Shift Lever Offset

[Steve Cassani]

The subject is up for discussion. An aspect of the build I have not shared has the car using a narrowed 427 chassis with the coil spring suspension (Kirkham hybrid). This takes the car well outside the provenance a faithful reproduction should capture. Also, the support post for the roll bar will angle backwards, another obvious departure from the forward-leaning bar that is characteristic of the originals. With these departures already in place, having the shift lever at the center of the transmission tunnel is to my eye an 'error' an appreciative owner might notice while shaking his head over what could have been a 'much better' car. The guages are there too and they are Kirkham, not Stewart Warner.

Thanks for encouraging me. The balance between the car I want to own and a car others will admire for the history it captures is hard to achieve, especially as in this case the weighing is to be done without benefit of a scale or an accepted unit of measure. Your counsel is well directed and I'm sure, should we have the opportunity to talk together over the finished car, you'll see aspects to admire. For one, I'm within a gnat's tail feather of matching the Light Maroon Metallic (ICI P151-R840) AC made available to its customers following the war and continuing until the early sixties. The owner of an original tipped me a direction for research during conversation at Road America.

This is all fun stuff.