[DeTomaso] Panteras for sale...

[MikeLDrew at aol.com]

In a message dated 4/30/13 17 45 13, mbefthomas at comcast.net writes:


> The red car, last listing, claims to only have 1500 miles, but looks it.
> 

>>>That's a sad story.

Believing it to be true, Fred Phillips of Calgary was all over it, and Mike 
Trusty was kind enough to go and eyeball the car for him before he plunked 
down the cash for it.

Good thing he did.

The seller has owned the car for 29 years, and while he has a few cars, he 
doesn't know much about them, and knows absolutely nothing about Panteras.   
Turns out this car is not at all what it is purported to be.   The speedo 
was disconnected with 1500 miles on it, but the car probably has many, many 
thousands of miles on it.   It was crashed heavily in the front, and repaired 
quite badly.   It's a '71 car, but was repaired with later-style, smaller 
headlight buckets, so that when the headlights are down, you can look right 
through into the inside of the fenders.   There is dribbling paint overspray 
everywhere, the whole car is grungy, the wheels don't match (the seller says 
he bought it from a guy who had three Panteras, so possibly wheels got 
swapped around, or perhaps the front wheels were damaged in the wreck and 
replaced with L-model wheels), and on and on and on.

Apparently the car is quite solid, but definitely in need of restoration, 
plus some proper headlight buckets.   The seller seemed quite sincere when 
Mike pointed out all these things, and very disappointed.   Apparently he only 
drove it a few times in the 29 years he owned it, in an effort to keep the 
mileage low.   You can imagine how he felt when he learned he had a 
high-mileage car--he just wasted 29 years of ownership. :<(

Call it a $30K car instead of a $75K car....

Mike