A Lorraine Dietrich B3-6 story

At the end of last year a good friend of mine got in touch as he'd seen a car for sale that he was most interested in and asked if I would go and take a look, what with it being so local. He's been drawn to the Lorraine Dietrich marque for many years through his love of all things mechanical, they made trains first, then cars and aero engines, amongst other things. To give an indication of the popularity of the marque, by 1909 they'd built 12000 cars. Post First World War they brought out the B3-6, with a 3.5 litre OHV straight 6, 3 speed gearbox and an enormously strong chassis. A tuned version of this engine was run in a B3-6 at LeMans where they came 2nd & 3rd in 1924, 1st & 3rd in 1925 and 1st, 2nd & 3rd in 1926 (the first 'hat-trick'). The car below was sold new by Bevan Bros & Tucker in Melbourne, Australia, but it's not known what type of body it had fitted at that point. It spent some time as a flat bed truck, in 1951 it was re-bodied in its current style, then in the late 80s it was completely restored, still in Australia. It was imported and entered its most recent ownership 25 years ago and has clearly been well loved. Short story long, the viewing and test drive went very well, the price was right, the car was bought. Yesterday I went and picked it up with my pal who has access to a rather massive covered trailer, the plan is to go over the whole car to make sure all is as it should be and then ship to him, he's overseas. It really is a pleasure to have such a car in the workshop, it's a remarkable piece of engineering.