Election of Club officers and directors is fast approaching. Those elected will take office in November, 2009. It is not too early for you to consider running for any officer position or as one of our board of directors. To qualify, you need to be a current member and have a desire to serve the club and its members.

Positions and Current Officers

• President – Justin Sarafin
• Vice President – Therese Dodge
• Treasurer – Richard Schwartz
• Secretary – Open position
• Board of Directors (four positions available) – Gary & Robyn Tyer

Volunteers

• Membership Chair – Shirley Dodge
• Historian – Open position
• Newsletter Editor & Web Master – Greg Magnus

The current officers have served on the board in some capacity for several years, and all of us can assure you it can be a very rewarding experience.

The number and quality of Club events as well as our long-term success is determined by our volunteer members. We will all benefit from new faces and fresh ideas to move our Club forward. Please consider serving our section and benefit from the people you’ll meet and the knowledge you’ll gain. Also, please consider contacting other members that you thing might be interested. The deadline for nominations is August 15, 2009; you can bring the nominations with you to our upcoming events or submit them using the contact form on this website. Your consideration of serving is appreciated.

MBCA CVA Board of Directors

The June 2009 MBCA Central Virginia Section newsletter has been published:
– Click here to read the newsletter.

In this issue…

• Shop Tour & Vineyards – July 26
• Summer Picnic – August 15
• Welcome New Members
• President’s Message

We look forward to seeing you at our next event, which is the July 26 Restoration Shop Tour and Vineyards visit.

Questions? Please contact us at your convenience.

Best Regards,
Greg Magnus
Newsletter Editor
MBCA Central Virginia Section

Greetings, Central VA Section Members:

Many of you have emailed to ask about our annual Tech Session at Brown Mercedes-Benz in Charlottesville.  Well, this was the first year it didn’t take place in a long, long time.  Unbeknownst to me, our dear friend and Service Manager, Julie Troyer, left the company in late 2008.  Her departure is a great loss to our section, as she did much to foster a continued relationship between the dealership and us.  She is succeeded by Service Director Mark Goyne.  Please drop into Brown to say hello to him and our friends on the sales floor if you find yourself on Pantops mountain.  We’ll need to work with him to put together a new and improved Tech Session once he and his team get settled into a routine and feel they can take on an extra weekend event.  Stay tuned.

After an incredibly busy winter and spring I recently had the pleasure of attending the President’s meeting held in conjunction with the National Board meeting and StarTech 2009, in Indianapolis.  As my second StarTech, and my first governing-body meeting on a national level, the meeting really opened my eyes to some of the issues of membership, changing demographics, and branding that face the club.  Read the rest of this entry »

Urbanna Picnic – Rappahannock River

On August 15, 2009 the MBCA Central Virginia Section invites our members and neighboring section members to join us for a wonderful day on the Rappahannock River. There will be boating, fishing (bring your rod), swimming, croquet, water skiing, tubing and of course fine dining and making new friends.

Provided: Fried chicken along with cole slaw, baked beans, ice tea, chips etc.. We are asking that everyone bring a desert or refreshments to share (soft drinks, wine or beer). Please contact event coordinators, Robyn or Gary at 804-358-8380 if you need more information.

RSVP – Pre-Registration Required: Please complete the registration form and mail it with your check to Robyn Tyer, 4308 Cambridge Rd., Richmond, VA 23221.

Read the rest of this entry »

Sunday, July 26, 2009 at 2 PM:  Restoration Shop Tour in Charles City, VA followed by a visit to New Kent Vineyards

Join shop owner Aaron Baze and the Central VA section for a behind-the-scenes tour of his newly-relocated restoration shop Classic & Sports Cars –Service, Parts & Restorations.  We’ll examine a 230SL in the process of being completely restored.

After the shop visit, we’ll have a tour and tasting at New Kent Vineyards (newkentvineyards.com).

Directions:  The shop is located in Roxbury Industrial Park, 606 Rt. 668, Suites G & H, Charles City, VA 23030 but is so new that it does not appear on maps.  The most scenic route from Richmond:

• Route 60 past the Bottoms Bridge turnoff
• Right on Route 106
• Cross the train tracks and swamp, go up the hill, Roxbury Industrial Park is on the left
• Turn left into the park, look for suites G & H

To sign up for this event, please email Robyn Tyer by July 21 at Tyers@comcast.net

A fellow enthusiast is restoring a 1959 Mercedes Unimog and he is looking for information concerning the vehicle. If you can answer his questions, please comment below.

Thomas Santoli asks:

I recently purchased a 1959 Mercedes Unimog 411.110 that I’m restoring, the truck was from the Staunton area.  I’m trying to research the truck and was wondering if any of your members know what, if any, dealerships in the area were around in the late 1950s or if anyone had heard of or seen the truck, they are pretty scarce in the US.  I’d appreciate any help available, thanks in advance for your time.
- Tom at Tlsantoli@yahoo.com

Any assistance an MBCA member can provide to Tom is appreciated – thanks!

Stuttgart – 2009 is a year in which Mercedes-Benz celebrates several anniversaries in the safety field: in August 1939 the safety pioneer Béla Barényi started his work in Sindelfingen. He invented for example the principle of the crumple zone, a trailblazing innovation which entered series production at Mercedes-Benz in 1959. With the help of its in-house accident research function, which was founded in 1969, Mercedes engineers in the following years have developed several groundbreaking innovations in passenger car safety. Now it is time for a look behind the scenes, and in this anniversary year, Mercedes-Benz is using the ESF 2009 research vehicle to reveal what its safety specialists are currently working on – with a time horizon that often extends well into the future.

The ESF 2009 is the first Experimental Safety Vehicle to be built by Mercedes-Benz since 1974. Like its historic predecessors, it illustrates trailblazing innovations in the field of safety and makes the progress achieved clearly visible. These amazing but by no means crazy ideas include inflatable metallic sections which give more stability to structural components within fractions of a second, as well as the so-called “Braking Bag”. This airbag housed within the vehicle floor is deployed when a crash is deemed to be unavoidable, and uses a friction coating to support the vehicle against the road surface. The ESF 2009 will be premiered on 15 June 2009, at the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV) Conference in Stuttgart. Read the rest of this entry »

Heimatfest – Something For Everyone

28 May -1 June 2009 | Birmingham, AL

This unique event staged by the Alabama and Peachtree Sections will feature so many activities that few people will be able to participate in all of them. Touring enthusiasts will have exhilarating drives upon lightly traveled roads to interesting sights each of the five days.

Destinations include racing go-karts, winery tour and tasting, the Talladega Motorsports Hall of Fame Museum, laps of the Talladega Track, a dramatic road to Mt. Cheaha, another breathtaking road along the longest and deepest canyon east to the Mississippi laced with unforgettable views of the canyon and beautiful waterfalls.

This will all be crowned with performance driver education and laps of the breathtaking Barber Road Course and visits to the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum with its unequaled collections of motorcycles (1300) and Lotus race cars (50+). Read the rest of this entry »

News from our National President, Pete Lesler:

The attendance for  the MBCA Section Presidents’ Meeting is far beyond our expectations! We have 52 sections represented with over 65 total in attendance.  This number is above and beyond the National Board Members.  We will have close to 100 people at the meeting.

The draft agenda for the Section President’s Meeting is below. The meeting will be held on Thursday, April 30, during the MBCA National Board meeting (Indianapolis, IN). Included are several presentations as well as break-out group discussion sessions.

Ed Johnson will act as our meeting Moderator.  National President, Pete Lesler will make the initial introductions. Following the lunch break, there will be 15 minute presentations on the following topics:

• Social networking to improve MBCA awareness
  - Greg Magnus
• Marketing and Branding Taskforce
  - Doug Dees
• FTP server, website developments and raffle update, zip codes
  - National Business Office (NBO, David & Renee)
• Newsletters
  - Stacy Rollins and Jim Luikens
• Selling ad space on your section website
  - John Pierkarczyk
• MBCA Online Forums
  - Chuck Landenberger

Based on the responses and the agenda items, we are looking forward to an informative and productive meeting where we can all network together for the common good of the club.