1962 Studebaker : Lark Daytona Con. Pace Car

I believe there was a TW article on these cars, but I do not remember if all the SN's are known or not.

I'm sure Lee D. will jump in as soon as he sees this thread, as he has a clone of one of the "Festival" cars and is fairly knowledgeable about these cars.

nate

Reply to
Nate Nagel
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Now that I look at the listing, I doubt it's real, as IIRC the real pace cars were 289/4-speed and the "festival" cars had 259s. Although this is going off memory (too lazy to get off couch and go upstairs and get TW article.)

nate

Reply to
Nate Nagel

Owner says there is no record at Indy by serial number to show if this is the real deal or not. Don't the Studebaker production orders show which ones were the Indy cars?

Reply to
Michael - Roseland FL

If this car is authentic, it should be in the Studebaker Museum.

Michael - Roseland FL wrote:

Reply to
Michael - Roseland FL

As well as I remember we DID make notes on many on the production sheets as to the purpose of the vehicles, (fleets, zone cars, celebs) especially in the case of these. (there were more than ONE!!)

Indy speedway may not have the records, why would they keep records on all the manufacturers cars that are called "pace cars"?

I find it interesting that you would have such a unique car & not take the effort to have the top operable & keep the car in first class shape! Decals can be cut & reproduced to make it a "pace car" gaboy

Michael - Roseland FL wrote:

Reply to
GABOY

The four Pace Cars had blue vinyl interior and a white convertible top according to the TW article. This car may have been a a "festival car", but I think there are about as many festival car clones out there as there are actual festival cars. I skimmed the article and I don't think there's a record of how many festival cars were produced. It's probably like the pickups used in NASCAR during driver introductions... they use a local dealers stock and slap the driver's number on the side with a vinyl decal.

Lee

Reply to
Lee Aanderud

Reply to
John Poulos

Michael:

This cannot be one of the actual Pace Cars, or even a 500 Festival Car, because the Serial Number is 'way too low. The seller is full of baloney, saying the actual Pace Car and Festival Car Serial Numbers are unknown; they certainly ARE!

I was part of the team that read 1962 V-8 Production Orders for hours in 1992, culling the actual cars tagged for The Indianapolis 500 as either Festival or Pace Cars. Check out the January 1993 Turning Wheels for everything you ever wanted to know about these cars, including ALL the actual serial numbers for the Pace Cars and the Festival Cars.

The lowest-number of the 34 Festival Cars is 62V27943; the highest number is 62V30006. The next-to-last Festival Car was 62V29659, and was reportedly assigned to Indianapolis Mayor Alex Clark. 62V29659 was sold through Turning Wheels within the last year.

It is not known exactly which of two virtually identical 289/4-speed cars was the actual Pace Car. It was either 62V38990 or 62V39027, both built with several unique features May 10, 1962. One of the two paced the race; the other was the backup car in case something terrible happened. As far as I know, neither of those important cars has surfaced to date. THAT would be a real find!

Again, you can read all about these in the January 1993 Turning Wheels Feature Article on 1962 Daytona Convertible Indianapolis 500 cars...and safely ignore any seller's remarks on E-Bay! BP

Michael - Roseland FL wrote:

Reply to
bobcaripalma

Thanks Bob! It is great to have you around :)

snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com wrote:

Reply to
Michael - Roseland FL

I sure hope it goes for big bucks! and the bidders remember it when I put

500 Festival Clone Car up for the bidding!

Jim Turner

Reply to
Jim Turner

Reply to
bobcaripalma

so?

Jim Turner

Reply to
Jim Turner

Well, Bob, you made me get up an go to my filing cabinet and re-read my January, 1993 TW!! Amazing what little details you forget when you don't refer to it for several years! Also most interesting was the follow-up article by Larry regardaing the research of the Production Orders. Wonder if any of those ambulances sent to Uraguay have surfaced in the 13 years since the article was written....

Craig.

Reply to
Craig Parslow

Perhaps we could read about these cars if TW was on cd-rom - I have seen copies on the Autolit site (Walter Miller) for US$3.95 a copy.

Avantilover

Reply to
John Clements

I asked directly if this car was a clone or real. His response follows: "My father in law purchased this car in l995 and restored it. The vehicle had these markings when we purchased it. The speedway says that these were the vehicles used in 62 but they kept no record of the serial numbers. I a picture of the vehicle the previous owner sent us when we purchased it. We can document his ownership back to 1986" bs

Reply to
Brian Scott

Studom is certainly fortunate to have folks like you who are knowledgeable as to the specific historical data of our beloved brand.

OTOH, you have dashed my plans to sell the "only one experimental produced" 1965 GT Hawk equipped with a similar singularly built 314 cid specially cast engine that was dual supercharged with the body painted a prototype Rose Mist polyurethane and stored in Egbert's garage unknown to upper management.

Geeeeeeeeez!!!

JT

(Back to the drawing board once again...)

snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com wrote:

Reply to
Grumpy AuContraire

Reply to
bobcaripalma

fyi, All issues of Avanti Magazine WILL be available on cd-rom later this summer through AOAI. Price to be $99 including shipping IIRC.

Jeff

John Clements wrote:

Reply to
Jeff Grohs

I just got an e-mail from the seller asking about the body number on the cowl. He doesn't have a build sheet, but said when his father-in-law bought the car it had a blue interior and a white top... which is what the pace cars had. Who knows, this may actually be an original pace car since nobody knows where they ended up. He is going to look at the body tag this afternoon and send me the number. If it is, I suspect someone from the museum needs to contact this guy.

Lee

Reply to
Lee Aanderud

The body number won't mean much to determine whether or not it is a real one.... The VIN number tells the whole story and, without a doubt, this one on e-bay is no more a REAL pace car than mine is.

Lee DeLaBarre Daytona62

Reply to
Lee

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