Dirty cars - what collectors want

Cars like this have become a staple of the collector car auction circuit.

"There's usually a 'barn find' car at ever high end auction," said Kieth Martin, publisher of Sports Car Market magazine, "and it's really important that it be dirty."

The dirt serves to accentuate the fact that this car is in, largely, its original state, said Hammers. It's a good candidate for what's called "preservation" rather than "restoration."

In other words, a buyer might simply clean it and perform any necessary repairs to get it running well, but that's it. There might be no attempt to fix the cracked paint around the gauges or to restore a showroom luster to the exterior.

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