Not Going, Not Going, And Gone
NOT GOING, NOT GOING, AND GONE
BEGIN WITH THE BAD news, that this Chieftain Mk. XII tank, the ex-Cal Rayborn Harley XR750 and the only XR750 that Kenny Roberts Sr. ever raced, are parked.
They are parked because not even Jim Feuling, creator of the Harley-based Feuling W3 (CW, October, 2000) gets everything his way. The tank and bikes run, but not even Feuling, holder of 100 patents and nearly as many speed records, gets to drive tanks on city streets.
The unlikely trio is on display here to illustrate a different sort of auction.
No one’s ever called Feuling cautious, or even prudent. His R&D firm has done projects for Ford, Oldsmobile, John Deere and Nissan. When he raced, he rode dirt-track with (against?) Cal Rayborn. His business thrived, and he began collecting. And because that’s the way Feuling lives, his collection grew into 150 vintage and racing motorcycles, the tank, a panel truck from Steve McQueen’s garage, the car
driven by the villain in “The Great Race” and a warehouse filled with racing engines, headers, camshafts and so forth.
Just like the garage we’d all like to
sum. But life has its changes of direction. First, the Ventura, California-based Feuling decided to move closer to his mom and the family home near San Diego.
Next, Harley-Davidson had been advised of the W3, but The Motor Company had plans of its own, as in the VRod so H-D won’t build the Triple.
This came about the time the dot-com bubble burst, taking with it the market for technical stocks and all those guys with risk capital in search of a project.
So, Feuling put his collection on the block, in part because 150 bikes and cars makes for a whopping moving bill, in part
because he had more machines than he could
use, and in part because he had other uses for the money spent on collecting.
The auction was a fun day, for the most part. The bulk of the collection was conventional, as in Norton Manx and Commando, BMW RIOOS and Aermacchi Sprint, and went quickly, at market prices.
But the market didn’t agree Feuling’s values for the historic XRs, so when the bids didn’t meet his hopes, he took them back and plans to loan them to the San Diego Automotive Museum.
The tank? Sold to the man from Minnesota! The winning bid was $22,000, by the way, all 58 tons, 750 horsepower from the two engines, and with cannon. It’s still in the back lot because the new owner’s out reserving a really big freight car.
Allan Girdler
