded at the dinner and dance that night. South Canterbury did very well with nine placings

Mk II convertible:Gavin Ladbrook first
Mk III modified:Eric Scott first
Mk II utility:Phil Rooke second
Mk II stock:Bob Stevens second
Mk I convertible:Malcolm Stewart third
Mk I stock:Jim Macdonald third
Mk II convertible:Bevan Cook third
Mk II modified:Ross Worner third
Mk IV stock:Don Campbell third

Sunday:
Cars assembled at the meeting place, the gardens� Feldwick Gates, for a run to Gore. This was a very impressive sight, with the cars in marks stretching further than the eye could see.
First stop was Hokonui Park and Vintage Village which included the local vintage car club then, after lunch at the Gore racecourse, we moved on to Mandeville to view the restoration of vintage aeroplanes.
Flights were available for the foolhardy and the brave.

Entertainment that night was provided by the Wheel Tappers Show Group and local girls performed some Irish dances.

America has its Chevys, Australia has its Holdens and while there are no James Deans rollicking out of the college campus here and jumping into dreamy �59 Merc convertibles, New Zealand has its Zephyrs.

All right, stop screaming all you guys who first had a Customline or Chev or Cresta � taken as an all-round car the Ford Zephyr models have fitted more people�s varying purposes than any other in this country.

It all started in 1951, when the Ford Motor Company of Dagenham announced its revolutionary �5 Star� cars, the Consul 4 and the Zephyr 6. My first glimpse was in early �52, still a kid in short pants and knobbly knees (now I don�t wear short pants any more), hanging onto my father�s coat tail with my nose pressed against the showroom window of a Ford dealer in the Waikato. Inside stood a Consul painted a revolutionary gutless green; alongside it a maroon painted Zephyr Six � both looked mighty strange.
Everyone had jeered a couple of years before at the slab-sided �square� look of the American Ford Forty-Niners and now here were these pint-sized Pommie models with slab sides, high windscreens and small 13-inch wheels. �13 INCH!! Wait�ll they hit Kiwi pot-holes, the bloody springs�ll fall off� was the typical scream of the average farmer � �NO CHASSIS!! Har, Har, Har; wouldn�t take six people before they break their back� said all the tow truck operators, and so on.

But they WERE revolutionary, and Vauxhall was releasing new Wyvern and Velox models almost simultaneously as the Fords, almost identical in every aspect of gear ratios and motor features.
Makes you wonder if industrial espionage is anything new.

Anyway, through a kind uncle pulling some strings, delivery was taken on Dad�s sparkling new Consul a month later. Why not a Zephyr? Well, I was so green when I wore short pants that I didn�t know the difference between six cylinders and four, the Consul grille looked like it had more shape and character than the Zephyr�s when my nose was against the showroom window, and it was better than our Morris 8!!

During that month I did some serious studying; I knew all about the MacPherson strut front suspension of the new Fords, �cause every time I saw one I�d ask the driver to wait a while for me to crawl underneath and study it.
I was worried about that front suspension, you see, because every one I pressed on the mudguard seemed mighty stiff and everyone knew that independent suspension was supposed to be soft and comfortable, although it�d wear the tyres out quicker than a meat pie disappears down Billy Bunter�s throat.

The car I was worried about was the Hillman of that era, because our neighbour had one! They had beautiful soft suspension and you�d see them wallowing like a launch as they dived through traffic, and the Forty-Niners were soft and comfortable too.

An eighth of a mile from where we lived was a great hump in the road, and I sat at the front window watching � about every thousandth car that came down was a Consul, and my eyes automatically became highly powerful telescopes, soaking up every detail of what happened with the front suspension on this bump. Man, they seemed pretty rigid and I was worried.

Back to the Meccano set, construct both the MacPherson and normal wishbone system in working models, and test them on my own test-track; Dad�s footpaths. But one consolation was that one of Dad�s workmates told him the new Consuls could give his �50 Chev a go, and that gave hope.

Then came the day when it was ours; in two months it went back to the dealer twice for crown wheel replacement in the diff because of noise. �Just teething problems with this revolutionary hypoid pinion, Mr Campbell. The whine in the diff�s nothing to worry about, gears are like new. Also replaced the door locks with new replacement ones specially flown out from Britain; shouldn�t rattle any more ��

And talking of diffs whining, the Traffic Department boys were using Mk I Zephyrs and that made me proud. I even spoke to them, too � �See that switch on the dash there, son? When I get up to 90 I just switch that on and I�ll get up to a hundred!� It was probably only the siren switch.

Another thing which gladdened my heart with my new-found cause (which was �Fords are King� instead of �Fords are tin lizzies�) was Ken Wharton winning the Tulip Rally in a Consul, but that got almost bashed down when some woman, with sun in her eyes and a dirty windscreen, rammed into the back of a stationary truck and demolished both herself and her new Consul. Now, any car would have been a write-off with what she did, but because it was one of the new Fords everyone said: �See what happens when you have no chassis?� Even our school bus driver said: �Your old man�s car won�t last a year son, wait and see.�