Red Dawson's Kensington Carpets Camaro

[Steve Holmes]

My thanks to Mike Feisst for snapping these photos recently when in the South Island as part of the Historic Muscle Cars/Historic Saloon Cars tour. Mike tracked down the famous Red Dawson Kensington Carpets Z/28 Camaro and took these photos showing how the car looks today.

I wrote a story on this car about 15 years ago for NZ Classic Car mag and spoke to the owner Kelvin Towns. He'd owned the car for a long time, and had done some restoration work, including reinstalling a factory firewall after this was removed to shift the engine back for OSCA competition in the 1980s.

One of the interesting aspects of this car is the beautifully crafted flares. Maybe someone here knows how they were produced, and by who? The factory Chaparral Camaros that contested the SCCA Trans-Am series had similar looking flares which were actually special stampings made for Chevrolet, and which were then pop-riveted in place. When i spoke to Kelvin he told me the flares on the Dason car were also pop-riveted in place. This is most definitely not a factory race car. In fact, Dawson purchased it as a road car. But its flares fascinate me.

Dawson first raced the Camaro in the 1971/72 season, painted a beautiful metallic gold and sponsored by Kensington Carpets. It remained much the same other than mechanical upgrades until a sponsor change came for the 1974/75 season when it was repainted in red/white Marlboro colours. Dawson then sold the car to Don Peddie and Allan Dick who had various people drive it, including Kevin Haig, and even Ken Smith had a turn in it. It went through various other owners including Lawrence Bruce and Ross Cameron, before eventually ending up with Kelvin Towns who has owned the car for many years.

As you can see, although restoration is required, the condition of the car is actually very good, mostly thanks to Kelvin who has preserved this special piece of New Zealand motor racing history.