First off, let me introduce the car, for those who don't know it. It is a 1953 Allard Palm Beach 21Z, which my grandfather purchased at the Allard Motor Company's store in New York City.  It arrived from the U.K. in April 9, 1953. There were 84 Palm Beaches built (http://www.allardregister.org/allard-pb-mk1/), either with the 6-cylinder engine from a Ford Zephyr Mk1 or a 4-cylinder from a Ford Consul. There was one special-order car made with a Dodge V8. The Allard Register does a superb job documenting the Allard brand, including all of Sydney Allard's various models, so check out their site if you're interested!

Unfortunately, in 2002 my grandfather passed away. At that time, my mother inherited the car. I had now clue he had an old car, because nobody ever talked about it.  It sat in his garage for many years, so who knows the last time it had ran. My parents shipped the car from his residence in Massachusetts to where we lived in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida (coincidence, right?), and it went straight to a family friend’s shop, who specialized in Porsches and high-end cars. He worked on it for months, if not over a year. He would regularly call my parents to tell him this new thing he learned about the car, and that he found parts in different corners of the world. Many months, and several thousands of dollars later, my dad drove the car from his shop to our house. The moment I saw it, I fell in love with it. My dad and I would take it out most Sundays to get bagels from Panera, and just cruise around. The car always turned heads, despite being littered with dents. In fact, when my dad was driving the car home from the mechanic's shop, someone offered to buy it!  I'm glad he didn't sell it right then and there.

A couple years later, my dad's job moved us up to Cincinnati, Ohio. So the car was put on the back of a semi and shipped up north! During the warmer months in Ohio, we were still able to enjoy getting the car out, albeit less often than we did in Florida.  In 2012, my dad's job moved my parents back to South Florida, and the car went back with them. I was in college and whenever I went down to visit my parents, I tried to convince them to get the car out. One day, we were driving the car around the neighborhood, and it eventually got to the point where the clutch wouldn't release. Neither my dad nor I had much experience with cars, so we pushed the Allard back in the garage and figured we'd leave the problem for another day.

Well, a year or so later, my parents moved back up to Cincinnati, Ohio, and (again) the car went back on a trailer. The car sat in my parents' garage for a couple years, until I graduated college and was able to spend some time working on the car. That brings us to July 2016, less than a year ago from the time of this writing. The rest of this website is dedicated to documenting the process by which I am getting the car back on the road. The primary goal is to rebuild the clutch and brake systems, including completely new lines and new wheel cylinders. Additionally, I need to clean (de-rust) the fuel tanks and run new fuel lines.  I'd also like to get the sheet metal floor cleaned up and repainted, and I'll cut a new sheet of plywood for the floor.  Other projects might come up too, such as a *spoiler alert* transmission rebuild.

Thanks for checking out this site, and I hope you enjoy it!  If you have any feedback or have any questions, feel free to reach out to me through the Contact page.