Interview- Vic Spiteri
I had come to know John Rundell and Vic Spiteri (2 names with a great association with classic Jaguars) while competing in tarmac rallies in South Australia and Tasmania and found them to be good intelligent company as well as great racers, so back in 2003 or thereabouts while organising a Jaguar team for the AROCA six hour race at Eastern Creek I invited the couple from Melbourne to form a part of our otherwise NSW team. So they drove up and joined us which was a typically generous thing for them to do. I can certainly vouch for that as John and I were teamed up with me driving John’s XJS for several hours of the race. They were laps never to be forgotten. Vic as usual worked quietly as crew for John and for anyone asking advice. At the end of the weekend one of our NSW guys commented to me “ that was a great weekend Toddy, I’m sorry that Vic didn’t make it!” “What do you mean” I said “you’ve been talking to him all weekend - he’s the guy over there in grey overalls!.” Vic is a quiet man who doesn’t blow his own trumpet but he is a mighty presence in the Jaguar restoration world. He and son Andrew who mans the office at V&A Spiteri are always generous with their time and advice, which is why, like me, their legions of customers feel they are friends, not clients. And so I thought it was time to ask a few questions of my friend Vic Spiteri. Here’s the result: B: Vic, let’s begin at the beginning...I know you’re 100% Aussie, but were you born here? V: I was born in Malta November 1941,during some of the heaviest bombing raids by the German and Italian air forces ( London 57 days & nights, Malta 154 days & nights ) Bombing raids started in Malta, June 1940 to August 1944.
V: As a kid ,I was fascinated with all things mechanical and electrical. My mother’s three brothers and brother in law were motor mechanics and ran a garage in Malta just down the street from Grandma’s, so I spent a lot of time there. As a seven year old and beyond I loved playing around with bulbs, switches and
batteries, making up all sorts of working circuits, like stop lamps on my billy-cart. Old wind up type alarm clocks served as mock up speedometers for the billy-cart also, after removing the minute hand and the clock’s escapement mechanism. My fiddling with electricity went beyond batteries when I built a device using a 240 volt bulb a magnifying glass and few pieces of tin fitted into a box so I could project sections of discarded film found behind our local picture theatre. I have no idea why I was never electrocuted. This “fiddling” went on to my later years,with such gadgets as fitting a spark plug 8 inches from the end of the exhaust pipe on the old FJ,connected to a secondary ignition coil controlled by a switch on the dash. The 18 inch flame out of the exhaust pipe was very impressive at night in Lygon street or any other High street when the accelerator was lifted and the secondary coil switched on. This and other mods and gadgets was a bit of an earner fitting it to mates cars.
We migrated to Australia in 1949,arriving a few weeks before Christmas 1950 on an Italian registered ship which was destined for scrapping on it’s return. The voyage was not short of problems, mechanical and personal, with the Maltese passengers and the Italian crew ready for a fight. It was just a few years after the war. B: What was your education? V: My education was Primary school and then Technical school. B: Did you fiddle with stuff as a kid? Break your toys to see how they worked? PAGE 36
Vic at Rob Roy hillclimb
THE OFFICIAL MONTHLY MAGAZINE OF THE JAGUAR DRIVERS CLUB OF SA
