I do not often agree with Udolahr but this time I do when he says that it is not correct to name a newly built car a Bugatti. Everyone is free to purchase or build a replica as long as he does not put a Bugatti badge on the radiator and tells the outside world that it is a real one made in 1928 as most of these owners do.
The fact that a real Bugatti has become so expensive is no excuse for calling a replica a Bugatti!!
Most people in the Historic car world agree that the chassis carries the identity of a car. Any car not built on a Molsheim produced chassis should be called a replica. This means that the usual myth of building two original cars out of one is just that, a Myth.
Bugwrench

But Udo- Why is a pursang replica any different than that Type 5 thing or whatever it's called that you are involved in?

like you say , involved . 2 Type 5 replicas are made in England , not one was drivable.My part is to get it running and drivable . I did not know that the car was so bad made , I have to build so many parts to get the job done .
One big differend Type 5 to all the others , there is no original Type 5 . So to make a replica is OK . But it is a replica and will not have any wrong nameplate and no wrong papers .

Same meat. Different gravy.

You must be joking!
Mass produced bad look-a-like same meat as a one-off of a car that does not exist anymore? You seem to be missing the point.
Bugwrench

Personally I am involved in the build of the replica of the Bugatti Airplane. Few Bugattistes will object to that, as the original is well known, and will not ever fly again and this one will.

Still I am 100% aware of the fact that it is a replica.

However, please take note that it is not the same as with a replica of eg. the Mona Lisa; Da Vinci put all (well, at least most) of the brush strokes himself. With automobiles it is different; Ettore Bugatti did not (except for a few of the first ones) build the cars himself, he made the design (and for that, he also left most details to others!), then in the factory the car was build according to that design.

If at this day somebody builds a car to the same design, it is much more of a Bugatti than anything else. Of course there is a question of build quality, but that is a matter of degree, not principle.

Personally I like the approach of Terry Cook, who builds his own Bugatti-inspired automobiles with modern technology, and calls them Bugnotti. One can't be any clearer than that!

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www.BugattiPage.com
www.BugattiRevue.com
www.BugattiAircraft.com

Not boring, just that the same issue is addressed again and again.

It continues to interest me, and I have my own opinion, see also the post above. Generally I think that the consensus is (for most people, there always will be some exceptions) that Replica's are Ok as a way to live your passion for a marque, as long as you are honest about the provenance of the car.

Meanwhile, there is no real solution for people not being honest about this, maybe to have different classes in rallys and races, where all replica's have a "R" in front of their race or participant number, for everybody to see

Maybe that can be enforced by the classic car organisations in each country, or maybe by the EU? Let them do something useful in Brussels for once!

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www.BugattiPage.com
www.BugattiRevue.com
www.BugattiAircraft.com

I don't think that this is the meaning of the statement. But fact is that this or similar topics had been discussed over and over again, especially the definition of "original". Therefore I recommend to concentrate the discussion on the original topic which is the "mass production" in Argentina.

EDIT: Jaap was faster...

Exactly this is the paradoxon! Dishonesty starts already to get the thing on the road. By changing your behaviour later to honesty you admit an illegality....

This is why the english system of registration was better.It is better to accept built up cars,and register them as "built from parts" with a full inventory of what is old and what is new.Then nobody has to tell lies in order to get their car on the road,and everybody knows what the car is.With a new argentinian car the owners must always lie in order to get the car on the road,because the car is new it cannot comply with the current regulations for a new car.They are therefore unregisterable legally in most countries. The new english system is very much more difficult,I personally prefer the three out of five rule.Simple and effective.The new rules require 9 points out of 16.With 5 points being given to the chassis.As original chassis are very rare,it means that almost every other part must be genuine.

I wonder if I may approach this from a slightly different angle? I do not believe building a Bugatti today to be any less of an achievement than what the factory did in it's heyday. It is this ability to turn a heap of bits into a functioning vehicle that I admire most. Recently I watched a documentary about two workshops who took up the challenge to build a type of vehicle known as a low-rider. Cars that can hop, skip and jump is really not my cup of tea yet I enjoyed the program very much. Why? Skilled workmanship. I maintain that these people's efforts are noble, it is the fraudsters who should be hung drawn and quartered.

I am very much looking forward to the unveiling of Jaap's Bugatti plane, a functioning recreation of a one-off, non functioning aircraft is surely something to be celebrated. An utterly splendid way of appreciating the design without risking damage to an irreplaceable original. I of course am way too much of a coward to ever risk my life clambering aboard a balsa wood aircraft, but Jaap is made of sterner stuff and his courage will provide all of us with a wonderful experience.

But of course re-creating a lost one-off is no less admirable than building a new T35, but it is the replica T35 which might, depending on the lack of integrity of the proprietor, end up being fraudulently sold on as an original. And it is this oft-committed fraud which is the cause of so much unhappiness and the cause for so many, many legal battles. A case in point, the Atlantic who would be 57473 :

God I love this car! So very beautiful, so very elegant, so very talented her builders. Paul Russell builds beautiful cars, no doubt about that. But I have to admit the owner of this Atlantic confuse the heck out of me. This man has spent a fortune on this car in an effort to convince himself he is the rightful owner of 57473. Yet I have never heard anyone refer to this car as original, witness comments on this thread by contributor ScottieWilliams and those of Auntie Loch-Braiques, Copperkettle et al in a thread on the book forum, every last one of them absolutely slate this car, most calling it an outright fake. Which it is. Yet the owner is still at it, most recently getting Christian Huet to publish outright lies in an underwhelming booklet he authored. To what purpose I ask? I really cannot think of one, but if someone wish to write in and state this drivel convinced him of the true provenance of this car, then there will be a purpose I suppose. Anyone? Yes, me neither.

But God what a beautiful car.

As to the proliferation of Argentinean-built T35s I must admit I have feelings of extreme ambivalence, sometimes I think their efforts are to the detriment of original T35s, but then again, replica Cobra's have not diminished the history of a single original. I think. Like I said, ambivalent.

And finally, the many replicas at the Molsheim festival is merely a reflection of the organisers' values, I for one can certainly see the attraction of a track full of replicas being treated like dodgem-cars. Yet most people who actually attended last year's festival found it both boring and very expensive. Surely an event celebrating the efforts of the men from Molsheim should celebrate the cars built by them - in my opinion.

Kind Regards
Johan Buchner
Republic of South Africa

Welcome back Johan,You must have been on a long safari indeed to have saved up so much erudite comment.

I had to take a very long break, I did not like the person I became. Reading some of my old posts I realised I turned from a waspish humorist into an embittered character assassin.

Johan

Everything has a reason !
Maybe for some it is boring , but for sure , for some others it is very interesting .
About 3 weeks ago ,a man from france did visit me . He bought a originalT35 chassis with chassis number and papers for realy big money .The chassis was from an accident , front damage . Just guess what hapened . Maybe some allready know the story ?

Go on Udo finish the story?