Rust now more expensive than Gold?

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Cliff Beer

You just know that somebody is going to buy it, "restore" it and try to sell it for original car prices. You also know that in the "restoration" process that nothing original will actually be retained because it's in such bad shape, but claims will be made about restoring and retaining some good sized portion of the original metal, again, in order to be able to try to say it's a "restoration" with a straight face instead of a "recreation" or a "tribute" car.

It all boils down to money and inevitably there will be somebody who is comfortable with trying to create the veil of legitimacy and originality for economic gain.
 
wolodymyr

Dave Bilyk

Dave Bilyk
Supporter
Eloquently put Cliff,
I do believe that it would be better kept in this condition as a museum piece (this is the stated intention of the new owner).
Theres a kind of purity about seeing it as it came out of the lake, to restore it would destroy that feeling. To my mind there would be little value in seeing a remanufactured car using only a handful of small bits from the original. In that sense, the rust IS the valuable bit of the car if you see what I mean!

Any other views?

Dave
 
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David Morton

Lifetime Supporter
The owner was presented with a bill for duty for the car and decided he didn't want it and nobody else was going to have it either. I think he lived in France and the bill was to the Italian customs so he said some thing like "Watch this Senor" as he pushed it into the lake and then continued homeward. Real Style like that is hard to find......
Apparently it was about 40 m deep so just about on the limit for club type divers without staging though they knew it was there for a long time before recovering it.
 
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Dave Deerson

Seeing that half of the car( I guess it had/has an alum. body?) has disintegrated,and I am assuming the lake is fresh water, which side was likely to be down in the muck? Was the "good" side down and therefore protected? Or was the "bad" side down and rotted away due to contact with the muck and mire??
 
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David Morton

Lifetime Supporter
Lago Maggiore in common with the other lakes in the region are non salt water. Apparently there was a chain attached to it when it was pushed into the water
but over time, it rusted away. As for how it was sat on the bottom of the lake , I cannot find that info. It may have been Swiss rather than Italian customs who to this
day are the most intransigent beurocrats world wide - bar none.
 
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Chris Simpson

As long as the chassis data plate is recoverable, it can be built into an as new Bugatti of the period - using all new parts and materials and will be worth very much more than the wreck went for at auction. We all know this is ridiculous but it happens a lot with cars and also wrecked vintage aircraft.

Chris
 
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