Re: the Zat-modified Sprint Speciale and the Zat SSZ

["John Hertzman" <johnhertzman@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I would never claim to speak for Tom Zat, and it has been a while since I
thought I would have much good to say about him (or he, me) but I can offer an
opinion on the "Zatmobile" recently discussed, and particularly about the
thought expressed in Ben Ament's first post (in #484, "To bad the mods were
done, though. Can't be good for value.")

I saw what I believe is this car at Zat's place twice in the early eighties.
He told me a tale about it, most of which I found entirely believable and
reasonable, (and probably mostly true) and a second part which he later
emphatically denied having told me. The believable and reasonable part is that
he got the stock Sprint Speciale in marginal parts-car condition - the usual
faded paint, shot upholstery, mechanical mess, beyond economically reasonable
restoration and sale - and did what parts yards do, making his money back by
selling NLA trim and other parts to people who had good cars missing a mirror,
a radio blanking plate, an ashtray, a bumper segment, a wiper bracket, a door
winder escutcheon, or something else they couldn't find anywhere - and in the
end had a gutted hull of a Sprint Speciale while twenty or so eighty-point
Sprint Speciales had become ninety-point cars or better, with their
unobtainable missing parts replaced. It is a short hop from there to having
fun with the gutted hull and his choice of a yardful of Alfa mechanicals, with
no concours pretensions. It was stripped, light, hot, and freely altered. In
my opinion changing the silly business on the front fenders was a vast
improvement. It was the beginning of a very desirable, but very unoriginal
car, and I saw nothing "too bad" about his having done it. I thought it
admirable.

I never saw that car in a more finished state, but it would be a short jump to
finishing the car to taste in ways which would be totally incorrect,
absolutely inadmissible in an originality concours, but very nice: the
instruments with the best proportions and the best graphics, of those on the
shelf; one's choice of seats, upholstery materials, carpets, whatever. You
want a 1750? Why not? Spica? What does it matter if it isn't original? I am
quite sure that car (or just possibly its exact twin) is the car on eBay. And
it was, of course, an Alfa - customized, but nicely, and absolutely an Alfa.

Phase two (or three? Whatever.) was his development of the tube-frame race car
he calls the SSZ which, when I saw it in Baltimore, had a lot to do with
American dirt-track stock cars and little if anything to do with Alfas. At one
point it did have an Alfa V6 engine, later it had some oriental engine, both
undoubtedly tweaked with Zatian go-fast goodies with funny Zatian names. He
used his original Sprint Speciale (or another) as a plug for a set of
fiberglass molds to make a butchered version of the Bertone Sprint Speciale
body for his tube frame - a lot easier than thinking up, and executing, his
own. Any number of people had built road-race "specials", with foreign or
American engines, simple or sophisticated frames(e.g. Payne's '32 Ford rails
versus Ken Miles' space-framed "shingle") and rough or very finished bodies,
but I wasn't (and still am not) familiar with anyone other than Bill Devin
cribbing somebody else's work like that, and Devin did what I think was a much
better job. I did give a review of my opinion of the car in a newsletter, and
Tom didn't like what I wrote. Unfortunate, but it can happen sometimes if
someone is frank. He doesn't need me as a customer, and I don't need him as a
parts source, fortunately. If I had my choice of one of Zat's SSZs and Max
Balchowsky's deliberately crude 'Ole Yaller' I would take 'Ole Yaller' in an
instant; if I had my choice of Zat's original customized Sprint Speciale,
reasonably finished, or a stock Sprint Speciale in comparable condition, I
would probably take the Zat, because it was a lovely car, better than the
original in some ways. As always, YMMV.

John H.
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