saved from a chicken.coop

[fulvia a.i.]

hello; this is johnny 48 writing in English for 2 Lancist that do not write English, nor speak much English beyond Coca-Cola. THEIR INITIAL HAVE BEEN CHANGED TO SAVE THEM FACE B)
Here is their story; TO DATE:

A.B. & C.D. were standing in a forecourt of the Fiat Car-Shop where they both have worked for many many years; next to a Lancia Thema belonging to A.B,; who had just inherited it from his dad, who had babied it from the 1st day it was registered in SW Germany until his passing. A.B. did (does) not want to sell it nor to add many km to the few km it had been driven in the last 20 odd years by dad. It was to be backed-up into the New-Car Showroom, to live among shiny new Ital-Cars, since it was - & still is a pristine S1 2.8L Thema.
(John note: I will see it soon !)

A passing car stopped in the street, quite near to them, a window was rolled down, am unknown voice said "I know where a lot of old Lancia are being stored, the owners wish to sell them, give me your card & I'll have them contact you". They did. Within days they met the family of the deceased Lancia Collecter, near the hsitorical City of Worms (jokes allowed; especially referring to the "Diet of Worrms" (google Martin Luther for details) ! The family wAS in the process of selling the entire-lot.

The oldest, rarest Lancia had already been sold, directly out of a chicken.coop at a chicken-farm; I was not told which Lancia these were. There were no chickens living in this coop when the Collector was living; only his cars. That changed soon after his demise. Car doors & windows were opened so that chickens could roost in, over, under, lay / hatch eggs etc ... for several years. The cars suffered !! Alot !

Of course neither A.B. & C.D. had any intention to buy any car when they arrived - they went 'out of general interest' ! Sfter viewing the poop-covered (in & out) cars in the chicken-coop they knew that they were not buying any cars ! That dumb (their words) they were not (their words) !

Ha ha - to make a long story short; their hearts made them do it !

The last 1 Lancia were saved by them. after some hard-bargaining; they were picked up one by one on a trailer & brought to various homes.

They are:
1x S2 FSZ - now being totally reverberated by A.B....after much steam-cleaning & total disassembling. Major damage had occured in this cars life; never well repaired ! This Z must have been "used-hard, crashed-often" in its pre. Chicken-Coop life. I saw this work-in-progress-in-pieces today. With permission I discovered previously undiscovered rust; rust that will require a major rethink of financing more needed / going-to-be costly-work. Work that will have to be done by by an artistically-skilled-tin.craftsman; one who can bend new-metal to blend into the Zagato roof-profile.

I poked around the hardly-visable rust for a while only to discover that ....yikes.....that....yikes....that .....perhaps the entire outer roof-skin will have to be removed - to get to the the rotted roof-frame underneath it; what is left of the frame anyway ! I have never seen roof-frame rust like this before; in actuality...there is no roof frame left ! I was shaking & shuddering more & more as I delved deeper; the "news" kept getting worse ! A.B. was getting "whiter" by the minute !

1x Beta Mc - general condition (I have been told) similar to FSZ above; perhap no roof-rust. This Mc is in the experienced hands of a friend of A.B. / R.M. Yes, he also works at the same Shop ! Yes, he is another Nut-Case !

1x Gam Cpe - was in quite same condition as the above Beta when removed from the Coop, but has been "frame, carosserie, mechanically" almost completely restored....by C.D. & friends. I will see this Gam in the next weeks.

1x Gam Berlina - condition - as expected - chicken-coop miserable. Future unknown; owner R.M. - I assume that I will see this Gam soon as well as the Cpe, since they are at the same location.

There was another Lancia that had been-painted by-hand-in undercoat-prehistoric-bitumen-road-tar, hiding a body consisting only of cracked tons of body-putty. That car was scrapped. I didn't ask what model !

I will take a camera on my next visit, shoot photos & everyone can weep !

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Oh yes, the ex-France Fulvia front-seats I have had for my own FSZ for months will be soon-installed as soon as A.B. & C.D. make a adapter-frame for them. The 1st shop tasked to do this has not delivered !

That was the prime reason I drove to VISIT THEM today; to measure the frame. I had no intention to poke holes in a FSZ roof, but I did !

Isn't life with old-metal interesting ! Ha Ha Ho Ho !!! To the Funny-Farm I (we) go !!