Me & My Car: ’58 Triumph in Pleasant Hill will soon be well restored

The history of Britain’s Triumph cars goes back to 1885 when they, like a lot of early automakers, were in the bicycle business.

The TR3 from 1955 to 1957 was the basic open two-seater most of us are familiar with but offered a rear seat (for very small people) and a bolt-on steel hardtop. From 1957 through 1962, further improvements were made, and those models were unofficially known as TR3A and included a new full-width front grille, exterior door handles, a lockable boot (trunk) and standard front disc brakes.

The TR3A was the most popular of the TR models, selling 58,236 vehicles. With the standard 100-horsepower, 1991-cubic-inch, four-cylinder engine linked to a four-speed manual transmission with an unsynchronized first gear, this 50-year-old model is often seen in vintage racing today and is still competitive in the Sports Car Club of America E-production class.

The company was acquired by Leyland Motors in 1960 and became part of the giant conglomerate British Leyland (BL) in 1968, when the Triumph brand plus Rover and Jaguar were absorbed into BL’s Specialist Division. Sadly, the Triumph-badged vehicles were retired in 1984 and have remained dormant ever since. The rights to the Triumph brand are currently owned by BMW.

This issue’s featured car is a 1958 Triumph TR3A owned by Doug and Joyce Balderston, of Pleasant Hill. Doug Balderston told me the background.

“Dad (a physician) bought a practice in Montrose, Colorado. The practice grew, and he bought a new Triumph TR3 painted sky blue, Balderston said. “He kept it for a couple of years and then sold it. A few years later, while making house calls, he saw it in a yard just rusting away.

“This bothered him, so he bought it back, had it serviced and repainted, but this time, as a big (football) fan, it was painted Denver Bronco Orange. It was given to me as a college graduation present in 1966. A couple of years ago it needed some maintenance work and paint.”

However, the painter refused to paint the car Denver Bronco Orange, and apparently there was a heated discussion on the subject. Finally, Balderston got the painter to agree to paint the TR3A red, and it was pretty close to the factory red. That’s the positive part of this story. The negative part is that after the car was painted, the painter couldn’t put it back together.

To the rescue came David Sorrell, who was mechanically skilled but on Triumph motorcycles and not cars. Parts are everywhere and nowhere. Sorrell and the Balderstons refer to the TR3A as their puzzle car, but at least a puzzle has a box showing how it should look if completed correctly.

There were pieces of that car in four shops. Sorrell said that all the parts he got to work on the car would fit in a 1-gallon Ziplock bag. Parts were difficult to find, and the reproduction parts were of inferior quality. The car is still a work in progress, with about $50,000 invested, but it doesn’t need too much more. It looks good inside and out and runs well.

It has some unique features, including how to open the bonnet and boot (British terms for the respective hood and trunk). One needs a special wrench to operate those two things. The car has a heater, but one needs to open the bonnet and turn a small valve to let the hot engine water circulate behind the fire wall to heat the interior.

The rugged “side screen” windows are plexiglass framed with metal that bolts on the interior of the doors. Sorrell has worked on this car for about seven years, and the Balderstons hope to sell it when completed to someone who loves a well-restored roadster.

Have an interesting vehicle? Email Dave at MOBopoly@yahoo.com. To read more of his columns or see more photos of this and other issues’ vehicles, visit mercurynews.com/author/david-krumboltz.