Own a vintage car? Don’t keep it like museum piece
If you owned a vintage car, would you keep it polished in your garage out of the harm’s way? British vintage car enthusiast Geoffrey Herdman, who just returned from a 16-month round-the world-tour on his Bristol 405 Drophead Coupe, says the best way to take care of a vintage car is to drive it regularly like a modern car.
The Bristols are hand-built luxury cars manufactured by Bristol Aeroplane Co, which made very limited edition cars.
Mr Herdman, who is the president of the Bristol Owners Club, bought his 1956 Britsol in 1999 and he drives it everywhere in the UK and regularly organises car driving trips to foreign countries for himself and fellow Bristol enthusiasts.
The Bristol enthusiast, who owned three other Bristol cars before the current 405 Drophead Coupe, has been driving the car since 2001. “It had been off the road since 1977 at that stage and my predecessor had done quite a lot of work on it, but it was in quite a bad condition. I put it back together again, not me personally, but a great team of mechanics. I first drove in April 2001,” says the former accountant, who was accompanied by his lawyer-wife Hilary on the trip.
Mr Herdman’s Bristol 405 Drophead, of which just 42 were made, is the 29th in the series and was made in 1956. “We think about 30 of them are still on the roads at present,” he says.
The Herdmans, who were taking a post-retirement gap year after retiring almost together in 2010, decided to take their car and tour the world.
The Herdmans’ round-the-world trip involved driving up and down, all across North America, then on to South America, from there they went to Australia and after shipping their car to Turkey, they drove back to Britain, making a total of 20 countries on the car and many more countries on their own.
They skipped Asia over concerns about the driving conditions, but travelled in the region on their own as their car was being shipped.
“I have been very keen to go to India, but I am not too sure about the driving conditions in India and how sensible the roads are,” he says, adding that he has never visited India. They missed an ideal opportunity to visit India as their car was being shipped from Australia to Europe because they didn’t get visas to visit India while they were in Australia.
The Herdmans, who covered more than 33,000 miles in their round-the-world trip, spend only £80 for repairs during the whole trip.
However, the maintenance regimen had be to be followed carefully. “Every 3,000 miles of travel, I used to have the car serviced,” he says.
“It is an old car and I had friends across the countries who helped maintain it, as I am not a mechanically oriented.”
The next trip for the couple and their Bristol is Romania, which is being planned for May 2012.
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