The ultimate wedding accessory

USUALLY it's the bride who's the star of the show, and fair enough too, but Jim Laird, of Masterton, recalls a time when the guests gathered in awe around the wedding car after the bride had moved on.
The bridal party and guests were from England, and they'd never seen anything like Jim's 1935 Nash LaFayette Brougham.
In fact, not a lot of people anywhere have seen the likes of this car, believed to be the only roadworthy example of this model in the world.
The Brougham is the top of the LaFayette range (named after a French general who fought in the American Revolution) and checks in at 1.3 tonnes. It is 4.8 metres long, bumper to bumper, and is powered by an 3.9litre 80hp inline six cylinder engine.
The car transports five people (bench seats front and rear) in most acceptable comfort, with lots of quirky features. For example, smokers enjoyed the benefit of flow-through ventilation in the form of stepped windows front and rear, aided by adjustable glass deflectors at the front.
Jim tells me with this system the car never fogs up in winter.
There's a factory-fitted radio, a massive valve affair with a kid-proof feature: select the station you want then use the ignition key to lock the setting. The radio pulls so much juice out of the 6 volt system that when it and the lights are on the generator can't keep up.
The radio, incidentally, is mounted on the passenger side. When the Nash came to New Zealand the controls were shifted to the right but other features remained where they were. So the driver gets a glovebox (with integral ashtray) and the passenger gets the radio.
Also, the only exterior door lock is on the front passenger side and the spare wheel is set into the right front mudguard. (Lesser models carried their spare on the trunk). Jim has plans for a matching spare on the passenger side.
Jim and his wife Lyn bought the car in Auckland in the middle of winter about 12 years ago and spent three days driving it home. The exhaust fell off on the way, and then there were problems with the manifold and water hoses. Just to add to the problems, both the Desert Road and Manawatu Gorge were closed.
The car came with a large collection of parts, including a spare engine. The engine was rebuilt by Francis Pointon, using new parts from the US.
The engine has seven crankshaft bearings, immensely strong. An odd feature is that the water pump is driven through the generator.
The engine is coupled to a three-speed gearbox with overdrive, engaged by a separate lever, which gives a comfortable cruising speed of around 50mph.
Fuel consumption is heavy at 14mpg.
"Francis reckons it should do 19mpg," says Jim.
The mechanical specs are completed by cable brakes, both hand and foot cables connecting to a rotating central platform. This arrangement means both hand and foot brakes operate on all four wheels, providing pretty reasonable stopping power. The '35 was the last Nash with cable brakes.
The body was virtually rust-free, but the paint was in a sad state.
Jim's son Damien was an apprentice at CE Spray when the car arrived in Masterton, and after the body was repaired and rubbed down he replaced the original dark blue paint with a metallic Citroen green.
While the Nash was parked at CE Spray it was spotted by a retired motor trimmer, who offered to do the interior. The man had left school in England at age 13 and spent his entire working life in the trade, including working on Rolls Royces. He has done an excellent job on the interior. A bonus was finding a Christchurch-based supplier of authentic 1930s fabrics, so the finished job is in keeping with the period.
The finishing touch is a beautiful burled walnut finish applied to the pressed steel dash by a Wellington man using poultry feathers and shaving brushes. You'd be hard pressed to spot that it isn't the real thing.
The Nash was very complete when Jim got it. (Only the headlamps and rear number plate lamp are non-original). He had a new bonnet decoration cast by Mac McKenzie, of Kydracraft, in Masterton, and all that remains is replacement of the well-worn hubcaps.
The car is one of just two legal vintage wedding cars in Wairarapa. For that a passenger service licence is required, the car must have a certificate of fitness instead of a WOF, and the driver needs a P endorsement on his licence.
Although Jim meets all these requirements, he spends a lot of time out of the area working, so most of the weddings are done by a friend, former truck driver Doug Gray.