DELAHAYE

Delahaye related articles

ONE DAY AT “TECHNIKMUSEUM SPEYER” IS NOT ENOUGH – 2

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Hi all, thank you for reading the first part of my review of “Technikmuseum Speyer”. This is the second part.

When leaving the first hall, you should turn right. In the narrow space between fence and the building, you can see a few locomotives. In the furthest space, there is a Chinese steam powered one which is really really huge. Some plants, crawling out from the edges, create a still life which contrasts with the massive power of the machine. My favourite on tracks is the German V200 (represented by the successor V220) which looks as if if it had been designed by a comic artist… Continue reading

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ONE DAY AT “TECHNIKMUSEUM SPEYER” IS NOT ENOUGH – 1

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During my holidays in the wonderful region Breisgau (Germany) and Alsace (France) I made a stop in Speyer, which is located between Frankfurt and Strasbourg. The museum of technology in Sinsheim once built an annex for their exhibits and picked Speyer for the location. It gradually expanded to become another great exhibition, stuffed with cars, planes, boats and locomotives. Even an original Buran can be found there. What is the Buran? I will show you in a minute. First things first.

Before you reach the museum, several aeroplanes on stilts can be seen from far away . Entering the hall after you bought your tickets might overwhelm you, because every single room is stuffed with exhibits: motorcycles are standing between old trains, a WW I plane (Fokker Dr.I) hangs from a wall, a boat is waiting in the left corner of the building, various mechanical organs standing amongst the tons of… Continue reading

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CHAPRON DANDIES AT PEBBLE BEACH

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Chapron at the 2016 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance… During a car week obsessed with auctions and economics, Pebble Beach shared the grace and elegance of Carrossier Henri Chapron.

Located in Levallois-Paris, Chapron was part of the French Art Deco movement along with Figoni et Falaschi, Pourtout, Guilloré, Saoutchik and Franay. Eventually his firm was bought by Delahaye and reached a height of 350… Continue reading

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SCHLOSS DYCK MADE SOME NOISE…

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This year was my first time at Classic Days in “Schloss Dyck” and it was overwhelming! We arrived on Friday and after wandering around and getting used to the area, we met some great racing legends, like Walter Röhrl and John Fitzpatrick amongst many others. The event at Schloss Dyck (Castle Dyck) is known to be one of the large vintage cars events, so you really need the complete weekend to have an opportunity to see everything.

The first cars that watered my mouth were the British racing green Bentley 4 1/2 Litre Supercharged from the end of the 1920s – better known as “Blower Bentley” – and the 8 Liter Bentleys and the famous silver colored “Mother Gun”. It’s incredible how much power these cars send out, even if they are not running. On the opposite side, there were their old rivals of the supercharged era: the Mercedes SS and SSK with their lovely exhaust manifolds. Soon their engines would burst to life and race against each other, just like in the old days. Until then we had a view at those good old Bristols with their very special… Continue reading

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SERIOUS BUSINESS AT TECHNO CLASSICA ESSEN – 2

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Jetzt gehts los! Let’s get back in the German mood, because we need to finish the Essen tour. In Paris I found my ugliest car, but at Essen I had a second encounter with this Mercedes-AMG CLK GTR. Now that I know that it is carrying a super serious engine I kind of love it, and I had heard of its performance and other stories…

I can imagine that most ladies don’t care much about car facts and stories, but luckily there were enough Louis Vuitton bags, and for the more openminded even exquisite lamps for decoration in your house. A large vintage headlamp on a tripod, how cool is that? To stay a bit closer to Paris, I encountered two other lovely automobiles that I had seen before. Mark Hyman displayed a couple of car striking like… (I am not allowed to say this word anymore), the Pininfarina aerodynamic X Concept, and guess what I found out… You can soon admire this unique car in The Hague… do I need to say more? One car I fell in love with the first time I saw it… Continue reading

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THE GREAT ARTCURIAL MOTORCARS AUCTION CINEMA

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We have all been waiting for the legendary sale of the Ferrari 335 Sport Scaglietti, or as my mom called it, that “little red car” of the auction. The Retro week was quite busy with three major auctions, but for sure Artcurial stole the show in a typically passionate French way. A large collection went under the hammer, and 80% sold for a total of €56 million, a European record, of which the 335 is claimed to be the world record for a motor car at auction. The 335 sold for €28 million, but with premium added, it actually yielded €32.1 million! A price unaffordable except for the few. Four automobiles were sold over a million, so enough ‘bargains’ still.

The big and black room downstairs was incredible and very very busy! The auctioneers knew how to fill the space with their voices/songs, and even if they made a mistake, I still like them. The 335 was one big spectacle. The lights were switched off and then… A movie started showing in full song the excitement of the 335. It took a while to… Continue reading

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BACK FROM PARIS! – PART 1

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An event to look forward to all year is the Parisian super exhibition Retromobile. Even though Retro is not as huge as Techno Classica in Essen, the variety of cars is better and, the quality is definitely as good and the atmosphere is just incredible. When entering the hall of fame, it is hard to decide where to start! There is so much to see and of course so many great people to meet.

I had some fantastic days, and will make you a list of the highlights. Four days were not enough to complete my whole to-do-list and I obviously forgot to… Continue reading

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LOUWMAN WILL TELL YOU HOW TO PURCHASE A DREAM AUTOMOBILE! – PART 2 

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All of this made a great time journey, BUT the real deal started for me when I stepped into the world of the finest of the finest. Before I did, accidentally, I grew like a giant after drinking something from a little bottle. I wasn’t able to get out of the Spyker hall with the wonderful aircraft, which was not a bad place at all to hang around. Luckily I remembered from Alice in Wonderland that I I had to eat some cake in order to get back to normal size. I was now smaller as before, especially when staring at those great historic heroes…

Next I ended up at the section of race icons and wonderful vintage and classic supercars. I listened with interest to some great stories about these heroic automobiles, told by… Continue reading

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DARE YOU?

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A great Bull Mastif guarded this rare Delahaye,
Just daring some car thieves to drive it away.
They’d sure better pause… Continue reading
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POTW – A FAMOUS FRENCH AUTOMOTIVE MOVIE-STAR ; )

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This time a POTW session of our 1938 135M Delahaye Chapron cabriolet. As you may already have seen, our Delahaye has a role in an upcoming Dutch war movie with my dad as the chauffeur! : ) So today will be all about this automotive actor! The 135M is already getting the manners of a famous movie star, so it demanded to be featured in a POTW of its own… (in a special scene as a kind of dirty trials racer) ; )

As you can see, after recordings, the Delahaye needed a beauty treatment as it was very DIRTY! This is how stars want to be treated… Like I said before, some classic cars need to shine like a diamond, such as this piece of eternal elegance designed by that master coachbuilder Henri Chapron! So remember this face, it will be on screen as of next year 5th of May, the day of the première of this movie! Click here for more POTWs!Schermafbeelding 2015-10-13 om 21.02.49

A FUN PORT-TOUR WITH THE 135MS DELAHAYE AND THE WORKSHOP OF A SPECIALIST!

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Life with all those great events doesn’t get boring! Last weekend we had again a nice tour with friends of the BCN (Bugatti Club Netherlands). My dad and I drove some 105 km to the location in North-Holland with the 1950 135MS Delahaye Chapron cabriolet.

A very nice man, the owner of the Silverstone party center at Halfweg near Amsterdam, organized this event which included two local tours. Everything was very relaxed and quite a few cars turned up, such as modern supercars like Aston Martin, but also many Lotus/Caterham/Donkervoort…, MG, Alvis, Cobra replicas, Ford Mustang, etc. For us there wasn’t enough time, but in the Silverstone center there were plenty of entertaining activities to do, such as laser gaming, karting, bungee football and bowling.

Our friends of the BCN live almost next door, so we were happy to visit them and see their large workshop and… Continue readinghttp://crankhandleblog.com

OUR DELAHAYE 135M CHAPRON CABRIOLET MAKING FAME IN THE DUTCH CINEMAS!

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Can you remember my request on CHB a while ago for period cars for that war movie about Mr. Riphagen? Well, after a serious request from my sister, who is casting director for this movie, my dad and our Delahaye 135M with Henri Chapron coachwork, accepted a role in that thrilling movie! The other period cars were supplied by Jan Wijnakker. He owns a host of classic cars of all kinds of marques and models, including a Delahaye 148L with coachwork by Pennock of The Hague!

Jan’s ‘actor car’ in this scene was a Peugeot 201, but once the movie appears in the cinema next year you will see many more of his cars on the screen. An interesting subject to report about some time, because he rents his cars for film sets, which is good business with a vehicle park of more than… Continue reading http://crankhandleblog.com

MY CLASSIC DRIVERS DEBUT – STARTING BIG IS THE BEST WAY!

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http://crankhandleblog.comThis week I experienced a VERY SPECIAL day! My first time driving a classic car and not just a classic car, but one of our lovely BIG Delahayes (the 1938 two tone blue coloured 135M cabriolet with Henri Chapron coachwork). Most people say you need to start small and I will follow that advice in my search for my first own classic car, but starting BIG is really more my kind of doing things… ; )

The very first moment of driving away was really strange! Steering on the right hand side appears not really to be so weird and soon it starts to feel quite natural, but steering and braking is not anything like in a modern BMW! Steering round on a roundabout is much harder work than I am used to. The cable brakes on this heavy car (about 1700 kg) work extremely well but you need to… Continue reading

HIGH CLASS FROM VANVOOREN

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As we continue with the Parisian coachbuilders, today is the turn for Vanvooren who was located with his workshop in the north-western Parisian suburb of Courbevoie. This coachbuilder was one who built on high class chassis like Hispano-Suiza, Bugatti, Bentley, Rolls-Royce, Delahaye and Delage. A great example of one of his creations is the 1939 Bugatti 57C Atalante that won an award at Chantilly. Vanvooren is best known for his work from the 1930s on those grandiose chassis of the era, but the company had already been active from 1910 and persisted until 1950. Vanvoorens style could be described as advanced with a conservative elegance, combined with very high standards.

Achille Vanvooren did good business with those expensive marques… Continue readinghttp://crankhandleblog.com

POTW X2 – CHAPRON BONUS

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Just couldn’t resist to put out one more POTW with some awesome pics of a Chapron Delahaye. Apparently this poor car raised a lot of interest, especially inside, so I wonder what was going on… do you know? My best guess is that this was one of those street markets where second hand cars were traded. Never trust such markets where more than once a car was sold with one or more wooden pistons in the engine to make it run for a couple of minutes until the deal was done and the seller had taken to his heels. For sure these are magnificent historical pics! Click here for the other pic!http://crankhandleblog.com

HENRI CHAPRON, THE VANGUARD AMONG THE GREAT FRENCH COACHBUILDERS!

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The next couple of days CHB will be dedicated to some great Parisian coachbuilders, kicking-off with Henri Chapron! Of course… because we have two Delahayes with Chapron coachwork.

Henri Chapron is definitely a big name when talking about prominent French coachbuilders. His influence can be detected in nearly every custom-built French body from 1935 to 1955, regardless of the house by which it was designed and built. His designs are sober as well as elegant, in an outstanding way. His identity could be described as vanguard, never ahead of his time.

Let’s first take a look at where it all started, how he developed into this profession and how his style and his business evolved… Continue readinghttp://crankhandleblog.com

POTW X5 – TALKIN ABOUT COACHBUILDERS!

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With this week’s topic being coachbuilders we just can’t ignore this flashy Art Deco masterpiece designed by Jacques Saoutchik! This 1949 Delahaye Type 175S Saoutchik Roadster must be one of the most outstanding coachwork designs, honored at the time at many prestigious concourses! A massive body that is titled ‘the most beautiful car in the world’ by many! One of them was English actress and sex-bomb Diana Dors, who once owned it.

In 2010 the masterpiece Roadster was sold for $3,3 million at the RM Sports & Classics Auction at Monterey in California. One POTW is just not enough for this wonderful piece of ART so POTW X5! I probably don’t have to… Continue readinghttp://crankhandleblog.com

A TRUE DRIVING PLEASURE IT IS!

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Always a pleasure to be on the road with one of the Delahayes! A very fine car which always performs so well. In about two weeks we (me and my dad) will head towards Chantilly with this 1938 Delahaye 135M – Henri Chapron chassis – to join the French Delahaye Club. Of course I will make a report of all of that!

A nice thing that is to come, is about blessing cars and the Saint Christopher! There is a specific reason for that subject in combination with the Chantilly Arts & Elegance Richard Mille, so just making you curious already ; ) For sure this Delahaye is ready to go all the way to France, not by trailer because we always drive the cars to their destination. The journey towards such events is a pleasure in itself! Driving those cars is one of the best parts next to meeting wonderful people at events and enjoying so many mind-blowing fantastic cars, with often intriguing stories! So, stay tuned for new adventures in France in two weeks time!

Click here for an impression of the most elegant concours Chantilly Arts & Elegance Richard Mille – hope to see you there! Click here for more pics of this delightful 135M!http://crankhandleblog.com

THE ART DECO LOVING DANDY MAHARAJA YESHWANTRAO HOLKAR II OF INDORE – PART 1

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http://crankhandleblog.comFirst some background! Maharaja Tukojirao Holkar III (1890-1978) ruled the Princely State of Indore (9,519 square miles with 19 gun salutes) from 1903 to 1926. He was already quite an unconventional Maharaja and one of the first in Central India who, around 1906, acquired an automobile! He always purchased (lots of) cars for a reason… for some kind of a utilitarian purpose. He was just more of a practical collector than a petrol head.

Now about that futuristic master dandy, which he really was… Continue reading

CALL 9-1-1! A TALBOT-LAGO T150 C FIGONI-FALASCHI TEARDROP IS BEING SLAUGHTERED!

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We have all seen the sleeping beauties, barn-finds and perished cars, passing by, but this? You might wonder how it is possible that anyone destroys such stunning cars on purpose! A Talbot-Lago T150 C – or CSS – with Figoni-Falaschi teardrop coachwork, an exceptional Delahaye 135 M – or MS – with Saoutchik coachwork and a Bugatti – probably a type 44, that definitely didn’t survive. Many other special cars have been sacrificed like this at stockcar racing events. If only they had known what there were doing… Continue reading

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