Treasure trove of classic car parts worth more than £1m unearthed

We’ve all heard of barn finds – cars that have been squirrelled away ready for discovery many years later, dusty and in need of love. But Coys auction house has unearthed a ‘container find’ – a huge collection of ultra-rare car parts – and it’s putting them up for auction at its Blenheim Palace sale later this month.

The parts come from a private collection and include valuable spares from mainly Italian manufacturers, including Ferrari, Maserati and Abarth.

Coys has spent the past few days combing through the container, cataloguing parts and attempting to place a value on them, and Chris Routledge, the auction house’s managing director, told of their incredible condition, with many still in their original packaging.

“Something of this scale and with the importance and rarity of the cars they are related to is unprecedented,” he said. “We are looking at at least £1 million-worth of spares, probably more, and I have never seen anything like it.”

He added: “It’s an Aladdin’s cave which is going to excite people all over the world. There are wire wheels in their original wooden boxes, carburettors in their original oiled wrapping paper, exhaust pipes, radiator grilles, dashboards – the list just goes on and on. It will take us several days to catalogue the parts and once we have done that we will issue a full list of the spares.”

Routledge said: “I feel a bit like Howard Carter uncovering Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922. Every time we remove one box or item there is something else of huge interest hiding behind.”