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1963 Sunbeam Harrington Lemans

bobs_diehl

Donation Time
Anybody care to chase this? Strange what turns up in the mailbox.

I have a 1963 Sunbeam Harrington Lemans and am interested in selling the car. I'm not sure where to start the process. Any information would be helpful. Thanks!

LeeAnn Weithman

My email address is pierre_w67@hotmail.com
 

Series3Scott

Co-Founder/Past President
Platinum Level Sponsor
In case some of you are dreaming......You should see the pictures of this car - sunk into the mud, incredibly rusty, with the Harrington top delaminating.

By pure stroke of luck Ian Spencer was passing by the area and was able to view this car today. According to his inspection there is VERY little worth salvaging from this car. It's in very bad shape, and just trying to pull it out of the mud could tear it in half.

A shame as it's a RHD HRO car. Who knows how it got to Ohio.
He did get the VIN number to be added to the registry.
 
A

AlpineIan

Sold

Ok guys... I just secured a deal with LeeAnn and bought this car. Will be picking it up on Thursday morning and will report back to the forum with detailed pictures.

Paul S... call me today.
 

alpine_64

Donation Time
Ok guys... I just secured a deal with LeeAnn and bought this car. Will be picking it up on Thursday morning and will report back to the forum with detailed pictures.

Paul S... call me today.


as i remmber ian.. last time you were trying to - 1 really nice harrington not + 1 real basket case
 
A

AlpineIan

Well.. between the 2 other LeMans cars that I have I should be able to complete one whole car now.
 

jumpinjan

Bronze Level Sponsor
Ian & I drove up and got the car today. Boy, is it cold outside and I'm all muddy because the car was sunk in the ground up to the floor boards and we had to pull it out. Before that, we had to try to jack up the car and install 4, good wheels. The original tire's beads were actually off the rim. No holding air in there at all. Then the rear brakes were locked up and we spent almost an hour pulling the drums off. This car was in her back yard, so we drove Ian's SUV & trailer through the soaking wet lawn, and then drive out through her neighbor's back yard to get to a street. We pulled the car out with a logging chain that we found in the trash pile next to the car. Did I mention that we had to chisle the brake drum's flat head screw off the best we could, because it wasn't moving? That was fun.....Oh, yes, it was loads of fun....:eek:
 
A

AlpineIan

Whew... I'm beat. What a cold wet day. I'll post a few pictures tomorrow... hopefully it will stop raining so I can take them.

I'm afraid to open the doors... I think it might break in half when I do. As soon as we put the wheels on it the doors wedged up against the B-post, so not much floor left there at all. The entire bottom half had been repaied once before with fiberglass... I ripped both rockers away very easily because they were just fiberglass attached to rust. The inner rockers are rusted completely away. I will need to find a way to support the body so the doors can be opened and the top removed without breaking it.:eek:
 

jumpinjan

Bronze Level Sponsor
We think that this car has been stored outside in the dirt since 1982. 25 years of neglect? Lots of rodent nests too. Oooh, what fun.
I love the smell of rodents, don't you?:D

(PS - I must give thanks to the Rootes engineer that directed the use of very mild steel, flat-head screws that hold those brake drums on. He must have reasoned that some day, in the year of 2007, two dumb guys will be thanking me for not incorporating case-hardened, flat head screws on those drums.
If you guys find it impossible to remove those screws, just use a chisle & heavy hammer and shear the screw head off. I was surprised it worked!)

Oh, another funny thing happened. When the car was FINALLY secured to the trailer and everything was stored away and we were just ready to leave, the nearby church bells started ringing and then playing some great music. It was like the angels above were joyous...and they were smiling down on us!
Now that was cool.
 

Jeff Scoville

Donation Time
I had been the first to respond to her add and recieved pictures from her in an email.
Brave Ian, All I can say is you are BRAVE!
 

Jeff Scoville

Donation Time
Pictures

OK, I'll try this picture thing.
pictures.html
 

V6 JOSE

Donation Time
It does look pretty sad, but I'm sure that Ian can use parts off of it to fix up his good one. It breaks my heart to see a car get neglected like that.

Jose :)
 

Series3Scott

Co-Founder/Past President
Platinum Level Sponsor
It's already stripped and ready for the crusher. He was able to salvage some parts off it, namely the Harrington fiberglass top, but not much else.
 
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