Lane's Motor Musem

Lane Motor Museum in Nashville is a 'must see' destination for all European car enthusiasts in the US. The collection primarily features European cars of the 50s and 60s and Jeff Lane and his team have assembled an unrivaled collection of odd and unusual vehicles that range from European micro cars to a gigantic American aquatic tank carrier. Let's go for a tour!

Lanes' has the largest collection of Tatras outside the Czech Republic. During our visit I counted 14, comprising:

Tatra T87

Tatra T97

2 Tatraplans

Tatraplan (with a Panhard)

Tatra T603-1

Tatra T603-3 and Monoposto racer

There were two Tatra T12 racer replicas

Late model Tatra T57

Tatra T11 chassis

An early model Tatra T57

Another late model Tatra T57

Tatra T12 limousine

Tatra aeroluge replica


There was also a decent DKW collection, including a DKW 1000SP and outstandingly rare Monza sports car.

Auto-Union 1000S

Auto-Union 1000SP

DKW Monza, a fibreglass bodied rally and race version of the 1000S

Linking these two marques was a small collection of Czech Aero and Jawa cars. Aero and Jawa were pre-war contemporaries of Tatra but used DKW 2 cylinder engines built under license. Both marques are virtually unknown outside of the Czech Republic.

Aero 30s of 1934 & 1936

Jawa 600

There was a good collection of Borgwards, starting with the three-wheeled Goliath Pioneer through to the elegant Borgard Isabella.

Borgward row starts with Carl Borgward's first car, the Goliath Pioneer. This little three-wheeled budget car was powered by a 200cc single cylinder two-stroke engine. The body was made of plywood covered in leatherette.

Goliath got its start building three-wheeled commercial vehicles. In the late 1920s they expanded into four wheeled lorry's with the Atlas. Its construction is very simple. Oddly the door is at the front of the cab.

When sales of Goliath's cars and commercials began to pick up, Carl Borgward moved to a larger factory opposite the Hansa-Lloyd factory in Bremen. When Hansa fell into financial difficulty during the Depression, Borgward bought the company. He rationalised their range and merged the company with Goliath-Borgward. This is a Hansa 1100 from 1937

After the war Borgward was one of the first German auto companies to adopt a pontoon body style. At this time most cars still had external mudguards and running boards. Borgward's strikingly modern cars were a sensation and sold well. This is a Goliath GP700, which was powered by a small 700cc two-stroke engine mounted transversely in the engine bay.

Borgward's wonderful Isabella set a standard in styling and performance.

A Lloyd LT600 lastenwagen. Despite the damage to Borgward's factories, he was able to get back into production almost immediately after the war. The first car produced was the Lloyd LP300, a very basic wooden car covered in leatherette. The Lloyd LTs were a commercial version of this car. Powered by a 600cc two-stroke motor, they were still primarily built of wood. These cars are very rare.

One of the highlight vehicles in the Lanes collection is a replica of Buckminster Fuller's 1934 Dymaxion streamliner. Pitched as the car of the future, the Dymaxion was a 3 wheeled streamliner powered by a rear mounted V8 Ford engine. Steering was via the single rear wheel, which made the vehicle inherently unstable.

Dymaxion and a couple of propeller cars.



A video of the car being taken on a test drive. It's notable how unstable the car is at speed.

Contemporary film of Buckmeister Fuller and the Dymaxion

The museum also has a collection of other oddball, American streamliners from the 1930s and 40s.

The Erikson streamliner is a garage built car, built sometime in the late 1940s or 50s. It was modeled on the Dymaxion and constructed out of salvaged aircraft parts and a Ford engine.

http://www.lanemotormuseum.org/collection/cars/item/erickson-streamliner-1945

A series of cars built by aero engineer James Martin.

1932 Martinette http://www.lanemotormuseum.org/collection/cars/item/martin-martinette-1932

1950 Martin Stationette http://www.lanemotormuseum.org/collection/cars/item/martin-stationette-1950

More European cars

Panhard-Levassor 

1930 BMW-Dixi. BMW purchased Dixi in 1928 and quickly adapted Dixi's Austin 7 copy into something more sporty. http://www.lanemotormuseum.org/collection/cars/item/bmw-dixi-1930

Mercedes-Benz 130H

VW Beetle

1938 BMW 320 and Isetta

BMW Isetta and 600

Biscuiter

1949 Mochet cyclecar and a 1954 Daus. Otto Daus was formerly chief designer at Vidal & Sohn Tempowerkes. After he left Tempo he developed several light car and truck projects, none of which proved successful. http://www.lanemotormuseum.org/collection/cars/item/daus-1954

A French Mochet microcar and Messerschmitt KR200

Messerschmitt KR200

Maico 500 and a Peel 50

Zundapp Janus

Russian invalid car

Two home built microcars - a 1953 Manocar and a 1955 Grataloop. Needless to say these oddballs never became production cars.

1951 Hoffman. This is one of the oddest vehicles ever built. It is asymmetrical, shorter than it is long, and is steered and powered via its back wheel like the Dymaxion. It goes without saying that it is inherently unstable and only a single prototype was ever made. http://www.lanemotormuseum.org/collection/cars/item/hoffmann-1951

Fiat Bialla

Fiat Multipla and 500

A pre-war and post-war Fiat 500 'Topolino.'

Ferves Ranger 4x4. This odd four wheel drive utility vehicle was based on Fiat 500 mechanicals. http://www.lanemotormuseum.org/collection/cars/item/ferves-ranger-4x4-1965

Toyota 600 and Honda S600

Davis Divan. The Davis story is a little like that Tucker. He attempted to build an entirely new type of car to cash in on the postwar boom but lack of capital and some dodgy business practices led to his prosecution and the collapse of his company.

British 1920s microcar ABC

1936 Peugeot triporter. This vehicle was originally a commercial triporter but was given a wood and leatherette body post-war so it could be used as a personal vehicle.

As impressive as the main hall is, the highlight of any visit has to be a tour of the basement where many of the surplus cars are stored. Some are project cars but most are simply on rotation, waiting their turn to be displayed.

Mochet pedal car from the 1940s



A Buckle-Goggomobil sedan from Australia

Saab 96 rally car

Auto-Union 1000S and East German AWZ P70

Wartburg 313

Skoda cabriolet

Panhard-Levassor

New Map Solyto

Saab Sonet

Wartburg and some British car....

Gregoire

Panhard coupe and Citroen H van

NSU 1200 and Tatra T12

Another Auto-Union 1000S

Gregory



BMW 700 with a DKW Schnellaster in the rear

Fuldamobil

Heinkel Kabine

Saab 96 coupe

Renault 750

Citroen Traction-Avant

BSA tricycle

DKW F2 with metal bodywork (possibly a Jhle or a post-war re-body)

Peugeot electric car



A rather strangely mutilated Maico or Champion 500. This car is awaiting restoration. Someone's gotta sort out those terrible headlights!

NSU Prinz 4

The Outside Garage

Velorex



Morgan

Bond

Citroen Kegresse

The military section.

Tempo Gelanger 1200

Steyr-Puch Haflinger

Short wheelbase Tempo Matador

Aquatic military transporter

If you can't make it over to Nashville you can always check out their excellent website here: http://www.lanemotormuseum.org/news

Tatra restoration update

In 2016 Shelly and I traveled overseas for six months so while I was away I decided to put the Tatra in the shop to address a couple of issues. The immediate issue was that the starter motor had failed and I had to hand crank her to get her started. Once I mastered the skill she started easy enough but it was a bit of a pain. The exhaust also needed replacing and there were a number of other, relatively minor mechanical issues to fix. I left the car with Classic Gasoline who had helped sort out the engine problems when I first bought the car.

The exhaust was replaced and the starter motor overhauled.

The engine out

A new clutch went in as the old one was virtually worn to the metal

The whole gearbox had to come out to fix the leaking boots. When I bought the car the gearbox did not leak as the oil in the gearbox had turned to sludge. Once the gearbox had been flushed and filled with fresh oil, it began to leak quite a bit. I was asked if I wanted the gearbox rebuilt. I said no as I was gearbox worked quite fine and I foresaw the risk that once the gearbox came apart it would be difficult to put back together.

Inevitably though, while the cats away the mice will play and once the gearbox was out, the guys did open her up and, as expected, problems were found. The gearbox had been restored using parts of dubious quality and it was probably the fact that the car had rarely been driven in the past 30 years that problems had not occurred. The guys sheepishly told me that they could not put it back together without replacing the worn parts. Now I had to find a donor gearbox. Great! Thank God for the internet and Tatra enthusiast forums. After putting the word out I obtained a replacement gearbox at great expense. Unfortunately, the donor gearbox had just as many problems as the original.  Some parts were okay but most were unusable.

Tatraplan gearboxes do not grow on trees. The company only built 3300 Tatraplans over four years. Due to wear and tear, gearboxes often require repair and replacement and stocks of NOS parts are no longer available. Wrecked gearboxes are pretty much all you can source these days and many have already been cannibalized for their most useful parts. In October 2016 I had put the word out again but had had no leads. After much cajoling I finally managed secure the missing parts from a source in Czechia.

By this stage Classic Gasoline had handed the gearbox rebuild over to a specialist gearbox rebuilder. It made sense as the job really needed specialist attention. However, none of the Tatra parts I was able to source met the company's high standards, which led to a lot of frustration on both sides. I couldn't make them understand that we simply had to make do with what we have.

The Body
With the car laid up it seemed a good time to send her in to the bodyshop. Although not really apparent in the photos I've posted, the paintwork was in pretty bad condition, especially on the car's left hand side where great cracks had opened up. I put the car in the hands of Karson Pasznicki of KPaz Panel and Paint.

The Tatra goes for a ride....

To KPaz

We were all pleasantly surprised to find that beneath the thick layers of bog the Tatra was in excellent shape. It appears that the car was involved in an accident on its left hand side and this had simply been bogged over. In some places the bog was a good inch and half thick. Beneath the bog was a resinous film from the decomposition of the old primer, but there was no real rust. This was really great news as I had expected the doors especially to be in very bad condition. The dents were beaten out and prepped with modern primer.

Taking a chisel to the cracked door panels

Despite the appearance of rust, this dark stain was resin from the original 1980s prep.

The steel beneath the resin was in pristine condition.

Signs of damage on the rear panel

Oddly enough the cake layering of bog was carried right under the car. This has all been take off now.

The roof is back to bare metal. Note the seam across the centreline. Tatra did not have presses big enough to stamp the roof as a single piece so the roof was built in two sections and then welded together by hand.

In primer



We decide to keep the Tatra silver because it's just such a traditional 'Tatra' colour, however, this isn't really correct. Tatra offered the Tatraplan in a wide variety of colour schemes include two tone. This came at extra cost of course and needed to be specially requested. The majority of Tatraplans left the factory in a standard gloss black. The trend towards silver as the standard is recent as restorers of T87s have adopted it to emphasize the aerodynamic appearance of their cars. Some people have even painted T603s in silver, a colour that that car never came in. When we peeled back the layers of paint we discovered that our car was originally dark green.

Final buffing

And rubbing down





The car looks fantastic now.

Back home temporarily

To the final chapter - http://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com.au/2017/12/tatra-restoration-update.html

For more of Tatra posts check out my dedicated Tatra blog: https://tatrat600.blogspot.com/