Remembering Armand Weyer

    We never usually write about our F-Register members, but Armand Weyer was something very special.

    He was our oldest member by age, and he was my personal regulator.

    If I made any mistakes during the update, I could always count on Armand to ask if I had replaced the staff - the call was inevitable.
Armand passed away on Friday, January 26th, at the age of 87 and I will miss him very much.

    He was one of the friends you always find in our circles - you know each other by name and by face, you know that the other person is just as crazy and also collects VINs, but in these circles you don’t talk about it and if you do, it takes a long time until the ice is broken enough for people to exchange ideas.

    Our ice was broken, Armand was one of a maximum of a dozen for whom the “VIN exchange” was something completely normal.

    Armand was a pioneer! Imagine if Ferrari had taken up Armand’s idea back when he had his 550 S/N 111550 delivered new in Oro Chiaro Metallizzato?

    Today the “Special Historical Color” is an expensive option from the factory, and I remember that he, already over 60 years old at that time, snuck around like us young people and wrote down the VINs of the cars at the Racing Days with paper and pen.

    Today, in the age of high-performance digital cameras, when I see friends - and they exist! They still have their little notepads, and they always make me smile, and in the future, I will think fondly of Armand.

    Armand had taken part in every edition of the Cavallino Classic at the Breakers organized by Alicia and John Barnes, where he was honored with a dozen other people during the 25th edition.

    Not to mention his many appearances at the grandiose Pebble Beach gathering. And it was clear that you would meet him at the events at the Nürburgring or at the Circuit Spa-Francorchamps, both rather close to his Luxembourg home.

    During the 1998 Grand Prix of Luxembourg Michael Schumacher used Armand’s shuttle service during a short trip in Luxembourg City to the helicopter landing pad.

    As Armand had the tight schedule in mind, he drove accordingly fast and Michael Schumacher remarked that Armand should drive a little slower.

    He was also an active member and founder of the Fondation Lenoir (Mussy la Ville, former G.D. Luxembourg), which rebuilt a functioning replica of the original engine.

    Armand had a collection of over 300 books on Ferrari, which he bequeathed to the Lycée Belval library.

    And … a collection of cars beside the Maranello mentioned above:

400i Automatic        S/N 31639              1980-2010
412 GT            S/N 64607                    1986-1998
456 GT            S/N 98456                    1994-1998
550 Maranello        S/N 111550                   1998-2013
599 GTB Fiorano    S/N 154446               2007-2013
FF            S/N 184301               2011-2013

    The boys in heaven will be happy now, they have someone else to discuss with. Surely there is the equivalent of Ristorante Montana in heaven on the opposite side of the Via Abetone and I see il Commendatore sitting with all our lost heroes - a comforting thought.

 

A Remembrance
By Jim Weed

    I first met Armand Weyer at the Cavallino Classic in 2014. I didn’t realize at the time this short fireplug of a man was a giant within the Ferrari community.

    I next saw him at Pebble Beach, and he greeted me like an old friend.

    Standing with him was like having a walking encyclopedia by your side. He knew everybody and each car by serial number.

    He could recite the history and other details I had yet to learn.

    One of my cherished memories was driving him to the jet party at Cavallino several years later. It was not at the West Palm Beach airport but much farther south.

    The forty-five-minute drive was filled with stories and anecdotes of people who worked for Ferrari and the behind-the-scenes intrigue of the factory.

    Clearly, Armand had spent a lifetime learning about individual Ferraris and knew all who worked for, or had ever worked for, Ferrari.

    The Ferrari community has lost another great historian.

    As Matthias has commented, Enzo is holding court with all the great historians that have passed before.

    Gentlemen like Gerald Roush, Stan Nowak, George Carrick and Michael Lynch, are now joined with Armand Weyer discussing and sharing their knowledge.