<VV> <CORSA Chapters> CORSA blunder

[S M]

There may have been some middle ground between the rules and what Bill was advocating. 
On looking at the photos of the Lambrecht car, If I had been the chair of the Concours, I might have reserved judgement on classification of that car until all the other cars had been classified, for two reasons: 
1) The whitewalls on the replacement tires weren't the typical 1/2" modern whitewall, they are wider. 5/8"? Maybe 3/4"? They don't look THAT wrong... If they are 3/4" they actually fit the spec. 7/8" +/-1/8". If they are 5/8" I think I might have overlooked the fact depending on #2... 
2) Were there any other cars competing for the preservation award? If the answer is no, like it often is, I would have allowed the Lambrecht car. If the answer was yes, I'd classify it as modified to be fair to the other stock class car(s) that followed ALL of the class rules. 


In my mind, that's why the Chair is there, to be fair and to make judgement calls for the greater good. 


Does anyone know if there were any other stock class cars? 


yea, Vairily ... Shaun 


----- Original Message -----

From: "Vairtec Corp via VirtualVairs" <virtualvairs at corvair.org> 
To: chapters at corvair.org, virtualvairs at corvair.org, "CORSA Board of Directors" <corsabod at corvair.org> 
Sent: Thursday, June 25, 2015 4:36:09 PM 
Subject: Re: <VV> <CORSA Chapters> CORSA blunder 

Bill, I key on two of the things you mentioned: 

"The '63 White Monza Lambrecht car was classified into the Modified 
class for Concours - technically correct due to the incorrect size of 
his whitewall radial tires" 

and 

"To call it modified because he didn't drive it here on 52 year old bias 
belt tires is insane." 

I now comment: 

The car was classified correctly, so any "blunder" would be with the 
classification rules, not their application in this instance. Any 
lesson learned here should be about revisions to the rules, not about 
making exceptions to them. 

If an exception were to be made here, I think the wise exception would 
have been to not place the car in the concours competition, instead 
putting it on display in a central location and giving the owner some 
kind of special recognition. 

To a great extent I think the problem is rooted not in the rules but in 
the nomenclature. "Stock," whether it is accompanied by "Factory" or 
"Original" or "Restored" or some other term, connotes not only condition 
comparable to as it left the factory all those years ago, but also a 
stock appearance to the ordinary person. "Modified" connotes not only 
those changes evident to the cognoscenti, but also changes readily 
visible to the average joe. So I think the term "Modified" should be 
reserved for cars with obvious changes -- aftermarket wheels, custom 
paint, high-back seats, that sort of thing. If a car looks stock to an 
ordinary person, it is in my view sufficiently stock to go into a class 
with "stock" attached to its name. 

You could have "Stock 1" for the utterly authentic cars, "Stock 2" for 
those with minor changes such as modern radial tires, and "Stock 3" for 
cars that appear stock but have such things as a '66 engine in a '64. 

This would avoid the pejorative nature of calling the Lambrecht car 
"modified," and it is a semantic distinction that has been meaningful to 
a lot of people through the years. For decades, Corvair owners have 
gotten their knickers in a twist over being moved out of "stock." So 
don't move them out of "stock," just move them into a different "stock." 

--Bob Marlow 

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