Which Car Do You Remember with Affection from your Youth?

[Piemaster]

I still find that beautiful even although I like modern cars. Always fancied a Triumph Stag too although I know they had engine problems and a lot of people fitted the Rover engine to them.

My second car - Stag with a Rover V8. I saw it again a couple of years after I sold it and the guy had swapped the engine again for a straight 6 Triumph engine (TR6 possibly?)

[QUOTE 5107441, member: 45"]It looks great but it's a truly rubbish car. Poor handling, underpowered, dodgy engine, unreliable, rusty.

The GT6 was a better car, or the Dolomite Sprint, or the Vitesse.[/QUOTE]
It wasn't that bad, and it wasn't a 'sports' car - just get the top down and cruise...
As for the rust - I had a mate with a Sprint. The headlights were held in with a bucket of filler. Engine was fine, but to demonstrate my taste in cars I owned both the Stag and a TR7 with a dolly sprint engine in it at the same time.
The TR7 biggest failing was the lack of a V8 in from the launch. Far too heavy for the original engine.

There was a W109 Merc saloon in there somewhere along the way too. And a Vauxhall VX2300. And a Mk.4 cortina. Just a consequence of working away a lot and buying whatever I came across first with an MOT to last a few months.

 

[Levo-Lon]

My father's second car was a Renault 750 (4CV in France). It was red to start with, then turned mustard (I cannot remember whether sprayed or brushed). We kids had to slide from side-to-side in the back to thump the door pillars in order to help the semaphore indicators to rise to the task.
[stock pic]
View attachment 390536

That's a very pretty car

 

[Blue Hills]

I had a Marina 1.3 Coupe, an Ital 1700 and an Ital 1700 Estate; none gave any trouble.
In fact I had lots of BL cars - Mini van, Austin 1800, Montego Estates x 2, Maestros x2, Ambassador and Marinas x 3. They all gave good service.
Sometimes I think it's just fashionable to knock them; mostly by folk who have never owned or driven any of them.

ah, so you are the perfect person to educate me. A friend's dad had an Ital. I gather that some Italian outfit had a hand in styling/upgrading the Ital from the standard Marina, but on a casual kid-look I was lost as to what the difference was. What was it?

 

[Levo-Lon]

I had a couple of Series 1, 3 litre Ford Granadas.
One in yellow, one in white
I managed to figure out a way of removing the inlet manifold & carb intact, without removing the distributor - so as not to disturb the ignition timing.
Believe me when I tell you that this was tricky - to the point of my having chinagraphed a couple of lines across the the bulkhead / firewall, delinating how it could be done again, for future reference....

Starter motor removal on a Scimatar in situ was something i was proud off..
Although replacing a coil spring on my cortina that was held compressed with welding wire while i put it into the wishbone was probably the most scary..

 

[Illaveago]

I've always liked the big Healeys especially in cream and metallic blue.

 

[Levo-Lon]

ah, so you are the perfect person to educate me. A friend's dad had an Ital. I gather that some Italian outfit had a hand in styling/upgrading the Ital from the standard Marina, but on a casual kid-look I was lost as to what the difference was. What was it?

Headlights and it rusted faster

 

[Levo-Lon]

Now when we talk of rust anyone have a Lancia Beta hpe?

 

[NorthernDave]

ah, so you are the perfect person to educate me. A friend's dad had an Ital. I gather that some Italian outfit had a hand in styling/upgrading the Ital from the standard Marina, but on a casual kid-look I was lost as to what the difference was. What was it?

Headlights and it rusted faster

New badges too!

Now when we talk of rust anyone have a Lancia Beta hpe?

My uncle had one - great to drive apparently, but the only car you could actually see disintegrating before your eyes

 

[Dirk]

ah, so you are the perfect person to educate me. A friend's dad had an Ital. I gather that some Italian outfit had a hand in styling/upgrading the Ital from the standard Marina, but on a casual kid-look I was lost as to what the difference was. What was it?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morris_Ital

 

[screenman]

Now when we talk of rust anyone have a Lancia Beta hpe?

Yep, Loads of them, I had a time buying every p/ex the largest Fiat/Lancia garage in the country took in.

 

[Blue Hills]

[QUOTE 5108097, member: 45"]My dad had a white Marina with a vinyl roof. Vinyl seats as well, which wasn't great for a 5-year-old boy in shorts on a summer holiday.

[/QUOTE]
That was normal in cars up to about then. I well remember my young flesh being fried even in North West coastal resorts. Seem to remember the wondrous marketing word "leatherette" - ie plastic. At least you grew out of shorts, imagine what it was like for women. Can't help but think a few cads had fun with this.

 

[pplpilot]

On iplayer.

Ford's Dagenham dream.

'Documentary which tells the story of a dream of happy families on wheels that the Ford Motor Company brought from Detroit to Dagenham, then sold to Britain.'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00j0gnm

 

[Levo-Lon]

Flipping monkeys at Woburn soon sorted my vinyl roof out..
Popular in the day
It was like a sail on the way home

 

[Tim Hall]

I'm pretty sure that the 16 and the 4L weren't the only models to feature the odd-leg wheelbase.

The Renault 6 had torsion bar rear suspension, so I'm guessing it too had odd legs, as well as the dash mounted gear lever. We had one, with a mighty 850cc engine, which transported Mum, Dad and us three kids all over the place. Dad molished a small step that sat next to the accelerator pedal, so he could rest his foot at a steady 50mph.

 

[screenman]

Beaded seat covers, they saved you having to shave your legs.