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Ford timelord


Bren

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  • 3 weeks later...

Oooh, I've somehow managed to miss a load more intrigue in this thread. Another keeper change, and again on the 23rd?! Are Cauty and Drummond messing with us by passing ownership between themselves? Wasn't Flinton Chalk up to something involving Timelord too so what became of that?

That pre-KLF photo is intriguing as we were under the impression Flinton Chalk bought it from the Pinewood auction but maybe he didn't and this guy had it first, and Flinton is the 'bloke who made pop videos' he sold it to. We need to learn more from him.

EDIT: the same story with a bit more detail is now on the hunttimelord blog. The chap's name is Chris Bland and it says he did indeed own it before Flinton. The 'guy who was just out of prison' must have been yet another owner between Pinewood and Flinton so that changes this part of its history quite a bit.

https://hunttimelord.wordpress.com/2022/02/15/the-hunttimelord-blog-has-kindly-been-given-another-great-story-of-ford-timelord-from-his-pre-klf-days/

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So where are we at with probable keepers:

  1. US embassy
  2. ?? (must be one more keeper at some point before Cauty as we know he was keeper #7)
  3. Pinewood Studios
  4. prisoner guy
  5. Chris Bland
  6. Flinton Chalk
  7. Jimmy Cauty (1987)
  8. new keeper 23/02/2020
  9. new keeper 23/02/2022

Assuming Paul Bickers was never a registered keeper as he only bought it to race, we seem to be almost there. Just need to find out who and when the unidentified previous keeper was - I'm guessing it's more likely to have been before Pinewood as it was 17 years old in Superman and an embassy seems unlikely to keep a car that long, and the timescale between Superman and Cauty is very short and already has three known keepers. @LightBulbFun I assume your tool won't show any other keeper change dates between 1 and 7?

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1 hour ago, quicksilver said:

probable keepers:

  1. US embassy
  2. ?? (must be one more keeper at some point before Cauty as we know he was keeper #7)
  3. Pinewood Studios
  4. prisoner guy
  5. Chris Bland
  6. Flinton Chalk

The car looks to be in pretty original condition in the Chris Bland photos (bodywork damage aside) so I had assumed he was an earlier owner ie. 2nd or 3rd after the US Embassy. Passing on later to Pinewood and thereafter these musical artist types. 
 

I did wonder whether it would be possible to aim some sort of an FOI request at the US Embassy in order to see what their records might reveal, it would probably have to be worded along the lines of “for every vehicle owned during the period 1965 to 1985, please list reg number, date acquired and date of disposal”. Dunno whether they would be an exempt organisation though. 

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1 hour ago, quicksilver said:

So where are we at with probable keepers:

  1. US embassy
  2. ?? (must be one more keeper at some point before Cauty as we know he was keeper #7)
  3. Pinewood Studios
  4. prisoner guy
  5. Chris Bland
  6. Flinton Chalk
  7. Jimmy Cauty (1987)
  8. new keeper 23/02/2020
  9. new keeper 23/02/2022

Assuming Paul Bickers was never a registered keeper as he only bought it to race, we seem to be almost there. Just need to find out who and when the unidentified previous keeper was - I'm guessing it's more likely to have been before Pinewood as it was 17 years old in Superman and an embassy seems unlikely to keep a car that long, and the timescale between Superman and Cauty is very short and already has three known keepers. @LightBulbFun I assume your tool won't show any other keeper change dates between 1 and 7?

indeed sadly what you see in my previous screenshots is all that backend has to give

for others wanting to keep track of the Ford Timelord, Carbaba is working again :) 

 

On 02/04/2022 at 14:49, LightBulbFun said:

image.png.e74809b6ad97ce2808a7487bc0a18021.png

CarBaba is working again! https://www.carbaba.co.uk/

(question is, is for how long LOL)

 

but heres a Modern UAZ bread loaf just looked up as proof LOL

image.thumb.png.c5ae06238a464e71042d445872e138f7.png

 

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1 hour ago, mk2_craig said:

The car looks to be in pretty original condition in the Chris Bland photos (bodywork damage aside) so I had assumed he was an earlier owner ie. 2nd or 3rd after the US Embassy. Passing on later to Pinewood and thereafter these musical artist types. 
 

Not sure about that. He says he bought it for £100, suggesting it was pretty old, and swapped it for a Commer camper with a guy who made pop videos, so presumably Flinton Chalk. His now 35-year old child travelled in it so he must have owned it after that child was born in 1986/87. That would make him keeper 5 immediately before Flinton, unless the video guy wasn't Flinton and actually worked at Pinewood and bought it for the film. The footage on the Superman DVD isn't clear enough to see what sort of condition it was in then so it could still have been in good shape and started to deteriorate under Flinton or Cauty's ownership. Shame there's nothing else in his photo that would date it.

Possible alternative keeper sequence could be:

  1. US embassy
  2. Prisoner guy
  3. Chris Bland
  4. Video guy
  5. Pinewood Studios
  6. Flinton Chalk
  7. Jimmy Cauty
  8. 2020 new keeper
  9. 2022 new keeper

That could work and certainly makes the right number, assuming Flinton Chalk and the video guy are not one and the same, but doesn't really fit with his kids' ages so I'm inclined to think my original sequence is correct.

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2 hours ago, quicksilver said:

Possible alternative keeper sequence could be:

  1. US embassy
  2. Prisoner guy
  3. Chris Bland
  4. Video guy
  5. Pinewood Studios
  6. Flinton Chalk
  7. Jimmy Cauty

That would seem plausible, corroborated here

1D94C971-9405-40AE-A2F3-96486E142783.thumb.jpeg.4fb498a100bda33f3688b298567d3af3.jpeg

I was a bit surprised to see that it had black number plates previously, I know it’s a 1968 car and such things were still current at the time but I had imagined that most cars of the era would have been “upgraded” to reflective ones before the end of the seventies, assuming they weren’t so equipped when new. Perhaps I’m just used to seeing the car in KLF-epoch condition. 

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39 minutes ago, mk2_craig said:

That would seem plausible, corroborated here

1D94C971-9405-40AE-A2F3-96486E142783.thumb.jpeg.4fb498a100bda33f3688b298567d3af3.jpeg

I was a bit surprised to see that it had black number plates previously, I know it’s a 1968 car and such things were still current at the time but I had imagined that most cars of the era would have been “upgraded” to reflective ones before the end of the seventies, assuming they weren’t so equipped when new. Perhaps I’m just used to seeing the car in KLF-epoch condition. 

It must have had a lot of keeper changes in a very short time in 1986 then. For Chris Bland's 35-year old to have travelled in it, that means he, the video guy, Pinewood and Flinton must have all owned it during the same year. Thinking about the ex-prisoner Chris bought it from, he presumably bought it before he was put away, meaning he must have owned it for several months or years while he was inside. There isn't enough time for him to buy it and serve his sentence between Superman and Flinton, plus Flinton apparently bought it directly from Pinewood. That makes him the likely second keeper, who bought it from the embassy some time prior to 1985, then went to prison and sold it to Chris when he got out.

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1 hour ago, mk2_craig said:

That would seem plausible, corroborated here

1D94C971-9405-40AE-A2F3-96486E142783.thumb.jpeg.4fb498a100bda33f3688b298567d3af3.jpeg

I was a bit surprised to see that it had black number plates previously, I know it’s a 1968 car and such things were still current at the time but I had imagined that most cars of the era would have been “upgraded” to reflective ones before the end of the seventies, assuming they weren’t so equipped when new. Perhaps I’m just used to seeing the car in KLF-epoch condition. 

Maybe it was fitted with mock American plates for Superman IV & the original ones were misplaced, so a reflective set was made up for it?

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1 hour ago, trigger said:

I saw the Timelord today. 

IMG_20220409_133758.thumb.jpg.a36d6de9c9e7cebb9bf4a89959410afe.jpg

IMG_20220409_133907_1.thumb.jpg.9b88a2d1c4a1aad43ab9f8a2896a48fb.jpg

IMG_20220409_134015.thumb.jpg.5cd613fa597817d707bf1a98bb0450fe.jpg

awesome to see the replica is still out and about! I really like the wear and tear its picked up overtime makes it look authentic just like what WGU18G looked like, I just hope it doesn't go too far! (then again @GingerNuttz has plenty of experience welding up Galaxies LOL)

I understand that it belongs to @Philmanns :) 

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8 hours ago, 808 Estate said:

Excellent, where did you see that at?

The timelord was a well together replica when Phil got hold of it. Then it got trashed by Jimmy and Bill and a few years of wear and tear cxomplete the look. :)

Phil brought it along to our East Coast Retros Car Meet at Shotley on Saturday, it's always nice to see it but it will need a bit of TLC soon as it's getting a little soft around the edges now 

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Yeah the knackered look is really what makes it isn't it. I don't know about you but rough old yanks were a reasonably familiar sight for a while, in the KLF heyday I guess! Where I grew up on the coast there were a few blokes who always had some proper US shite, always with the 'classic American' tax disc holder and usually parked up outside a shite house. Not hard to imagine they could get in the dance if the need took them. 

 

Did I miss it or has there been any discussion on the "shipping container near Sizewell B" referenced on the tunnel poster a few years back? 

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3 hours ago, scruff said:

Did I miss it or has there been any discussion on the "shipping container near Sizewell B" referenced on the tunnel poster a few years back? 

Sort of... internet rumours a while back spoke of a shipping container in Norfolk reputed to hold the mortal remains of the Ford - I suppose Suffolk's not a million miles away?

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Yes, @Piemanspoke to him in late 2019.

On 12/17/2019 at 10:21 AM, Pieman said:

I recently managed to have a brief phone conversation with Paul Bickers himself, and he confirmed that it was indeed the original Timelord that he banger raced.  Interestingly though, the theory I'd come up with that he obtained the car after filming the video for 3AM Eternal was incorrect - Paul tells me he was not involved with that and only obtained the car through one of his contacts in the film industry at a later date.  He did say that the car was scrapped after the meeting (unsurprisingly) and that was the end of Timelord.  Paul was however also involved in building the smaller Yank that was raced by Jimmy Cauty at Wimbledon - and I think that might be the car that got taken back to his yard in Norfolk, giving rise to the rumour that Timelord had survived. 

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30 minutes ago, sierraman said:

Has anyone actually just ring him up and asked what happened to it and if he’s still got it?

I'm sure someone here did speak to Paul a while back. IIRC he didn't even remember racing Timelord until he was reminded, so it's very unlikely he still has anything related to it. Seems most likely this was the second car, which Cauty apparently dumped at Pinewood after the 3AM Eternal shoot, and Paul acquired it from there.

EDIT: beaten to it by datsuncog!

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