Classics Worldの March 2021 の目次

The classic scene is a constantly evolving one, and that brings with it both opportunities and difficulties. Starting with the difficulties, these are usually more in the mind than rooted in reality. We’ve all been at events and heard somebody snort: ‘That’s not a proper classic!’ What they usually mean is that it’s not a car they are interested in, and of course they are perfectly entitled to have their own preferences. Personally I have a fairly relaxed attitude to the subject, and although we tend to focus on affordable cars from the 1950s to the 1980s in Classics, I love reading about cars from earlier and later eras too. Phil White’s regular Emerging Classic slot is always a highlight for me, and many of the cars he covers will…

The Renault Clio supermini – the company’s most successful model and best-selling French car of all time – has just celebrated its 30th birthday. The Clio was first shown in 1990 at the Paris Motor Show as a replacement to the successful and popular Renault 5, and went on to win European Car of the Year in 1991 where it was recognised for its 'remarkable styling, strong quality levels, generous cabin space and unprecedented equipment for a model of this size.' More than 15 million Clios have left production lines around the world over the last 30 years, with more than 1.2 million making their way to UK roads. By 1994, the Clio made up 49% of all Renault UK sales when a ‘phase 2’ arrived featuring subtle styling tweaks…

One-time king of the fast lane and darling of the company car park, the BMW 3-Series E36 has been named the top affordable car of the 1990s by readers of Car Mechanics Bargain Cars. The bargain Beemer was voted into the top slot by followers of Bargain Cars on Facebook and Instagram, narrowly pipping the Mazda MX-5 into top spot. The MX-5’s arch-rival, the MGF, took third, ahead of the Jaguar XJ saloon. Other 1990s icons on the list included the Ford Mondeo, BMW 5-Series E39 and Alfa Romeo 156, along with the boy racers’ favourite – the Citroën Saxo. But more unusual cars also got a look in, with the quirky Fiat Bravo and Brava twins putting in an appearance in the final top 10, proving that enthusiasm for…

MY MOTORING LIFE IN MODELS Over the years I have tried to collect diecast models of all the cars that I have owned. I am missing some, such as the Herald 1200 estate, Morris 1300, Ford Scorpio in the correct scale, Vauxhall Senator 24 valve (represented currently by a Carlton GSi), three Kia Sorentos (but I do have photos of those) and the current Sorento in the correct scale. I also have a photo of an Alvis TA14 drophead which represents the car I learned to drive in. I had several Mk1 and Mk2 Granadas and several Scorpios over the years, including two of the 4x4s. Currently I own a 2015 Sorento and a 1978 Midget 1500. The size I prefer (to match the majority) is 1/43. Where possible the…

Top Gear loves Lancia – what a bombshell that was back in 2010 when the superannuated schoolboys devoted a considerable amount of airtime to an effectively defunct Italian make of car. In fact, Lancias had really been Fiats since the end of the 1960s, the last hurrah of the era being the Gamma launched in 1976. My personal experience of the marque stretches back to about 1979, when I was working at a weird and sometimes wonderful car and motorcycle dealership. This now long-gone business had started life as a sort of glorified tat emporium based in a group of rickety buildings on the side of a hill. If you knew where to look you could buy anything from a broom handle to a Bentley MkVI, the one thing they…

CM: Perhaps you could start by telling us how you first become involved with Karmann Ghias? Mark Poulton: I had grown up with VWs from my father's side, and so naturally enough I started out in 1976 driving a 6v Beetle. After nearly 10 years and a couple of Beetles, I thought it would be nice to have something a little bit different, and a Karmann Ghia seemed the logical progression. This would have been around 1985 and I actually looked at both types of Karmann Ghia, including two Type 14s that were close to me but both of which were horrendously rusty despite being only 13 years old at the time. The sellers wanted around £1000, and didn't agree with my assessment that the cars were probably only worth…

In some ways, the twin histories of Bond and Reliant follow remarkably similar paths. Lawrence ‘Lawrie’ Bond designed his three-wheeled Minicar aimed squarely at those struggling to buy their first car or wishing to move up from a motorcycle and made a deal with Sharps Commercials Ltd of Preston to build it from 1948. Meanwhile, down in Tamworth, Tom Lawrence Williams was also targeting the bargain basement end of the market, having registered his first three-wheeled delivery van under the Reliant name in 1935, and introduced the Reliant Regal three-wheeled car in 1951. Both marques later went on to produce larger and more sporting offerings alongside their three-wheelers, Bond with their Triumph-based Equipe from 1963 and Reliant with their Sabre introduced in 1961 and the more familiar Scimitar family from…

Martyn Morgan-Jones Contributor Martyn has been passionate about classics ever since he joined the Imp Club back in 1981 and has owned around 15 Imps over the years. If money were no object he’d love to own a 1972 Porsche 911S, an Austin-Healey 3000, a Renault 8 Gordini – and another Stiletto! MY FLEET 1969 SUNBEAM STILETTO OWNED SINCE: 1986-1996 and again since 2010 1983 DAVRIAN MK8 OWNED SINCE: 2000 1989 PORSCHE 944 TURBO OWNED SINCE: 2018 2000 JEEP GRAND CHEROKEE OWNED SINCE: 2018 Having recently treated the 944 Turbo’s transaxle to fresh oil, I decided that it would be sensible to change the engine oil as well. It’s only done about 2000 miles since the last change, but some 15 months or so have elapsed. Plus, since changing the…

Will Armston-Sheret Contributor Will has a collection of Morris Minors. This column follows the maintenance and modification of them for daily use, as well as the long-term restoration of a 1950 Lowlight Tourer from a desert scrapyard in America and a 1970 Morris Van which has been in his family for nearly 40 years. MY FLEET 1950 MORRIS MINOR LOWLIGHT SALOON OWNED SINCE: 2012 1950 MINOR LOWLIGHT CONVERTIBLE OWNED SINCE: 2017 1967 MINOR SALOON OWNED SINCE: 2010 1970 MINOR VAN OWNED (BY MUM) SINCE: 1980 Dad has put me to work on the family’s 1969 Morris 1000 van. It feels a bit of a busman’s holiday, going from bodywork prep on the 1950 Lowlight tourer to bodywork prep of the van – it would be nice to do something mechanical…

It’s often difficult to tell whether a car has actually been looked after, or superficially maintained to look good and tick a box in the service book. In our case there is no service book, but going by looks, the new-looking air filter pointed out in the last issue didn’t tell the full story. Neither did the fresh coat of grease on the two bonnet-release mechanisms, though they can seize, so we’re not ungrateful for them being lubricated. The pollen filter gave the game away as to the thoroughness of any previous servicing because it was filthy. I don’t really know why this was neglected, as it’s accessed via the passenger footwell and only requires a selection of crosshead and hexagonal screws to be undone. It’s a little fiddly to…

Northern Irish rally driver Patrick ‘Paddy’ Hopkirk MBE is among the first of just 100 customers in the UK to receive the MINI Paddy Hopkirk Limited Edition, named in his honour to commemorate his triumph at the 1964 Monte Carlo Rally in the classic Morris Mini Cooper S Mk1. When asked what the special edition means to him, Paddy said: 'I’m so flattered to have a MINI named in my honour. Motorsport is long behind me now and for my win at the Monte Carlo Rally to be remembered in this way is a great thrill and honour. The designers have done a wonderful job. They’ve got a lot of the features on it just like the classic Mini which I took to victory, with the number 37, the bonnet…

Aston Martin is returning to Formula One in 2021 for the first time in over 60 years. Better known for its achievements in sports car racing, Aston Martin also has a fascinating Grand Prix history. The first Aston Martin Grand Prix car, commissioned by Count Louis Zborowski (a fabulously wealthy son of a Polish Count and an American heiress) debuted in 1922 at the 2.0-litre French Grand Prix in Strasbourg, but the untimely death of Zborowski in 1924 signalled the beginning of the end for Aston Martin’s first foray into top flight motorsport. The 1950s saw a return for Aston Martin to the Grand Prix circuit, the DBR4 being tested as early as 1957, although it was not until May 1959 that the car made its competition debut at the…

December 27th, 2020 marked 75 years since serial production of the Volkswagen Beetle began. The model had originally been planned as a prestige project of the National Socialists, but from 1939 onwards the Wolfsburg plant had produced armaments instead of vehicles, and up to the end of WW2, only 630 units of the model – which had been renamed KdF-Wagen in 1938 – left the Volkswagen plant. It was only after the British Military Government had assumed trusteeship in June 1945 that the unique success story of the VW Beetle began The British intended to use the Volkswagen Type 1 to perform urgently needed transport tasks within their occupation zone, and it was this British pragmatism that finally protected the plant against impending demolition. Senior Resident Officer Major Ivan Hirst…

It seems to be a long time ago that I was head-hunted to the design/ development area of Chrysler UK, eventually to run a big department covering what was titled Road Proving. That meant submitting prototypes to all manner of indignities before signing them off for production. However, this column isn’t about the routine, the meetings, the reports or the endless trundling around proving ground surfaces, but rather it is about the odd occasions when my eyebrows were well and truly raised. The most interesting project was to drive prototype Avenger GTs and Chrysler 180s all the way down to the southern tip of Italy and back in high summer – think of staying overnight in Reggio di Calabria (the ‘Big Toe’ of Italy, if you get my drift), and…

“In 1961, the E-type pretty much set the motoring world on fire with excitement” I find it hard to believe that we are about to celebrate 60 years since the launch of the Jaguar E-type, the car that Enzo Ferrari was reputed to have said was the one car he wished that he had built. In 1961 when Jaguar announced the E-type, it pretty much set the motoring world on fire with excitement. In fact it is probably true to say that never before or since has such an aesthetically beautiful yet radically new car design been created. So I was over the moon when I recently had the chance of comparing 77 RW – the very first 3.8-litre E-type Roadster – with HDU 555N, a Series 3 V12 roadster…

I’ve said before that once you start digging into a project car, the one thing you can be certain of is that things will get a whole lot worse before they start getting any better. We had already seen a nearside sill repair balloon into new inner and outer sills on both sides of the car, plus all the concomitant repair work around the wheelarches and A-posts. We also found some past damage to the front panel, and decided the best way forward would be to replace this entirely and effect any other repairs that this process revealed. This quickly grew into removing the engine and gearbox, which proved to be a blessing in disguise as it revealed a number of mechanical issues to be addressed, not least the fact…

Mike Taylor Contributor Mike is based in Australia and although his Stag and E-type have both been restored to a very high standard, both of them still require regular maintenance. MY FLEET 1965 E-TYPE JAGUAR OWNED SINCE: September 1986 TRIUMPH STAG OWNED SINCE: 2004 Prompt action by both federal and state governments here in Australia has enabled the country to minimise the spread of COVID, and after the initial Queensland lockdown restrictions stopped the spread of the cases that were active prior to lockdown, the local government could take steps to gradually relax the regulations so that groups such as car clubs could organise runs with limited numbers and have a picnic in open spaces. I have therefore been able to take the Stag on a number of outings, and…

FORD ESCORT STEERING JUDDER Q I have a 1973 Ford Escort 1100 with front drum brakes. When braking, I am feeling a judder which comes up through the steering column. This is quite a severe judder, and although it is felt when braking, I am not convinced it is due to a problem with the brakes. The shoes are in good condition and the cylinders are free. I have dusted out the drums and ensured that the contact points on the back of the shoes are greased, but this has had no effect on the judder. Patrick Parsons A Like you, I am not fully convinced from your description that the origin of the judder is in the brakes. A distorted brake drum can give an uneven brake and that…

In the last issue of Classics, we followed P&K Thornton Restorations stripping a 3.8-litre XK engine from an XK150S. The time required to properly reassemble this engine, once any machining has been completed, can easily take around two working weeks (80 hours), which makes it impractical to follow, so we asked SNG Barratt to demonstrate the main stages of reassembly on one of their test engines that is frequently stripped and rebuilt. Our photographs and 44 steps over the following pages provide an overview of what’s involved, but remember this is quite a complicated engine to assemble. For instance, it’s important to know how to time it up. The timing marks on these Jaguar engines can be found in one of three positions. Early engines had timing marks on the…

Getting into the classic car scene for the first time can be a bit like getting on the property ladder – not so bad to move up and down once you are on it, but very difficult for a newbie to get started. It doesn’t help that prices for iconic classics such as Jaguar E-types and MkI Ford Escorts have gone stratospheric in recent years, with headline figures for those pulling other stalwarts of the classic scene such as Triumph TRs and MGAs up in their wake – it wasn’t that long ago you could buy a TR4 or TR6 on the road for well under £10,000, but now the best dealer cars are going for £30,000 and above. The knock-on effect of this has been huge. Until recently, MGBs…

Jaguar is marking the 60th anniversary of the E-type sports car in 2021 with the introduction of a new limited-edition 575PS, V8, supercharged F-Type Heritage 60 Edition. Just 60 examples of these all-wheel drive sports cars will be available, and the commemorative specification includes solid Sherwood Green paintwork (an original E-type colour that hasn’t been offered on a new Jaguar since the 1960s) and extended duo-tone Caraway and Ebony Windsor leather interior trim which isn’t normally available on the F-Type. The new limited-run model also features a unique aluminium console finisher inspired by the E-type’s rear-view mirror casing, the E-type 60th anniversary logo embossed on the headrests of the lightweight performance seats and E-type 60 badging shared with the limited-edition E-type 60 Collection vehicles announced by Jaguar Classic last year.…

1100/1300 FRONT WINGS Price: various The 1100 Club has taken the original BMC factory front wing tooling for the 1100 and 1300 range and put it back to work producing new panels. The new panels are the culmination of two years' work, prompted by David Kingerley of Longbridge Motor Spares kindly donating the wing tooling he’d acquired when taking over spare parts company Earlpart. At that point it wasn’t known if the tooling could be salvaged as it had been stored outside for a long time, but the club managed to find a traditional family-run engineering firm to painstakingly clean it up and put it back to work. The wings are now available to purchase, either as complete panels or in sections, with hefty discounts for club members. Email info@the1100club.com…

My British chums might react with a less than polite response if I suggested that you should be grateful for roundabouts. However, hear me out. The car accident death rate here in British Columbia is more than twice as bad as it is in the UK, with seven automotive-related deaths per 100,000 people, compared to 2.58 in the UK. For comparison, most of Canada has five deaths per 100k, and the USA has 10 – worse than Azerbaijan. And much of that death toll is down to having crossroads instead of roundabouts. When I first arrived here 15 years ago, it struck me that the number of cars you would see upside down after accidents was bizarre. That just doesn’t happen in the UK. Think about the accident scenes you’ve…

Choose from over 300,000 parts and accessories from the world’s largest independent manufacturer and supplier of classic Jaguar car parts. SNG Barratt is trusted and valued by Jaguar owners all over the world with branches in the UK, France, Holland and the USA. Whether it is a classic Concours saloon, restoration project or a modern everyday family car, SNG Barratt has an unrivalled range of parts that span vehicles from 1949 through to current models. SNG Barratt is in a league of its own, manufacturing thousands of parts that are no longer available anywhere else in the world and safeguarding the future of many historically important vehicles. Step inside the factory and you will see original tools from a bygone era recreating replacement parts from original drawings with painstaking detail.…

In the 1970s and 1980s, some special edition cars were a clever means of clearing an obsolete product from showrooms by way of adding fog lamps, vinyl roofs and a MW/LW radio to the specification. Other special editions fall into the category of ‘agreeable enough but now almost forgotten,’ such as the Ford Fiesta Sandpiper or the Vauxhall Cavalier Command Performance. There is a third category too, as exemplified by Peter Cobb’s MGB Limited Edition Roadster, which marked the end of a long-running model with style and distinction. The sales copy informed prospective buyers that ‘Two are being acquired by the BL Heritage Collection. The remaining 998 are being offered for sale to members of the public.’ Compared with the standard MGB, the Limited Editions boasted Stag-style alloy wheels (convertible…

Peter Love Contributor Peter Love is Kelsey Media’s group editor-at-large. He created its tractor and commercial vehicle titles starting with Tractor & Machinery some 25 years ago. However, he is also a keen steam and classic car owner and loves working in his workshop on his Allards when time allows. MY FLEET 1948 ALLARD M DROPHEAD COUPE 674G OWNED SINCE: 2016 1949 ALLARD P1 SALOON 1517 OWNED SINCE: 2017 1949 ALLARD L OWNED SINCE: 2020 I have previously introduced my latest Allard, a 1949 Allard L four-seater, and started work on the back of it. Now, moving to the front, I replaced the black capless sidelight bulb and sorted the sidelight plastic holder out that had come dislodged from the main connector. Unfortunately, it still didn’t work! After a discussion…

Teng Tools offers hand tools in smart storage solutions for demanding professionals within the automotive, maintenance and engineering sectors as well as motorsport and classic enthusiasts who aspire to use the same tools as top mechanics across the globe. With close to 3000 products in the wide range, their tools have been developed to help you work more efficiently with ‘Typically Teng’ features on many products that have repeatedly earned top ratings for value and performance and numerous recommendations in the trade and consumer press. ‘Typically Teng’ features will help you work better, smarter and faster. See www.tengtools.com…

The hero of 25 novels, numerous short stories and two Hollywood movies, Jack Reacher is quite possibly the second-most famous literary hero on the planet. The brainchild of author Lee Child, he combines a loner’s mystique with intelligence, morality and the ability to demolish bad guys in more ways than most of us could imagine. Reacher is a household name, a classic American action hero and a byword in my home. ‘What would Jack do?’ we ask when facing a question or dilemma. The answer, when it concerns the Chrysler 300C, is: steal it from a now-dead would-be assassin, drive it to Los Angeles and use it as a battering ram to break into the headquarters of a company plotting to sell deadly weapons to a terrorist. ‘Reacher… started it…

VOLKSWAGEN This is not something you see every day – a Volkswagen splitscreen bus that corners like it is on rails! With just 30bhp from an 1192cc flat four engine, this one is never going to be an express train, but thankfully hauling wagons was never its purpose. We believe it must be one of 30 rail-going draisines that were built for Deutsche Bundesbahn (the West German railways) in 1955. And don't worry, we had to look it up too – according to Wikipedia, a draisine is 'a light auxiliary rail vehicle, driven by service personnel, equipped to transport crew and material necessary for the maintenance of railway infrastructure.' I can remember as a kid riding on a draisine at the Railway Museum in York, though to move that you…