B382001910 LRXFE

SouthDakotaTiger

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In August, 2008, I got a phone call from a former colleague in Wisconsin offering me an opportunity to look at his Tiger and consider purchasing it. The car had not been driven since 1992 and for that entire length of time had been in "dry" storage. When I viewed the car I found it disassembled -a rolling chassis, if you will, along with many boxes of parts. The engine and transmission were removed from the car. Originally Arctic White, the car had been repainted several times. There were 2 bonnets with the car. The original which had 8 louvers in it and needed paint. The 2nd hood was a LAT model. Other than paint, both were in very good condition. The trunk lid was also in good condition. The hardtop was in very good condition with no rust. The headliner was removed, but the bows were intact. The hardtop glass had also been removed and was included with the car. The glass was in bad shape though. All the hardtop hardware was included and was in good, usable condition. The soft top was removed and not usable as it had shrunk badly. Also the rear window was more translucent than transparent. The bumpers were OK, but required minor straightening and re-chroming. The windshield frame was in good condition. The windshield glass was missing. The original Tiger wheels were still on the car. The VIN tag was removed but in a box of parts. The JAL tag was missing.

After viewing the car and returning home I looked in my Book of Norman to see if the VIN number had been recorded. It had. I contacted Norman and provided him with the engine number, tranny number and rear end number. The engine and tranny were original. At some point the rear end had been exchanged.

At this point I was feeling confident that this was a legitimate Tiger worth restoring. I called my former colleague and arranged to pick up the car. After bringing the car home I did a little more investigation - lots of phone calls - and found the car had originally been purchased in Ohio. The original owner sold it to #2 - also in Ohio. Owner 2 was an active racer - probably that's where the rear end got swapped - and also where some minor rear quarter panel damage had occured. Owner 3, a gentleman from Illinois, had the car for a number of years and was the person who disassembled it and repainted it in a Porsche Red. Personal problems prevented him from finishing the project and he sold it to my colleague. At the time of purchase my colleague had the car for 16 years - paying $50/month storage - and had not done anything with the car.

I trailered the car to SUNI V in Rapid City where it was authenticated. The car is now in a shop in Parkston, SD where it is nearly ready for repainting. I decided to return it to a white color - basically Arctic White, but with a bit of Pearl added. The hardtop will be Onyx Black. The exhaust pass through areas have been repaired and also a couple of small quarter size spots in the trunk floor.

There is still much to do - but I feel good that an original Tiger can, at long last, be back on the road. :)

from sunny South Dakota,

Paul
 
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