Innholdsfortegnelse for 7/12/2023 i Classic Car Buyer

Former British Touring Car Championship (BTCC) racer and successful team owner, Steve Neal, has sadly passed away at the age of 82. Most famously known for racing Minis in the 1960s, Steve went on to help form multiple BTCC champions, Team Dynamics, in the early 1990s. Under Steve’s leadership the team secured six drivers’ championships, with son Matt Neal winning three, plus numerous manufacturer and team titles with Honda. He also formed wheel firm, Rimstock. In equally sad news, tuning legend Jan O’dor has also sadly passed away. Having arrived in Britain as a Hungarian refugee in the 1950s, he formed Janspeed in Salisbury in 1962. The firm quickly made headlines, with Jan developing the LCB exhaust manifold and becoming the first to adapt the Mini Marcos for racing. Janspeed…

Respected car designer, Peter Horbury, has passed away at the age of 72. Peter’s remarkable career began at Chrysler UK in the 1970s where he notably penned the grille for the Talbot Horizon. However, he is best known for his work at Volvo, which began in 1991 and saw him reinvent the Swedish brand’s design language during an 11-year stint as design chief. In later years he worked for Ford’s Premier Automotive Group before becoming head of design at Geely. At the time of his death he was also executive vice-president of design at Group Lotus. The industry lost another stalwart recently in Gerald C. Meyers, the former CEO of American Motors, who has died at the age of 94. Meyers was promoted from product engineer to CEO at AMC…

The vast majority of British sports cars were exported, and a vast majority of those went to America. So it’s not surprising to regularly come across repatriated examples. This ‘Big Healey’ is one such case, having originally been sent to Fort Worth, Texas in 1961. It came back to the UK in the 2000s, had a spell in storage and then was fully restored in 2004, which included a conversion to right-hand drive. BODYWORK It has been very well maintained since, so the light blue metallic over Old English White paint (a classic combo on an Austin-Healey) is still in excellent condition. This Healey is of the more common 2+2 body style, and when we drove it was fitted with a factory-supplied hard top (restored to the same standard as…

MG RV8 Just like the Plus 4, the MGB passed away and then came back in modernised form. The RV8 is more consciously luxurious than even this leather-clad Morgan, and the 3.9-litre Rover V8 offers more shove and aural delights than the T-Series. But the performance and ‘feel’ are not too dissimilar. CATERHAM SEVEN The obvious alternative when it comes to hyper-traditional sports cars. If you can’t fit a more modern engine, just upgrade a classic one to modern power levels – that’s what Caterham did with the 1.7-litre Super Sprint, using a tuned version of the famous Ford Kent four-pot. TVR 280i A sports car much more in keeping with the 1980s than the revived Plus 4, but still using a classic engine – the meaty Ford Cologne V6…

Mazda UK’s Heritage Fleet has switched to sustainable fuel. The group of 15 vehicles, which includes a 1969 Mazda Cosmo, 1973 RX-3, 1984 Mk1 RX-7 and a handful of MX-5 models, are used for media and publicity events. They will now be fuelled by SUSTAIN Classic Super 80, the new fuel by Coryton tailored for classic vehicles. The sustainable drop-in solution requires no modifications and can be used by any petrol-fuelled vehicle and is created using 80 per cent agricultural waste, including by-products from crops. The fuel offers a reduction of at least 65 per cent in greenhouse gas emissions when compared to fossil fuels.…

The Best of British Car Show at Turvey House in Bedfordshire will include a special exhibition commemorating 60 years of the Hillman Imp. Taking place on September 3, the highly anticipated show promises to be a treat for enthusiasts and casual visitors alike, offering a unique display that showcases the Imp’s enduring legacy. The event has the makings of a fun-filled Sunday, alongside a wide variety of iconic classic cars, there will also be special themed displays, club stands, a retail village, music and other entertainment, a pride of ownership competition and more. Supported by Kelsey’s diverse motoring portfolio, including Classic Car Buyer, is sure to be one to remember. Tickets are currently priced at just £10, which includes entry for your own British car. For more information, visit events.prestigeandperformancecar.com/best-of-british.…

Historics’ summer auction at Windsorview Lakes on July 22 will mark the firm’s 60th sale since first opening its doors in June 2010, and its fourth of 2023. The consignments already point to it being an eclectic sale, with everything from a 1906 Wolseley Siddeley to a 6500-mile 2005 Ford GT that could sell for as much as £280,000. The GT is part of a large contingent of Blue Ovals that also included a rally-prepared Ford Anglia 105E with competition papers, a 1966 Ford Lotus Cortina with period competition history and a Mk2 Ford Escort that’s prepared to Group 4 rally regulations and fully road-registered. You’ll also find a Mk2 Cortina Crayford convertible, plus an early Capri 2.8 Injection, a Series 1 Escort RS Turbo and a Mk6 Escort RS2000.…

Remaining examples of Vauxhall’s ‘PC’ Cresta are rare enough, but this one is even rarer than most. The single headlamps mark this out as the basic Cresta (‘Standard’, in Vauxhall’s own words), which did not sell well back in period and survivors in the UK are now estimated to be in single figures. The exact history of this one is unknown, but with 66,000 miles on the clock, it’s still largely in original condition and has avoided the rust that ravaged so many of its Luton-built contemporaries. BODYWORK It hasn’t escaped the rust bug entirely, though There is evidence of a small repair on the top of the inner near-side wing (a notorious PC Cresta rot spot), some surface rust at the back of the rear sill on the same…

With cars making their way home from the Le Mans classic, we thought it appropriate to revisit this scene from Calais. There’s no date given, but the British car pictured wears reflective plates that became popular at the end of the 1960s, while the ferry operators, Townsend Thoresen and Sealink, began operations under those names in 1968 and 1970 respectively. So our guess would be around 1970 or 1971. We think the grey car is a Daimler 2.5-V8 rather than a Jaguar – the dark centres of the hubcaps would seem to confirm this. Over on the left, we just about see the back end of a Renault 16. The left-hand drive coach eludes us though – anyone know the make or model? Sealink would be acquired by Stena Line…

‘80s COUPES We pitch three big 1980s coupes against each other as the Ford Capri 2.8i takes on the Opel Monza and Audi Coupe B2. BUY A SUNBEAM RAPIER Don’t even think about purchasing a pre-Arrow Sunbeam Rapier until you’ve read our in-depth buying guide. COMPACT EXECUTIVES We revisit the rise of the compact executive saloon, from the Triumph Dolomite through to the Mercedes 190, BMW 3 Series and Jaguar X-Type. DOWNLOAD THE DIGITAL ISSUE OF CLASSIC CAR BUYER FROM AS LITTLE AS 94p! Visit: www.pocketmags.com or download it via the App Store; search Classic Car Buyer. The printed version of Classic Car Buyer is available in ASDA, Tesco, Morrisons and WH Smiths, plus all good newsagents…

ASTON MARTIN DB7 V12 VANTAGE (1999-2004) If you are searching for an affordable entry route into luxury GT ownership, then the Aston Martin DB7 should be on your radar as a contender. Despite its rather unusual origins as a rebooted Jaguar project with parts bin componentry, the DB7 was the car that helped saved its maker and propel it into a new era. Initially launched in 1994 with the 3.2-litre AJ6 in-line six-cylinder engine, things would ramp up in 1999 with the launch of the new Vantage and Vantage Volante models, which boasted a new 5935cc V12 engine putting out 420bhp. Back in 2015 you would’ve needed in the region of £50,000 to secure a Vantage, but by 2018 that figure had steadily reduced to around £30,0000-£35,000. The low point…

It’s easy to say that the Morgan sports car never changed in its long production run – that’s one of those facts that is broadly true (few other marques changed so little of their fundamental design or engineering principles across more than 60 years) but not strictly accurate. For one thing, the Plus 4 received various power units through the decades – partly to keep pace with requirements for performance and emissions, but mostly because the chosen engine would eventually cease production while the Plus 4 continued. A glance at the list of engines used in the Plus 4 is a bit like a survey of the motor industry since 1945 as a whole. The original Plus 4 of 1950 used the Standard Vanguard engine of 2088cc. This later became…

By the late 1980s the Saab range had become rather complicated. The 900 was the core model, but from 1984 there was the new, bigger, more modern 9000 and in 1987 buyers in certain European markets could still buy the Saab 90 – the old 99 with the rear end of the 900. All these cars were fundamentally of the same sort. They were solidly made executive cars with clever engineering and an emphasis on refined, usable and practical performance. Most other executive cars of the 1980s didn’t have front-wheel drive, and most didn’t have turbochargers or a hatchback body style as options either. But despite Saabs being very much ‘of a type’, there was a distinct difference between the ordinary 900 model, which was effectively just an unusually styled…

TVR became synonymous with high-performance versions of the Rover V8 in the 1980s and 1990s – so much so that TVR would end up making its own bespoke versions of the engine in capacities that were never built by Rover. But it took a while for TVR to come around to the V8. True, the first production TVR, the Grantura, spawned the racing Griffith with a Ford V8, and in the 1970s there was a limited run of 5000Ms, but in this period TVR favoured Ford four- and six-cylinder power, with occasional dalliances with Triumph units. That changed in the early 1980s when the company’s new owner, Peter Wheeler, decided that the new product line, based around the ‘wedge’ cars designed by Ian Jones and Oliver Winterbottom, needed more performance.…