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I wonder what the story is with that car in the photos, it looks immaculate. It's never even had holes drilled for the front license plate.
or it was removed during post-editing. magazines always do that!
for example it's very rare they have a black or white car on the cover, it just doesn't pop out, so they change the color to red or blue but the car within the pages could very well be black or white!
I wonder what the story is with that car in the photos, it looks immaculate. It's never even had holes drilled for the front license plate.
Originally Posted by timmy0tool
or it was removed during post-editing. magazines always do that!
for example it's very rare they have a black or white car on the cover, it just doesn't pop out, so they change the color to red or blue but the car within the pages could very well be black or white!
My thoughts are that it's the car currently being held at the Toyota USA Auto Museum in California:
Even though this car has a plate on it, it has been in photos before with the plate removed, such as this one:
The mounting holes are so small, that at the right angle with the right lighting, or with the use of photo editing, it could appear as if they aren't even there (like the photo in the C&D article). Notice how hard it is to see the holes on the ES 250 beside the LS (above).
The museum car is also a non-Trac equipped model, just like the one in the article:
I heard they recently closed that museum this year...not sure if that's accurate and their website is dated 2008.
Indeed, they did close the museum in September, 2017 (see yelp review). It's a shame, as I would have liked to go. I hope they reopen it at their new location in Texas.
Indeed, they did close the museum in September, 2017 (see yelp review). It's a shame, as I would have liked to go. I hope they reopen it at their new location in Texas.
Little factoid here, I worked at Hill& Vaughn in 1980-1983 with my uncle, Phil Hill, when Toyota came knocking for us to restore a boring blue Corona and a red right hand drive Toyota 2000GT, subsequently discovered to have been owned by supermodel, Twiggy. I was in charge of parts procurement for Hill and Vaughn at the time, and developed the patient knack for wearing down codgy old British and some American collectors of their secret stashes of parts for old Rolls Royces, Cunninghams, Packards, Duesenbergs, MGs Crosbys, Pierce Arrows, a boattail Hispano Suiza, Delahayes and you name it. Heck, we even had a 1903 Baker electric that you drove from the back seat with a tiller, don't call it crude either, it had bevelled curved corner glass and exquisite piano finish woodwork with red velvet under the switches.
But the Toyota projects were easy as heck, just call the west coast distributor for Toyota and the parts came in. So, we got busted for using Ferrari red, what can I say? Phil was a team driver for Ferrari, we restored one of the most desirable red Ferraris in the world, a 250 GT Testa Rossa (which I got to drive 120 feet, thank-you Phil), and Toyota USA said, "yeah, that's a nice red." The bodywork fiasco underneath was just not in the budget. Toyota USA was not yet fully onboard with a Hill & Vaughn 100-point re$toration. It was a beautiful car, but honestly, I was 21 years old and the Datson 240Z had seized my imagination far more than the Toyota 2000 GT, which was the better quality car. Had you told 21 year-old me that I would buy a Toyota product, then again, then again, I would have said "just shoot me."
Colin
Wow, that is incredible, Amskeptic!
So, you worked on this car? And is it still Ferrari Red?
I was the parts procurement "agent" and I was the nephew of the owner who had to start at the bottom of the pecking order and work my way up. I ordered parts for the car, and was sometimes pressed into moving it around in the shop so we could get other cars in and out as necessary. Toyota USA kept us on a tight leash as far as expenses, because at the time, it was 'only a Toyota" as was the blue Corona.
Later, the car was re-restored with a correct lead filler and it was sprayed with the correct Toyota red. I am only here defending Hill& Vaughn, because the article was a little too breathless about "what they found" when they went under the Ferrari red paint.
Colin
12-18-17, 04:32 PM
