In May 2021, I received a phone call from a friend of mine who asked if I had ever heard of a Doretti. I answered in the affirmitive, he then said that someone at his work was selling one and asked if I was interested.
The car was three miles away from my house so I took a deposit and went straight away to look at it. We negotiated a price and I left him a deposit. The next day I went to the bank and withdrew the balance due for the car. The vendor drew up the receipt of payment which is when I found out it was Chassis No.1003, (the third production Swallow Doretti built by the factory), which was exciting.
Such an early car needed to have a good restoration. It had not run since 1973. I did the easy stuff and left the hard stuff to the pros. The body of the car was in great condition due to it being in California all its life. The front underside of the hood had to be remade because of a water trap being there also top of doors. It had been hit front passenger side at one time but nothing really bad. All the needed parts were there except for the side spears and rear wings. The bumpers were like nudge bars, not original, leading me to believe maybe it was amateur raced. The heads were ported with a Mallory distributor and magneto coil. This also leads me to believe it was raced. I put these things back to standard but kept the old stuff. When removing the paint, first coat was red, then a silver blue, then the original green with a yellow primer. When removing the coats of paint, I paid close attention to the front and hood which were different to the other early cars I had been researching. I could not find a seam where the hood had an addition in length above the grille. Also, the yellow primer was the last colour to come off on both the addition and the louvres which still mystified me and Classic European which did the paint and body work.
I reached out to Tom Householder about my car in the early days trying to find out more about it. He sent me an advertisement dated 1956 with the same info in it that my car had louvered hood, modified front ported head, Mallory ignition magneto which leads me to believe it was my car. It looked like all the work done prior to 1956. I also asked him about my engine numbers TS116 being 166 on the plate. He assumed it was the original engine and a mistake on the plate? The answers to all of these questions I don't think I'll ever know. So, upon restoration, I didn't change anything except front TR3 over-riders and rear bumper. I left off the over-riders and brought bumper closer to rear of the car for better aesthetics. I also left one of the dashboard brackets the original green just in case when I'm dead and gone the original green is still to be seen. In the restoration, most of the dated parts were dated 11-53. I documented this through pictures. Also, chassis number checked 1003 on chassis. All this will go on to a CD that will be kept with the car documents. To the best of my knowledge with what I've seen and check, this car had wooden floors, green paint, silver-coloured wheels, black carpets, red interior, green door tops and dash top with black stitching, a tan top and side screens with lift the dots when originally sold in Los Angeles. Early features of this car were thermostat housing, windshield stanchions with two extra holes, lift the dots on soft top and a wooden floor.
...Information and photos courtesy Peter Greatbatch