Originally Posted by
AMCO72
Yep, your spelling is correct. Carlos Neate raced that Skyline GT seen at the right rear of the photo. Quite a tiny car and went damn well. Any of you who saw it will recall the howling sound it made on its journey round the track. I think that the boys had constructed some sort of megaphone which was attached to the exhaust outlet that gave it that distinctive sound. Neates car yard was one I was going to mention as my Dad had bought a car or two from them. The one I remember best was his 1960 Mercedes benz 190 SL.. Perhaps I was too one eyed about my preference for English cars, but I found the Merc the oddest machine. Unlike the 300SL, this thing had a puny 2 litre engine which could hardly pull the skin off a rice pudding. The gearing was incredibly low.....had to be to get it to go, and it seemed to be reving its guts out to get anywhere. Was constantly breaking down....dodgy electrics, and when my Dad died in 1977 I could have inherited the car but after driving it around Christchurch during the week I was tidying his affairs, I said no thanks and put it up for sale. I thought the correct thing to do would be to offer it back to Carlos Neate and duly rang him to see if he was interested. I got a guarded ' yes, but let me do some home work'. I told him that he had better be quick because I wanted to get back to the Nth Island and needed the car gone. I had also put an ad in the newspaper and a couple of days later got a ring from a chap who came and inspected the car and bought it on the spot. I rang Carlos to tell him it was sold, and he called me for every mongrel under the sun. I pointed out that I had given him first option and he had blown it by mucking around. For Gods sake, I only wanted $3000 for it......probably would sell for about $70,000 today. Funny fellow.