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The odd, the rare and bizarre, car, bike or truck.
Last edited by: VxFan on Thu 15 Aug 13 at 21:30
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A dark red Jaguar MK IV with the big Lucas headlamps. It was being used on a shopping trip to Waitrose Surbiton.
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One of those shooting brake style recentish Ferraris. You know, the ones which look a bit like a Reliant Scimitar.
I'd never seen one before. Wowza. They've gone to the top of my lottery win garage wanted list. Odd for me, I don't usually lust after exotica.
Last edited by: VxFan on Wed 15 May 13 at 16:58
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Today, after finding an excuse to blow the cobwebs out of the old Prelude - it is still lurking here and making me feel guilty - I was passed in the opposite direction by a French-registered Vanden Plas 1100 or 1300. Remarkable, I thought.
Oddly enough, not 10 kilometres from here there's a UK-reg dead one lying on a garage forecourt with (the guy says) a blown gearbox. It's not even visibly rusty, although the suspension is down and the leather looks first class.
Last edited by: VxFan on Wed 15 May 13 at 16:56
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>> It's not even visibly rusty, although the suspension is down and the leather
>> looks first class.
>>
By the time the rust becomes externally visible on those things it's usually terminal, as they rot from the inside outwards. Rear subframe mounts usually go first, hotly pursued by the sills and heater plenum drains.
Badly worn leather upholstry is rare, as the leather usually outlasts the steel.
Blown gearbox would suggest it may be a rare automatic version. The manual 'box is fairly indestructible, but the auto also runs in the sump and is famous[1] for destroying its 3rd and top gear clutches fairly rapidly, especially if the astonishingly frequent oil and filter changes required by the auto are not religiously adhered to.
[1] I had an 1100 auto as a student. It slipped ferociously on 3rd upchanges.
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Following recent talk outside a pub close to Holmfirth, An Allegro Vanden Plas in brown and I think on an F plate. Looked in fair condition.
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Don't think Allegros would have seen an F plate. The suffix was 67-8, still in the era of the 1100/1300, and as a prefix it would be 89-90. Allegro production ran from 73 to 83/4, the last were Y suffix or A prefix. Possibly a P suffix?
Our school art teacher and his wife, who also taught there, won one of the first Allegros in the Yorkshire Post's 'Spot the Ball' competition. Presented in front of the entire school.
They didn't keep it long........
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Sun 19 May 13 at 12:33
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I was driving past so was a partial glance. It was a prefix plate as I was surprised that production had run on that long. I remember a neighbour having one when it was relatively new, about the time my dad had a new M prefix plate Simca 1100, the first foreign car on the street.
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>> I was driving past so was a partial glance. It was a prefix plate as
>> I was surprised that production had run on that long. I remember a neighbour having
>> one when it was relatively new, about the time my dad had a new M
>> prefix plate Simca 1100, the first foreign car on the street.
I think we're using prefix and suffix differently. The year indicator letter started in Jan 63 as suffix A. It lasted until 82-3 with the changeover moving from 01 Jan to 01 Aug in 1967.
The year prefix ran from A in 1983-4 until Y, Mar-Aug 2001 - two changes a year arriving in the late nineties.
A Simca 1100 as eg RPT 775M would have coincided with early Allegros as the BL model arrived towards end of 'L' suffix (1972-3) in Spring 73.
Simca was part of Chrysler Europe and the name changed to Talbot after Peugeot bought the operation in 1978.
My dad was also a foreign car pioneer with a Simca 1500 Estate in April 1966. Change of company policy, firms' cars were previously Vauxhall Victors.
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Sun 19 May 13 at 16:31
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On the A322, Bracknell to Bagshot, this morning I saw an immaculate Citroen SM. German plate and in a very attractive light brown/fawn colour which was called Brun Scarabee, I think. I owned one in the mid-70s but on balance I am glad I don't still have it.
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This morning, on a trailer heading back to its home at Pendine's Museum of Speed;
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babs_%28land_speed_record_car%29
I shall be down there over the weekend of 21/22 June with a few like-minded cronies, as "pit crew" for our friend's supercharged 1954 KHK Harley which he's running on the sands.
More details here;
www.pendinelrc.com/
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SWM saw a Nissan Leaf actually on the road in Stockport today. She had never heard of the thing before but said it looked quite pretty.
Surprised when I told her it ran on electricity but you needed a long cable or the plug would be pulled out when it got too far from the socket !
Gullible ??
Ted
Ted
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Did you know, oddly enough, that the word "gullible" doesn't appear in the Oxford English dictionary?
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Best buy a Chambers, then.
:)
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No lavatory humour. Thank you.
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>> Did you know, oddly enough, that the word "gullible" doesn't appear in the Oxford English
>> dictionary?
>>
What about this? oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/gullible
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I be reckoning Humph was having y'all on, which just goes to show how gullible some people can be.
:}
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Gullible: likely to believe anything and easily deceived by others. Not to be let loose in the real world without a responsible adult. Loved by car salesmen! :-)
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>> Did you know, oddly enough, that the word "gullible" doesn't appear in the Oxford English
>> dictionary?
>>
Does in mine.
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>> Did you know, oddly enough, that the word "gullible" doesn't appear in the Oxford English
>> dictionary?
>>
Hook, line and sinker.
Well done.
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>> >> Did you know, oddly enough, that the word "gullible" doesn't appear in the Oxford
>> English
>> >> dictionary?
Well, you learn something every day, thanks Humph. Said he, falling into the Humphmasters trap !
Ted
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>> www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKm5xQyD2vE
Why in .....
does that get a scowly?
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>>Why in .....
does that get a scowly?
My sense of humour Bromto, no arm meant though.
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>> Did you know, oddly enough, that the word "gullible" doesn't appear in the Oxford English
>> dictionary?
>>
it does ive just checked :)
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Car transporter outside local Vauxhall dealer offloading a load of new, unregistered cars.
It had Czech republic plates (CZ).
I can't believe they'd been driven all the way here, so I assume the Czech company undercut the price of any UK company.
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>> I can't believe they'd been driven all the way here, so I assume the Czech
>> company undercut the price of any UK company.
>>
Collected from the various Opel works in DE, with a load of BMW MINIs or somesuch to pick up here and go the other way?
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Lots here Tom, from various East European countries, contracted to certain makes importers/contractors.
Its not just cost, the shortage of home grown competent transporter drivers is starting to bite, and the recent changes imposed in some companies haven't worked out quite as they expected.
My old gaffers cast aside by the new wave could have told them that after a lifetime of experience, but the new breed already had all the answers, cars carefully delivered on calculators..;)
Car delivery cannot be done on the cheap, its been tried so many times over the years, it never works.
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>> Car delivery cannot be done on the cheap, its been tried so many times over the years, it never works.
In the fifties and sixties they used to drive them on the road. Once or twice got lifts from those drivers, in cars wih plastic and paper to protect trim, seats and carpets, and red-on-white trade plates attached crookedly with elastic bands.
I don't remember those drivers hammering the cars, but often saw them on the road going quite briskly, and the motoring press regularly got disapproving letters from people who had been overtaken by them at enormous speeds. Remember that new cars then were supposed to be run in carefully and progressively, starting with low cruising speeds and working up, but slowly.
Sometimes wonder now what those hard-driven examples were like in later life: clunkers or sweet-running, long-lived jalopies? I will never know.
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Wed 5 Jun 13 at 23:44
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Fern Green Morris 1000 Convertible [UAP 191] with a (new) black hood on the A38 near Ivybridge (Devon) this morning being driven by a white-haired lass wearing a baseball cap while her equally white-haired husband/partner was enjoying the view of the countryside.
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Tonight on the way home - four Bentley Mulsannes crossing Britannia Bridge on the A55 heading east - lovely looking plutocrat mobiles.....all had DK (Cheshire) plates...!
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Must be a lot of money about oop North then.
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There was a Supercar in front of them - superb exhaust noise - I would like to imagine it was that Bentley concept thing....you never know Ty Croes is very popular with the testing fraternity...
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All the Crewe press fleet and test cars have DK registrations - they do a surprising amount of lending out to journalists and potential customers for weekend jollies. Restaurant/hotel write-ups in glossy magazines etc.
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Driving home from the bike shop in the car along the A55 - busy with holiday traffic, my progress was held up by a mimsing craphound - the was a 6 series growing ever bigger in my rear view mirror so as soon as the mimser woke up and moved over I let the 6 past just before entering one of the three road tunnels on that road - turns out it was M6 - he let it off in the tunnel - yowling in delight...all the hybrid, blue crap drivers tut tutting to themselves no doubt.......long live petrol.
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Was at a car boot sale in a nearby village this morning - haggled with a guy for barn-find Honda 350 from about 1980 that would scrub up - when a rally of old motorcycles passed through. It was led by a Norton Dominator 88 that made me sigh and among the myriad old French putt-putt stuff was a guy on a Rudge, not an Ulster but a Rudge is a Rudge. And, bringing up the rear, to my amazement was a mint Ariel Golden Arrow, complete with its flyscreen and 'Ace' bars. I really can't remember the last time I saw one.
Last edited by: VxFan on Mon 10 Jun 13 at 01:07
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Parked in the street in the Arab quarter of Limoges this morning and looking very tidy for a French motor - a Rover Streetwise.
I thought they'd all crawled away in embarrassment.
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'Ere, what about this then?
This afternoon I popped into the local old car dealer, on a matter I'll tell you all about some other time which concerns a mint 1967 Fiat 500 with 16k kms that has come into my possession, when I spotted this...
www.flickr.com/photos/64660965@N03/
It's a Daimler DB18 Barker Special Sports from the early '50s, rare enough in any book. But this one was stored for years in a barn, until a church tower collapsed onto the building - I was told. It was then dug out with not too much damage and the bodywork was 'restored' so that, apparently, it could take part in some sort of theatrical production. A lot of the metal seems sound underneath but I reckon it's beyond economic restoration - they never did fetch huge sums.
The dealer, of course, wants a lot for it - this being France. But if you didn't restore it I suppose you could sit and read it on rainy days.
The Mk 2 in the background is a Daimler, too, a single bumper V8 250 and in absolutely lovely condition. Made me yearn for mine again.
Last edited by: Mike Hannon on Thu 4 Jul 13 at 16:11
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More of a odd sighting really - a plain white Mini Clubman with blanked out rear windows and a load space - an expensive van ?
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Do you mean the clubvan www.mini.co.uk/model-range/clubvan/
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That was it - I never knew they did one..
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>> More of a odd sighting really - a plain white Mini Clubman with blanked out
>> rear windows and a load space - an expensive van ?
>> Sounds awful.
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Might not be rare but I've not seen this colour before.
Passed a Fiat 500 Twinair. Two-tone paint. Cream over burgundy. Looked very smart.
Ted
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A Goddess and an SM next to each other near Waterloo station:
s1192.photobucket.com/user/alanovich/media/old%20cars/2013-07-06-361_zpsfdcd127e.jpg.html
tinyurl.com/lonhrr5
Last edited by: Alanović on Mon 8 Jul 13 at 15:39
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Nice paint job on that DS. If the panels were adjusted it would be well pretty.
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>>Nice paint job on that DS
Nice! - looks like bleed'n undercoat to me.
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>> looks like bleed'n undercoat
Exactly. Elegant.
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I'm sure you'd have approved of the moss on the roof, AC. Looks like it still chugs around in that condition, too. Although no sign of a tax disc.
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Ah yes, I know that location, roupell street.
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Bullseye. I started a pub crawl in the Kings Arms there. Nice little boozer. Nice little street.
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nice baker on the corner.
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Yes, I did spot that, maybe could have done with a nice bit of sponge cake to soak up the beer. Looked a bit on the posh side for me though, waited till we go to Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese before tucking into lunch, didn't want to waste beer space too early on. Sam Smith's Taddy Porter to wash down.
Last edited by: Alanović on Mon 8 Jul 13 at 16:21
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And there we have our separate philosophies in a nut shell. Mine is gastonomy and yours is a gut full 'o ale.
Edit, we'll have to meet half way for a pie and a pint.
Last edited by: Zero on Mon 8 Jul 13 at 16:27
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Time and a place for everything. An annual lad's pub crawl in London is no time to be discussing the merits of fine French pastries. That's for another day. Moderation in all things, dear chap. I shall be indulging in the significant gastronomic delights of fair France shortly, will barely be touching the ale. Couple of good glugs of wine though, I expect.
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>> Edit, we'll have to meet half way for a pie and a pint.
>>
Well played.
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Lovely old cars exhibited yesterday at Hollowell Steam and Heavy Horse Fair.
Mostly older British stuff including Ford Pops and Vauxhall Cresta, Velox and Viva from sixties. Two vey neat looking Renault 16's as well.
The Lad's last outing with the school's steel pans as well.
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I saw a tidy Renault 4 of 1961-1994 type, with the plate REN 4C parked at the side of the road today.
Maybe not unusual, but certainly uncommon - I thought they'd all rusted away.
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They're still all over the place here - more common in everyday use than 2CVs. There's even a racing challenge for them.
I even thought about it when my neighbour offered me his very low mileage van version - just to give my family a smile if I ever got it to England. But common sense prevailed.
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1930`s(?) Bentley in BRG, unsupercharged, 3 up on the ferry to Zeebrugge and later onthe motorway around Antwerp
Also an immaculate Amphicar on site when we arrived, but it disappeared before I got a good look at it
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>> Also an immaculate Amphicar on site when we arrived, but it disappeared before I got
>> a good look at it
Yes they were prone to rust.
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Unlike the pair of Morgans heading along the Intal out of Jenbach this pm - they`d be more concerned with woodworm but I gues you get a pretty goodview of the scenery
Last edited by: borasport on Wed 10 Jul 13 at 17:03
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Orange Lamborghini Countach , S suffix plate (1978?) BAG 825S, I think - might have been DAG. Joining A43 South towards Brackley from M1. Being driven very sedately! But then you hardly need to show off in one. Unlike the Subaru WRX which drew alongside Lamb, blipped his throttle a couple of times and accelerated away very quickly and noisily. Lambo didn't respond! Mind you, would a Subaru outperform a 1978 Lambo? I suspect so.
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I thought it could be a replica but this photo from the Goodwood Festival of Speed suggests it's the real deal.
www.flickr.com/photos/darkblackcars/5913185632/
This website gives a 0-60 for the Lambo of 6.6 and the Subaru of under five seconds.
www.zeroto60times.com/Lamborghini-Lambo-0-60-mph-Times.html
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Vauxhall's new steel roofed convertible - Cascada - a very handsome beast - not a bad buy from around 23k - But the General should really consider a premium badge on this - even Opel has better associations than the outdated Vauxhall handle. Sorry FF !
Edit...soft top !
Last edited by: R.P. on Wed 17 Jul 13 at 22:50
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LQQKS nice: www.honestjohn.co.uk/carbycar/vauxhall/cascada-2013/
I'd prefer an Opel badged jobbie too, if I was buying one, like.
Opel models were always screwed together better than their Vauxhall equivs. ISTR.
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>>Opel models were always screwed together better ....
A popular myth.
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>> LQQKS nice: www.honestjohn.co.uk/carbycar/vauxhall/cascada-2013/
>>
>> I'd prefer an Opel badged jobbie too, if I was buying one, like.
>>
>> Opel models were always screwed together better than their Vauxhall equivs. ISTR.
even those built in Vauxhall plants in the UK?
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>>even those built in Vauxhall plants in the UK?
Well, I'm going back a few years Mr Zed Sir, decades actually!
(*_*)
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I guess in the era Dog means (late 70s?) we came very close to buying an early 70s Opel Commodore Coupe like this...
www.classicandperformancecar.com/front_website/octane_interact/modelpicture.php?id=3508
At the time it was streets ahead of a similar age Vauxhall Victor in styling, fit and finish.
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There is an Opel Monza behind a gargae near me that has been left to rot away.
Feel sorry for it every time I see it, when my dad had a Carlton the Senator / Monza / Royale were very much on the radar....
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Dog linked.. www.car4play.com/redirect.php?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsCyC1dZiN8
Can't beat the Tull... Mrs F dislikes them though. Lumps them in with Steeleye Span who cause her to leave the room.
Anyway with teen girls I'm only allowed one foot in the past.
Last edited by: Fenlander on Thu 18 Jul 13 at 12:55
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>>Anyway with teen girls I'm only allowed one foot in the past.
That's quite okay Fenlander, as long as the other foot isn't in the grave.
(*_*)
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Just cycled out to do some errands and was surprised to see a visiting mint Renault GTA 3.0 Turbo in this colour parked a couple of doors down.
www.flickr.com/photos/45676495@N05/8515065195/in/photostream/
Not seen one for ages.
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I've just come back from the Isle of Man.
Visiting Peel, the site of the factory that produced the P50 and Trident, this lot turned up:
tinyurl.com/jwcknrb
Three Deemsters - I'd never heard of them before. The one with a blue bonnet at the end was a Trojan. I haven't a clue what the other one was, it paled into insignificance in that company
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On my way home from Reading tonight, a black Porsche ragtop being driven by something with long blonde hair (gender unknown).
Number plate was Y4HOO.
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Googling - Yahoo - sorry crap attempt at a search engine type joke.
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>> a black Porsche ragtop >> Number plate was Y4HOO.
MyCarCheck says the Boxster's colour is blue.
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>MyCarCheck says the Boxster's colour is blue.
Maybe it was dirty.
My Porsche was supposedly "Diamond Blue Metallic". It was actually Grey.
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My Porch is black and white.
Ted
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>My Porch is black and white.
Very PC Ted.
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Ethnic diversity....name of the game nowadays !
Ted
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en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Sera
I see one of these on my daily commute - a very pretty little motor.
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As a certain law would have it, I didn't have my camera phone on me when I spotted one of these last week in France:
www.howstuffworks.com/1965-1969-avanti-ii.htm
A purple one with Dutch reg plates. I had never heard of the make before. A new one on me.
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>> As a certain law would have it, I didn't have my camera phone on me
>> when I spotted one of these last week in France:
>>
>> www.howstuffworks.com/1965-1969-avanti-ii.htm
Co-incidentally, a fellow club member's got one (of five known to be in the UK).
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What a spot!
There was a Nissan Cedric in the car park at Lidl this morning. SWMBO said 'that's a nice looking Mercedes'.
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Two in five minutes this evening in sunny Stockport:
1. A Reliant Scimitar. Not the fastback, the original SE4 version.
2. A Jaguar F-Type. Sure to become more common, but the first one I have seen in the wild. Very nice.
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Saw an Ariel Atom on the A3 yesterday. Complete with a full width wing on the back, the sort of size F1 cars had in the 70s.
Arrived out of nowhere in the outside lane. Just past me he sat a respectable distance behind the car in front. And when that car moved over he was off again at warp speed.
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Two up ? With matching helmets...?
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It was past me before I had a chance to get a good look.
Only saw one head, with grey hair blowing in the wind.
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Funeral of a local resident, excellent conversions to a hearse and a 3 rows of seats 3 doors per side limo. Looked smart and a change from the usual Merc and Volvo conversions
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Poste in haste - forgot the key point that they were Jaguar XF conversions!
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I saw a couple of those at a funeral in Yorkshire last year. Very impressive for the job, I thought.
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Really not sure that having them converted to funeral cars does much for the brand image.
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Why? Who cares? There have been Jag XJ/Daimler hearse conversions around as long back as I can remember. It's nothing new. Hasn't done their image any harm so far.
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Ever since I have lived over here I have rarely failed to peer into any barn I happened to pass and I've often been rewarded with the sight of something interesting.
I thought I had done all the barns in this area but the other day I saw one I hadn't noticed before while driving through a village a few kms away. The door was open and I did a double take, then turned around in the road and went back.
Standing in the barn was a magnificent Delage limousine, about 1920 I guess. It looked in cared-for condition - not a given in France by any means - but I've never seen it around or at any nearby gathering. Maybe the owner just opens the door and looks at it now and again. Bit of a waste really...
Last edited by: Mike Hannon on Sat 10 Aug 13 at 10:54
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Unusual Sightings - Out and About - henry k
