This ultra low-mileage, mint condition 1958 Studebaker Champion was bought as a honeymoon gift - but the wedding never happened.

A classic car is back on the auctioneer's block, with a mileage so low it would make your granny green with envy.

For the first time since 1993, a much-coveted, hardly driven surf-green 1958 Studebaker Champion is looking for a new owner who will neither drive it nor do it up.

The rock'n'roll-era saloon has clocked up just 74 miles (116 kilometres) since a Wellington plumber bought it straight off the United States production line as a honeymoon gift for his wife-to-be. But the wedding didn't take place, and kept the car stored in mint condition as a monument to the bride who never was.

MURRAY WILSON/ FAIRFAX NZ In 58 years, the Studebaker has racked up just 74 miles.

In 1984, it was sold to Lower Hutt car dealer Tony Edwards who, a year later, flicked it on to a Timaru firm. By the late 80s it was on display at Queenstown's Motor Museum.

But it was in 1993, when it sold to a consortium of seven Wellington businessmen, that the Studebaker really made its mark, going under the hammer at auction house Dunbar Sloane.

Among that magnificent seven were Robert Muldoon's former lawyer, and future chief justice of Tonga, Tony Ford and financier Bernie Vanston.

ALEXANDER TURNBULL LIBRARY The car outside Dunbar Sloane's downtown Wellington auction house in 1993 - the last time it was up for sale.

Ford got into the deal on the day of the auction at the Southern Cross Hotel, where he and wife Valda had driven to buy burgers for the family.

Ford bumped into Vanston, whom he knew from the Wellington bowls circuit, as the syndicate were deciding on their stakes in the Studebaker. One member pulled out and Vanston asked Ford if he was in.

Ford went next door, where Valda was buying the burgers, asked her for the chequebook, and wrote Vanston a cheque for $6000.

When he got back in the family car, his wife asked him what he needed the chequebook for. "I almost got the burgers thrown at me," he recalls.

To preserve the Studebaker's value as a low-mileage rarity, a spokesman for the syndicate said at the time: "The car shall never be driven – shall never be allowed to be driven."

Over the years, the syndicate's members peeled off and passed away, and the car is now owned by Ford's and Vanston's adult children.

At 74, Ford has retired and is about to set off for a European rail trip with his wife. But he said the main reason behind the decision to sell was because the Wairarapa mechanic and Studebaker fanatic who has kept the car box-fresh for the past 23 years was selling his house.

The car was put up for auction through Turners Palmerston North on Trade Me on Friday night, and will close on July 18.

Turners office manager Leanne Ranson said it had already attracted considerable interest, given the market for untouched classic cars.

"It's priceless, absolutely priceless. It's got the original patina and hasn't been tampered with or restored."