Tu-xxx

[WaltSV]

Wondering if anyone w/ an Alpine is planning to attend Tigers United XXX in Grants Pass in June?

Dates are June 21-24, and all activities are Tiger based and focused.

I have family nearby and plan to drop in. I'm told we (Alpines) are welcome, but there is no class for us and we cannot participate in concours or autocross. Registration is $155 until 6/1.

scroll down to event info here:
http://www.catmbr.org/Events1.htm


Walt Suman
Seattle

 

[Green67Alpine]

Hey ! We got some class, don't we ? At $155 they sure are proud !

Tom j

It's just an Alpine, But I like it just fine !

 

[Series6]

$155

Hey ! We got some class, don't we ? At $155 they sure are proud !

Tom j

It's just an Alpine, But I like it just fine !

Keeps us riff raff V6 guys out....

 

[skywords]

No Pets No Smoking No Ticky No Washy. Did not even make it to the registration page before I was hit with the fun police. I'll stay home

 

[RootesRooter]

Alpiners in the Pacific Northwest have an alternative to Tigers United, and it's even held on the same weekend. Ohan Korlikian (who drove his Alpine across Canada last Fall for the Targa Newfoundland Rallye) is hosting Rootes Rendevous IV, this year near Vancouver, BC. Info at: SunbeamCanada.org.

Dick Sanders
Kent, WA

 

[atallamcs]

Tigers United

Hey all--

This is a great event. I have gone with my tiger, alpine, harrington--they always like any sunbeam guy/gal. Last year, I was the only Alpine guy there--makes it easy to win first place in the concours. Hope more will show this year. I am thinking of bringing my alpine race car--hope some other Alpines show up.

Bill Atalla

 

[Pumpkin]

Tu Xxx

Most of the Alpines and NOT Tiger people in the NW have learned that , yes we can come but not participate.

I know of about 20 piners and a couple of tigers that are not going because of the retorical attitude of some club members in the NW. I for one was ready to go, EVEN at the more than high rates and fees.
Some said they may go down but not waste their good car on the trip..
Personally I was a bit picked at the whole thing. But then who cares for the Alpines anyway.

Slowley, but surely a new club may rise in the NW to include all Rootes. I go clear to (see Rootes Rooters' post below) B.C. with the Sunbeam Group of Canada for a run and meet that is intresting.

My wife and I put on small runs and go where ever in WA and OR. But few if any ever show at the things away from the greater Seattle area.
The ones that do are mostly not Tiger.

Any one that wants in the Greater NW let me know by PM and I'll put you on the call list.

That is my $3.25 cents
Chuck in Portland

 

[atallamcs]

Tigers United

Well just for the record. The Tiger guys are all very nice--maybe they tolerate me because I am a Tiger owner--anyway, they always seem glad to see what I bring--even if it is an Alpine. I tried a couple of years ago to get them to call the event Tigers and Alpines United. Worked one year and then it returned back to TU. Oh well, who really cares--fun time, fun people, great cars.

Bill Atalla

 

[burgy711]

I live in the NW and am surprised by the assault on Tiger owners. I was a long time Sunbeam owner before I was ever a Tiger owner and my Tiger and Alpine get along just fine in my garage. Maybe I should be watching them more closely as they do hang out with a Ford, a Chrysler and my God a Harley too!!!!

 

[V6 JOSE]

I live in the NW and am surprised by the assault on Tiger owners. I was a long time Sunbeam owner before I was ever a Tiger owner and my Tiger and Alpine get along just fine in my garage. Maybe I should be watching them more closely as they do hang out with a Ford, a Chrysler and my God a Harley too!!!!

I used to live in the Pacific NW, Seattle area specifically, and can testify to the attitude of some of the Tiger owners. There are some that are nice people and don't discriminate against Alpines, but there are quite a few that aren't very excited to see Alpines show up at their anual get together. I guess that this shouldn't be a surprise, because some Tiger owners even disagree among themselves.

I gave an example a while back, of five guys standing around talking Tigers, when someone asked me if I'd ever own a Tiger. I said I'd love to own one, and the very next question to me was, When you get your Tiger, will you modify it or keep it stock. My answer was that I have never owned a car that I didn't modify, so would surely modify it. Immediately, an argument started and it broke up the chat session. A couple of the guys got their nose out of joint, because they were purists and couldn't accept that anyone would commit sacrilidge by modifying a Tiger. To me, it was silly to get upset about what anyone else did with their own car.

Another incident that shows that discrimination exists with some Tiger ownners, was when I took my turbocharged V6 Alpine to a club meet and wanted to have a real slalom driver drive it to see what the car would do, without the handicap of me driving it around the cones.

I asked around as to who was the best Tiger driver was, and I went looking for him. I don't remember his name, or I would mention it. I didn't tell him it was a modified Alpine that I had, when I asked him what I wanted. As we were walking toward my Alpine, he asked me if my car was a Tiger. I said no, and instantly, he spun on his heel saying, "The guy you want to drive your car, is Dick Sanders". I just stood there with my mouth open.

I used to go to all the PTC club meets, because I was a member. The order of events at these meets was, Car show on Saturdays, and competition on Sundays. (Read slaloming) I would always go on Sundays, because I go to church on Saturdays. It was like this for most of the years I attended, until one year there was the anual Ford drags, which was held for two days, Saturday and Sunday. These drags were not sponsored by the PTC. All of the Tiger guys that wanted to compete, went on Saturday, but not Sunday. I went to the drags on Sunday and had a pretty good day, but the car wasn't running to it's peak, because as it turned out, the distributor had a bad bushing and I couldn't get it to rev past 5,500, when my usual red line and shift point, was 7,000. It turned a 12.52 at 108.9 mph, which wasn't necessarily bad, but not really indicativre of it's potential.

That night I called one of the Tiger owners to find out how all the club members did the day before. I was told that the quickest Tiger was from Canada, turning 12.20 with a 302 and nitrous oxide. The next quickest Tiger turned a 12.90. The conversation ended rather quickly, when this guy asked me what mine had done, and he found out that his own Tiger went slower than my Alpine. The next year, at the PTC meet, the order of events was turned up side down. Competition was switched to Saturday, because they knew I would not be there. The car show was now switched to Sunday. My Alpine wasn't pristine enough to win any prises at the concourse, so I never showed it for competition. I never went back.

It is really sad to see that some have so much invested emotionally in the fact that they own a certain kind of car, that they can't respect other people's choices.

Jose

 

[Jeff Scoville]

I think/hope that it's not really a matter of fact. I think it is more of a biggot thing. when you have any situation where there is a minority, there will be the few who get together and "pick" on the minority.
I could almost bet that if there were a Mustag II get together where there were 30 with V8's and only 1 or 2 with 4 cyl. the 4's would get their share of ribbing.
Human nature or whatever. Testosterone?
As I say I have never been the recipient of any of this badgering, or what have you, so I can't give a first hand story.
Although I am confused. Bill says he won the award for Concourse with his Alpine. I thought Alpines couldn't be involved?

 

[RootesRooter]

After reading V6-Jose's rant, I have to write in defense of the Sunbeam community up here in the Pacific NW:

There's always been stock freaks and modifed enthusiasts within the Tiger community - coast-to-coast. And there's always been a sizable percentage of Tiger owners who often act like Alpines don't even exist (except for sheet metal to fix their boo-boos). I've encountered these owners at our NW regional events, at Tigers Uniteds up and down the west coast, and at all four SUNI's. Most Alpiners learn to live with them and seek out the more open-minded Tiger owners. Luckily, the open-minded ones are not that hard to find.

As far as re-arranging an event schedule just on the odd chance you might want to enter your Tiger-eating V6, well.... I think I'll have to say "No Way, Jose." I've volunteered for almost all of the Sunbeam Northwest conventions held in the NW since 1979. The weekend schedule is almost always contingent on the availability of the autocross track. In those rare years when we had flexibility, the schedule was sometimes changed (often at my own insistence) simply for the sake of change - to try to keep the event fresh. I've always wanted to avoid letting repeat-registrants to get into the mental rut of assuming, "It's 3pm Saturday. It must be time for the rallye." We usually busted a gut trying to entice every single Rootes-mobile owner out of the woods for our events. To suggest we even had a notion to pick-and-choose is just plain nuts.

For your unpleasant autocross experience, I have to ask: Have you ever driven a Tiger hard? Partially because of the extra weight, but mostly because of the reverse-Ackerman, they're an entirely different beast from an Alpine on the street or the track. If I were that Tiger owner you talked to (I can probably guess who) I also might have turned you down since I know that guy doesn't have ANY Alpine-driving experience, and wouldn't have been of help in setting up your car.

Joe, from your recent post, and from your other posting of a few months ago which unjustifiably slammed my good friend Jim Leach (who has forgotten more about Rootes cars than you or I will ever know), I gotta tell ya, it's obvious you haven't been up here to the NW for an extended period in a lonnnnng time, and some of your old memories are, how can I say this politely, running together.

Why not come up to Vancouver, BC for Ohan Korlikian's annual Rootes Rendevous shin-dig in June and get reaquainted?

Dick Sanders
Kent, WA

 

[V6 JOSE]

Dick,

I don't have a bone to pick with you or a lot of members of the PTC. I was talking about some of the guys that make life miserable for anyone that doesn't own the same car they do. I lived in the North West till just three years ago, but I haven't been a member of the PTC for more than a decade, because of some of the experiences I had with some folks. I was treated with respect by Larry Atkison, who was president of the PTC at the time. By Dennis Grote, you and several others that I can't remember their names.

If you want to defend the Tiger driver that just blew me off, it would be hard for you to judge what happened, because you weren't there. His facial expression and voice tone is what made it so bad.

Jim Leach and I know each other pretty well. We had some financial dealings when I first got to Seattle. It may be true that he knows a lot about Sunbeams, but he knows nothing about my V6 Converted Alpines. He deliberately went out of his way to say things that weren't true about what had to be done to convert one, so that others wouldn't do it. He had no cause to do that, because at that time, I hadn't even developed the kit yet and was just showing my Alpine to the guys that were interested in it. The ironic thing, is that I wasn't trying to get anyone to copy one.

You say that my memories are running together, well, you posted a while back, that you had driven the turbo Alpine, which isn't true. The only guy that I let drive it was Larry. You got to drive the normally aspirated version, which by your own admission would beat a stock Tiger. I didn't build any of my Alpines in order to beat Tigers. I built them to beat Porsches, because a lot of Porsche owners are conceited and I wanted to put them in their place. My first Alpine did it quite well, but some of the Tiger guys have seemed to take offence at it's performance. Why?? In all the time I had any dealings with the club, I never bragged about my cars. I never was rude to anyone. I didn't push myself forward. I tried to be a good guy and good member of the club.

You mention that things have changed. I'm glad. I hope things continue to get better and better as the years go along. There are some nice people in that club, at least there used to be. I don't want to include them in my, so called, RANT.

You are the present president, maybe that is why things have changed. I don't know. What I do know, is we need to respect other people. I don't tell any Alpine owner to go to Tiger meets anymore, because of my experiences. I enjoyed the Invasion, because there, I didn't see anyone looking down their noses at others. Apparently you haven't ever run into this kind of discrimination, so it is hard for you to relate.

Jose

 

[atallamcs]

TU

Guys,
All this back and forth sounds dumb to me. There are all types of people and that will never change. If Tiger folks think they are different than Alpine folks, so be, why should anyone care--you drive what you love and I for one do not need anyone to recognize me and my car to feel good.

As for TU--I love to go and talk tiger, alpine or whatever--and yes there is an award for Alpines--no one ever challenges me, what a shame. So I guess I will head up there again this year to get my $9.95 trophy.

Bill

 

[65beam]

guys,

i have attended all four SUNI's and many meets all over the U.S. i don't care where you go and tigers and alpines both are present,you'll find guys that look down on alpines.i have found that most of them don't know much about the rootes group and the history of the cars.some only know that they have a car with a shelby connection and that is what matters to them.if you set thru the shelby dinner at SUNI 4 shelby didn't know much about what was being done to the prototype when it was being put together.it's a shame that this has to happen.but i have seen many of this type come and go over the years.i guess i am just happy to have what i have.most popular/suni 2,most popular and first place stock /suni 3 & first place /suni 4. how many tiger owners have that kind of record? plus it's fun when you kick their butts in a popular vote show.done that a few times.so, jose and rootesrooter;quit fussing and enjoy what you have and know and ask those tiger owners that don't have a clue questions that they don't have answers to .they go away eventually.

 

[V6 JOSE]

I have never needed anyone to ratify my cars, nor the effort it took to do them. I have always done what I liked and didn't need anyone's approval.

What has bothered me, is the open and not so open opposition to what I, or anyone else that has modified their Alpine, has done. Today, there is more acceptance for modifications to the Alpine. Part of this is because of more and more guys have seen the benifit of the conversion. It speaks for itself.

I used to tell the guys that wanted to convert their Alpines, to do it for themselves and to not look for anyone's approval, because there wouldn't be much. Today, it is a different story, because here are a lot of good examples running around. People have gotten used to them.

The original intent was to say that there still are some guys that discriminate against anything that isn't exactly like their choice. I have known some Tiger owners that were fine people, so I'm not trying to paint them all with a broad brush. To those fine Tiger owners, I want to apolpgize if you were offended. It wasn't meant for you.

Jose

 

[mikephillips]

The Shelby connection is weak at best. Unlike the Cobra he wasn't working the garage floor with the rest, the project was turned over to a couple of the staff to complete while he pocketed the money. But there are those who think that this will lead to owning 1/4 million dollar cars once Shelby dies and that it'll finally put them in the same league with the Cobra owners. well, guess what, the Cobras is what it is due to it's success in in american racing and events like Lemans, and the big block which has pulled up the value of the 260/289 cars, and the Tigers don't have that same claim to fame. Not to mention a dozen different flavors of replicas so that everyone with an interest in cars knows the Cobra shape.

 

[Series6]

Sorry

I think I started this with my V6 Riff Raff comment which was meant to be a good natured nudge to my fellow Dark Siders. For that I appoligize.

 

[Jeff Scoville]

I think I started this with my V6 Riff Raff comment which was meant to be a good natured nudge to my fellow Dark Siders. For that I appoligize.

Long time "problem"
Not your fault.
There are still folks who are divided North/South,
And that's been a LONG time!

 

[WaltSV]

I think I started this with my V6 Riff Raff comment

Series 6, you're off the hook as I think I started this by simply asking if any Alpines would be in Grants Pass for TU-XXX.

Yipes, didn't mean to create a scene. Confirms I'd better keep a low profile in June.

I did confirm my suspicion that the entry fee has little merit for those with 1/2 the cylinders and 2x the carbs.

Bill (atallamcs), I've been told there won't be an Alpine category in the concours, so I'm saving up $9.95 (trophy value) and we can have a beer.

I look forward to seeing and appreciating the cars in whatever state of modification or completion and trust the Tiger pilots will be in good spirits.

Walt
Series-V