Cars are better now than they have ever been aren't they? Despite the three letter acronym issues of DMFs, DPFs etc etc...
They are safer, stop better, handle better and are far more reliable in the main. They are faster, use less fuel and keep the driver and passengers in air conditioned comfort while listening to high quality radios. Many now link automatically to a mobile phone or have a sat nav system built in. Marvelous things by comparison to their predecessors right?
Trouble is, the roads are now so full of them they aren't really or nearly as much fun.
I was only a very small child in the 1960s but I can still remember the first awakenings of my lifelong facination with cars. My dad had some nice ones and I seem to remember him being able to use them for their intended purpose. Long holiday journeys on sweeping empty roads at the helm of something with a straight six. Being able to park the thing outside where he was going. Driving into city centres without having to sit in interminable queues or avoid bus lanes or yellow lines. No traffic wardens or speed cameras to deal with.
Depending upon need and budget you could have bought a Mini or an Aston Martin. An MGB or a Jaguar.
Were those the "Golden Years" maybe?
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No they weren't, really.
Average People were still driving around in uncomfortable, unreliable sheds because they had little money, a holiday Journey to Devon from London could take all day, 14 hours or more from the West Midlands during the peak, Driving into city centres was a nightmare, London was palace to avoid, Guildford almost in permanent gridlock and Jamming up the A3 that ran through it to boot.
And if you needed a cool drink to calm your frayed nerves on the journey, the pubs were shut, and even if open the food was HundScheiße.
you have a bad case of "it was always summer in my youth"
you need 1949 traffic levels, 1970s cars, 2000's wages and 2012's food and drink to make the perfect utopia.
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You can drive some lovely A/B-roads around here on a weekday or Sunday afternoon and see only a handful of cars in 10 miles.
If you enjoy driving on clear roads, going North of Luton is not a bad idea although Lincs is dull beyond belief and full of plod. Leicestershire has some great roads and achingly pretty countryside to drive through. Rutland isnt bad either.
Cars are pretty nice overall now, there are plenty of places outside of the south east that you can enjoy a drive too. My wife and I go for a drive once a week now to the west of Uppingham usually though we plan on getting an MX-5 to make it more interesting in the future.
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>> You can drive some lovely A/B-roads around here on a weekday or Sunday afternoon and
>> see only a handful of cars in 10 miles.
>>
>> If you enjoy driving on clear roads, going North of Luton is not a bad
>> idea although Lincs is dull beyond belief and full of plod. Leicestershire has some great
>> roads and achingly pretty countryside to drive through. Rutland isnt bad either.
Yeah, I know the roads of East Northants and Rutland well. Some complete crackers to drive, great country and fabulous pubs for lunch. As long as you keep away from Corby.
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OK then, it's a summer's day, the first day of your holidays. You're heading for France. You've got your latest squeeze in the passenger seat. You decide to drive from Edinburgh to London on the first day. By a miracle of time travel you can do it on 1960s traffic/roads in an MGB or on 2012 traffic/roads in an MX5.
Which one do you choose?
I'd be going for the one which runs on 4*, no contest !
:-)
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It would have broken down before you got there !
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Probably before you got over the country border.
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I mean the border at Berwick.......
Last edited by: Zero on Sun 22 Jul 12 at 15:48
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I would chose the MGB over the hairdressers car anyday, it might be unreliable, but its has 100 times more character.
Last edited by: Skip on Sun 22 Jul 12 at 16:22
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>> I would chose the MGB over the hairdressers car anyday, it might be unreliable, but
>> its has 100 times more character.
The MGB had character. All of it bad. It wasn't fast, it wouldn't handle, even by the standards of the day.
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I think the MX5 shook off its hairdresser image over the years - my wife's 2.0 Sportech was a cracking motor.
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>> I think the MX5 shook off its hairdresser image over the years
Never looked at all hairdresserish to me. More like a modern equivalent of the Spridget, but better of course. The sort of car a late friend used to call 'wine gums'.
If you want to look like a hairdresser or WAG, get a two seater Mercedes. Even the snorting monster one with square side exhausts seems totally hairdresser to me.
No offence to anyone who's got one. They are undoubtedly excellent as cars.
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>> >> I think the MX5 shook off its hairdresser image over the years
>> If you want to look like a hairdresser or WAG, get a two seater Mercedes.
>> Even the snorting monster one with square side exhausts seems totally hairdresser to me.
>>
Nah, a MINI is a proper hairdressers car.
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>> Nah, a MINI is a proper hairdressers car.
No, the MINI's a junior estate agent's car. The boss used to drive a Porsche in the heady seventies, but probably something else these days.
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From the Midlands after A levels, eventually on A303 in my Morris Minor. With new valves, so fast I missed Stonehenge:) Down to Brixham, crab sandwiches and a pint at lunchtime. 1968, and v. little traffic. Then to Uni, with a car, independent - a holiday after 6 years work! Now that was golden.
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I followed an old geezer in a very tidy Morris Minor across Salisbury Plain, past Stonehenge and up a bit of the the 303 the other day.
At first I thought I'd get around to overtaking him but in the end there was no need. He hustled that little car up the road like a good 'un...
Fair cheered me up.
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Agree with most of Zero's summary bar the 70's cars. Give me late 80's when the manufacturers finally took rust seriously and I also said goodbye to sticky brake calipers.
I remember my Dad's car having a complete respray and the bottoms of the doors redone (ground down and filled) at five years, this was a low use, low mileage car. Most cars of that era still had some form of tin worm especially with the salt air in the NE.
All car paintwork was dull around the time of the first MOT.
Last edited by: gmac on Sun 22 Jul 12 at 21:35
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I'm not a big MGB fan either but I wouldn't mind a lightly tuned MGCGT with tweaked suspension and brakes. The OE Armstrong dampers are rubbish. I saw a very pretty one in my favourite shade of primer grey some time back.
As for being able to give the thing its head in peace, it isn't just a question of where but of when. You might as well have a Prius or Micra or Bentley or something for commuting, but if you want to have a nice drive you just have to do it early on Sunday morning or in the middle of the night, depending on where the road is.
I've posted before about the person I sometimes see howling about near here in vintage Bugattis. He doesn't seem to mind that there are a few other cars on the road. And he doesn't mimse in his million quid's worth of jalopy either.
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I wonder if the 1970s tick most of the boxes implied by Humph and Zero above. Cars were a bit more reliable than before, but the main thing was that most of the motorways were in place by then.
Maybe I was lucky, but of my first 5 cars in the 10 years from 1969 (Austin A50, MG 1100, MG 1300, Maxi 1750 and Maxi 1750HL) only the MG 1300 gave trouble, and even that didn't actually break down on the road.
But even now it's possible to get away from other traffic: I've just been out for a spin to give the Z3 a good run (lovely day for a convertible) and even in the Chilterns I could drive for miles and rarely see another car. You can do the same in rural Hampshire, and I'm sure this is even easier the further away from big conurbations and tourist traps you get.
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You're in good form tonight Roger. That's Les Leston's racing Lotus Elite. Leston was a jazz musician and long-time cannabis user as well as a successful retailer of tuning parts and so on. Your sort of chap perhaps?
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I saw him race DAD10 - that's enough for me!
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We did Kendal to Shap a week last Thursday. Had lunch at Milnthorpe earlier so I guess we hit the north side of Kendal about 1400 hrs.
Lovely day, just nothing on the A6. We were in the Automatic 1600 Note. Just bimbled along at about 50. Hardly saw more than 12 vehicles on the way. Passed the Jungle Cafe site and the farm where the Leyland clock used to be.
Bit different to when we went to Scotland on honeymoon in '69. Usual jams all the way up with elderly buses and trucks wheezing their way along. Being in a Mini Cooper 970S, I was able to do a bit of queue hopping, though.
Ted
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Quite a realistic view of the "Golden Age" there Ted !
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I had one of the nicest drives today that I've had in years. Tootled back from Bucks to Hants across country in glorious sunshine and on largely deserted roads. Apart from one NSL on a particularly lovely stretch of road, I didn't so much as bruise a speed limit. All four windows down, climate off, random tunes playing at modest volume, and a general sense that all was right with the world, just for an hour or so.
Would rather have been doing it in a nice mk1 MX5 but the Beemer did alright. Reconfirmed my belief that it is a much nicer car to drive at 7/10ths than flat out, although most of the trip was at a far less enthusiastic pace than that.
Even managed 70.3 mpg on the computer, which speaks volumes for the general rate of progress. Enjoyed it immensely though.
Last edited by: DP on Sun 22 Jul 12 at 22:02
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"The MGB had character. All of it bad. It wasn't fast, it wouldn't handle, even by the standards of the day. "
Zero is absolutely correct (as ever). I was very much into cars in the 70s and anyone who knew anything considered the MGB in all its variations a pile of automotive rubbish. "It wasn't fast " - you can say that again - the cooking Escorts and Cortinas of the day could out handle and out drag the heavy 1800cc lump of a car. Remember the sad image of Charles in his MGC which at least had a little oomph.
The positives: The GT has a certain look about it and the exhaust gave a pleasant throaty sound.
The negaives: everything else.
Why people laud them as classics I just don't know.
Now, if you want to get talking about a proper sports car like the Lotus Elan I could go on all night. Fragility was a problem I must admit.
Last edited by: Dulwich Estate on Sun 22 Jul 12 at 22:12
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Just to add to the general reporting of quiet roads today, even the North Circular was reasonable for a change. The only drama was coming eastbound from Hanger Lane, when some plonker in a blue BMW panicked at seeing the "Games Lane" and cut me up.
I wouldn't mind, but there were signs everywhere saying that the lanes were not even active yet!
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I was a child in the 1970s and certainly don't regard it as any kind of golden age. Vinyl seats, no entertainment and interiors that were either greenhouse-hot or bathroom steamy made even a 50-mile weekend trip to visit friends something to dread.
My dad bought Renaults for their reliability (imagine!) but even that was relative: his 12 seemed to get a puncture every other week, wouldn't start after a night in the rain, and I remember losing a day's holiday in Aberystwyth after the exhaust fell off in Snowdonia.
By contrast, I bought my first car, new, in 1989 and I've had six others since. I've had punctures, but about six in more than 20 years. I've never had to replace a battery or an exhaust, and I've never been unable to get to work on time because of a mechanical problem. The best of them - the two on the drive today - give a long journey on a nice day a real sense of occasion. Yes, they're more expensive cars than my dad chose, but I can't imagine their 1970s counterparts being anything like as comfortable or as reliable.
My neighbour has a 1980 MGB GT, which he probably imagines is a classic. I wouldn't give him 50p for it; horrible-looking thing, and it can only get worse inside.
Early-2000s turbodiesel and early 1990s roads, please. But don't bring back John Major.
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Everything modern is much better - cars, houses, boats, furniture, household goods, people.
Better made, cheap to run, energy efficient, longer lasting, more reliable.
The only downside is that it is all so boring, and everybody has exactly the same tastes, views, and aspirations.
I like old old cars with wood and leather, old wooden boats not plastic ones, old houses made of brick and stone not concrete blocks and MFI timber. That's because they are not just machines for living in or getting about in, but personal expressions of taste, to be enjoyed for their form not just substance.
That's just me. There is no point in arguing the case with people who see things differently.
But I do agree there are no Golden Years. Just good things and bad things, things I like and things I hate, from most years.
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>> The only downside is that it is all so boring, and everybody has exactly the
>> same tastes, views, and aspirations.
Car's are more boring to look at these days. The price you pay in the quest for efficiency is that they take on the most efficient aerodynamic shape, meaning they all start to look similar. I miss the variety, the difference in look between the manufacturers.
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>> I like old old cars with wood and leather, old wooden boats not plastic ones,
>> old houses made of brick and stone not concrete blocks and MFI timber. That's because
>> they are not just machines for living in or getting about in, but personal expressions
>> of taste, to be enjoyed for their form not just substance.
I like these too. There's something about the feel and smell of natural materials that gives me a feelgood factor. I like established towns compared to new towns because of the materials that they are built from, and sense of history.
>> That's just me. There is no point in arguing the case with people who see
>> things differently.
>> But I do agree there are no Golden Years. Just good things and bad things,
>> things I like and things I hate, from most years.
>>
Agreed. Good post. I tend to look fondly at the 70's as a kid, because I wasn't old enough to be aware of all the bad things about that decade. I was lucky in that I was surrounded by happy people on the whole. I do remember spending large amounts of time in pub gardens watching wasps trying to escape from beer glasses that my mum and dad's hippy friends had turned upside down on the tables. And it was always sunny :)
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The first generation of Lotus Elites with the Coventry Climax engine were nicer IMO.
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I'd like cars of 2012 together with the days of no 70mph speed limit, and no speed cameras.
Last edited by: L'escargot on Mon 23 Jul 12 at 08:58
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>> I'd like cars of 2012 together with the days of no 70mph speed limit, and
>> no speed cameras.
>>
Sounds good to me as well.
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Deserted roads theme carried over to today. Commute took 30 mins. Half what I expect on a Monday morning. Even used cruise on the M3. Normally impossible to get beyond 2nd gear.
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>> Deserted roads theme carried over to today. Commute took 30 mins. Half what I expect
>> on a Monday morning. Even used cruise on the M3. Normally impossible to get beyond
>> 2nd gear.
Kids are off school.
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This was way beyond the usual school holiday effect. I suspect a lot of people have taken holiday because of the weather.
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>> >> Deserted roads theme carried over to today. Commute took 30 mins. Half what I
>> expect
>> >> on a Monday morning. Even used cruise on the M3. Normally impossible to get
>> beyond
>> >> 2nd gear.
>>
>> Kids are off school.
>>
Bizzarely enough Spamcan Junior finished school today, unsurprisingly the class was half empty. M3 was OK this morning until Amazingstoke area where an Audi had tailgated a Saab estate, plus an A class pointing the wrong way and a Focus with a bashed rear quarter involved somehow. Sod's law meant I didn't hear the traffic news until after I'd passed J9 so an extra half an hour going nowhere.
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Given that the 70mph speed limit came in in 1965, and the only place to really exceed them was a motorway first opened in 1958, you have a 7 year period.
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"Everything modern is much better - cars, houses, boats, furniture, household goods, people.
Better made, cheap to run, energy efficient, longer lasting, more reliable."
I have to disagree as far as houses, furniture, electrical items and people go:
Houses: New stuff is lightweight to comply with heat insulation standards but will not stand the test of time. Houses of 1920/1930 are approaching their 100th birthdays and are generally in good nick. I guarantee that buildings of this current era won't make it past 2050. The rot started in the 1960s and 1970s and it just gets worse.
Furniture: It used to be solid wood that joe public could afford. Solid wood, with some exceptions, is now for the top end. Now it's all chipboard and MDF for the masses; or maybe stained strips of cheap pine which is an IKEA speciality. Peeling veneers etc.... - rubbish.
Electrical items: Recently, I have had need to equip a house from scratch with electric tools and appliances. With the exception of the TV, they are all of inferior quality today. For example I have a Black & Decker drill and jigsaw bought in about 1978. They are going well, they are solid and very good quality. My workmate is of equivalent age. Each renewed item is chinese made and won't last. The plus point is that receipts in the old tool boxes show I paid the same in £s for these items in the late 1970s and I did 40 years later.
People: "More reliable" - you are kidding aren't you.
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>>
>>
>> I have to disagree as far as houses, furniture, electrical items and people go:
>>
Yes, I was writing tongue-in-cheek. :)
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...Houses: New stuff is lightweight to comply with heat insulation standards but will not stand the test of time. Houses of 1920/1930 are approaching their 100th birthdays and are generally in good nick. I guarantee that buildings of this current era won't make it past 2050...
Jerry-building by speculators is nothing new - I lived in a listed Georgian terrace in London which would make a Wimpey house look substantial.
Those older houses which survive have been much refurbished and renovated.
If the same is done to a 'current era' house it will also last 100 years.
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>> Electrical items: Recently, I have had need to equip a house from scratch with electric
>> tools and appliances. With the exception of the TV, they are all of inferior quality
>> today. For example I have a Black & Decker drill and jigsaw bought in about
>> 1978. They are going well, they are solid and very good quality. My workmate is
>> of equivalent age. Each renewed item is chinese made and won't last. The plus point
>> is that receipts in the old tool boxes show I paid the same in £s
>> for these items in the late 1970s and I did 40 years later.
The most reliable, long lived appliance in our house is a British made Creda condenser type tumble dryer, which will be 13 years old this year. Apart from requiring a new door safety cut out switch a couple of years ago, it has never gone wrong, and still performs as well as the day we bought it. Works for a living too, with two kids in the house and the wonderful British weather (this week excepted)
Obscure as it sounds, a really good illustration of the deterioration in quality and durability is board games, which thanks to my parents keeping many of the ones I had as a child, allows me to directly compare the ones we've bought for our kids, with the ones they bought 30-odd years ago for us. Durable plastics and thick card have been replaced with brittle, flimsy fittings and paper. They won't last.
Worst was an "Operation" game we bought for my eldest daughter for Christmas last year. My parents still have the one I got for Christmas in 1980, and it still works fine. My daughter's new one, despite careful / supervised use, had completely ceased to function within a week. We exchanged it under guarantee, and the replacement lasted a week before doing the same thing. At that point we gave up.
I agree that in terms of price ticket, these things haven't changed in 30 years, but as soon as you use them, you can see how this has been made possible.
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...Durable plastics and thick car...
Our family heirloom Monopoly has metal playing pieces and wooden houses and hotels.
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>> ...Durable plastics and thick car...
>>
>> Our family heirloom Monopoly has metal playing pieces and wooden houses and hotels.
>>
My parents' set from the late 70s has metal playing pieces, but plastic houses and hotels.
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>> Electrical items: Recently, I have had need to equip a house from scratch with electric
>> tools and appliances. With the exception of the TV, they are all of inferior quality
>> today. For example I have a Black & Decker drill and jigsaw bought in about
>> 1978. They are going well, they are solid and very good quality. My workmate is
>> of equivalent age. Each renewed item is chinese made and won't last. The plus point
>> is that receipts in the old tool boxes show I paid the same in £s
>> for these items in the late 1970s and I did 40 years later.
Which just goes to show you got what you paid for. Electrical appliances were expensive but good quality and long lasting. It's the same today. You would normally have to pay more for a good quality drill with metal gears compared to a chinese built item.
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Quiet on the M4 too - 15 minutes off my usual 50 or so.
Would these fabulous 1960s-70s roads also include the Drive Home After Four Pints Club, which was so effectively closed down by public opinion in the 1980s?
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"Yes, I was writing tongue-in-cheek. :)"
Must of missed that !
I am not at my best today and feeling a tad grumpier than normal, so I'm not able to do humour just now.
Last edited by: Dulwich Estate on Mon 23 Jul 12 at 10:29
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>> Would these fabulous 1960s-70s roads also include the Drive Home After Four Pints Club, which
>> was so effectively closed down by public opinion in the 1980s?
The Four Pints Club were the safe ones I should think. Reactions are slowed and judgement suffers a bit, but mature and sensible people can, and must have, offset that with extra caution.
I have at least one very respectable friend, now 75, who will admit that the designated driver's objective was to remain capable of actually driving the car, while the rest got more or less legless. He eventually had a fairly serious one car accident with a total of about nine people in his Zephyr estate, thankfully with no actual fatalities but some fairly unpleasant injuries.
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>>Given that the 70mph speed limit came in in 1965, and the only place to really exceed them was a motorway first opened in 1958
No cameras though. All we had to do was watch out for the rozzers. Was it about 1980 when radar guns came in? I think I did more or less what speeds I chose in my formative motoring years in the 70s, but the fastest thing I had was a Hunter GT that would do 100 or so. I was first 'done' for 60 in a 30 in about 1982 IIRC. Well, it was a dual carriageway, and it was where it changed from NSL to 30 ;-). Probably has speed bumps on it now.
Last edited by: Manatee on Mon 23 Jul 12 at 10:46
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>> I was
>> first 'done' for 60 in a 30 in about 1982 IIRC. Well, it was a
>> dual carriageway, and it was where it changed from NSL to 30 ;-).
Snap. I copped my first speeding fine in 1983 (after 10 years driving) with a 60 in a 30, dual carriageway, NSL to 30. I managed to talk that one down to a mere speeding fine, not bad considering I raced a plain clothes police car away from the traffic lights.
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>> the only place to really exceed them was a motorway first opened in 1958
I have driven, and been driven, in many places that weren't even dual carriageways, at speeds well over 70 and up to 120. The M1 was just the place where you could do it without having to really concentrate. Motorways are safe for any speed at all, or would be if it wasn't for the other drivers (and admittedly these days, heavy traffic sometimes).
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Let's hear it for modern tyres. They seldom get punctured or need topping up with air, last well and must be very tough. The later speculation is raised by motorists in my area who drive up onto kerbs at speed, often leave their cars all day with a tyre centre resting half on the sharp kerbside and drive off with another shock to the sidewall.
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>> the only place to really exceed them was a motorway first opened in 1958
But you'd have to go to Preston for it until the M1 opened about a year later.
Who'd want to go to Preston?
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...Who'd want to go to Preston?...
At least you could get past it quickly.
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I reckon that's why the M6 toll round Birmingham was a shrewd move. I think they knew people would willingly pay to avoid it.
:-)
Last edited by: Humph D'Bout on Mon 23 Jul 12 at 12:29
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Like Barclaycard, Priceless.
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>> Like Barclaycard, Priceless.
>>
Err. . . wasn't that Mastercard?
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The Golden Years? - Zero
