Five doors?

In 1964? This was the year of the Renault 16. Two doors on each side was the norm, but the large rear door was not. Estates and ‘Shooting Brakes’ were not new in Britain, but a regularly styled family car, albeit a French regularly styled family car, with an opening back? That was new.

In standard form it was a bit of an ugly duckling, call it ‘awkward’ styling if you will, but it was roomy inside and very comfortable. The rear folding seats could be set in a variety of positions, more than the driver could remember, so it was always a good idea to have the manual handy. Oh, yes, the spare wheel was under the bonnet, so didn’t get in the way of the seat permutations and load.

Eventually, a TS model was released which finally gave the vehicle decent performance but the best was yet to come. In 1973, Renault released the TX version. It was the most fully loaded family car I had ever seen.

It featured electric windows, centralised door locking, good heating and decent facia vents, a very slick five speed column shift gearbox, the best car seats I had ever sat on, rear seatbelts, incredibly good Cibie headlamps, a very novel map reading light which actually illuminated where you needed illumination, rear window wash/wipe, and a ride not too far off the Citroen DS.

It’s worst feature was heavy steering at parking speeds, and if that is the worst thing said about a car, you know that it is a good one.

TX performance was more than adequate but as with all smallish four cylinder engines, when pushed hard, it was a little raucous. Having said that, if you just want to cruise along the N7 in real comfort, who would have cared?

Canadian Snow Plows..

If you happen to live within the North American snow zone, you are really going to appreciate this one. I think that the one in the photo is an older International, but still being used in Ottawa. The business end has been folded away on the right side of the vehicle. So, what is there to like about these things?

They get full marks for being ugly, and after a session on the roads, they are the grubbiest trucks on earth.

They’re definitely not fast, and passing them when they are flinging out salt and sand behind them is hazardous to say the least.

They leave mountains of snow across the front of driveways, and sometimes they knock down whatever is at the side of the road when plowing rural areas. One should NEVER ever stand at the side of the road when one of these vehicles is strutting its stuff because the driver doesn’t always have a good view. Just ask a mail box for confirmation.

BUT, they really are beautiful vehicles. Canada in the east and centre is a lot flatter than you might think. Both areas border the high Arctic, and the capacity for snow and drifts is beyond the comprehension of many.

If it wasn’t for these and their drivers, you wouldn’t get the kids to school, get to work, get to the grocery store, or get anywhere at all. Mind you, there would be no point in going to the grocery store because there would be nothing to buy. Most of what is bought in Canada gets to the stores courtesy of road transport.

To finish, I have posted a video of formation snow clearance on North America’s busiest highway, the mighty 401, which starts on the Ontario – Quebec border and finishes at Windsor Ontario on the Canada – USA border.

Mercedes 230 SL

In 1963, we all got treated to a Mercedes sports car which we may be able to afford. It was pretty much a M/B220 shortened by the length of the rear seats and foot well, and being a Mercedes means that it was built to standards which much of the rest of the world did not understand.

Note the lack of rubber noses, huge bumpers and over-riders. Safety was built in from the get-go, not something thought about after the horse had bolted.

It was powered by a 2.3 L, fuel injected straight six which gave it 125 mph on the Autobahn, putting it in the league of the fastest TR’s of the day. Unlike the TRs, the soft-top fitted well and was not the whistle inducing, leaking, flapping things that were British soft tops.

There was a hard top too, Pagoda style which could be bolted to it, and if you could afford the car, you could afford somewhere to store the hard top.

Everything about the car is neat, nicely squared off. The front is typical Mercedes, the large ‘Star’ and vertical headlight binnacles. At the back, nicely formed rear lights and another ‘Star’ which reminded you that you have good taste.

In-between, it looks like this..

Note the padding in the wheel centre and along the top and lower edges of the dashboard.

The 230 SL was a in a different league to the British TRs and Big Healeys. The car was refined, not the kind where you had to hang on for dear life, fighting with the controls in a bid to keep the shiny side up.

It was also beyond the pockets of TR and Big Healey buyers. That isn’t and wasn’t a bad thing because we all needed a dream, and for me, this car was ‘the’ dream.

Triumph GT6..

They called it the ‘poor man’s E-Type’. By the time it made it to Mk III version, it was one of the best looking cars to ever roll out of the Canley plant.Why didn’t it sell very well?

Maybe because:

• It was developed from the Spitfire which in turn grew out from the Herald. Do I hear ‘Girl’s cars’? It was actually a Vitesse chassis and engine with Spitfire panel bolted to it
• It was always overshadowed by it’s ‘TR’ cousins, a problem that the better selling MGB GT never had, because the B didn’t have any illustrious cousins.

OK, so rear three quarter vision was not particularly good, but look at it. Can you tell that the car was a bit nose heavy because the straight 6 engine weighed more that the Spitfire inline 4’s did? Not with uprated front springs, you can’t..

In 1972, the year before Triumph dropped the GT6, 112 mph and a 0 – 60 in 10 seconds wasn’t bad and comfortably better than  ‘B’ GT could manage.

In the end, safety laws and emissions limits killed it off. Where the MGB was adapted and was the worse off for the changes, Triumph let the GT6 go. Personally, I am glad that Triumph dropped it. To overburden this beautiful little car with rubber noses, jack it up to get the headlight height to conform, and add weight to get the safety features incorporated would have killed it off anyway.

As it is, one can still find the GT6 in various states of restoration, and it still looks every bit as good as ever it did.  

The best three box design ever.. the E30

It is one of the Ultimate Driving Machines, at the time, the most affordable Ultimate Driving Machine. Despite the upright front end, it actually challenged cars like Citroen in the ‘drag coefficient’ stakes. It’s headlights were good for 70mph vision on dark winding country roads. A ten year old example would drive better than a new car of almost any make.

The car was designated E30, and was the car which saved BMW from oblivion. It was the preferred transport of the ‘upwardly mobile’, and if you have ever driven one, you will understand why.

The photo shows a 2 door 318i, the junior model if you will. Even so, ALL of the models were subject to meticulous design and construction.

The engines are very efficient, and there isn’t an aftermarket device that can make them any better. The car’s handling will suffer if you make ANY changes to it, lowering it, wider wheels and tyres etc.

Inside, the dashboard controls are turned towards the driver and are as ergonomically placed as you will ever find in any car. The seats are firm but they hold you well. The brakes are powerful but never grab, and the Getrag 5 speed gearboxes are slick and short throw.

When you get into an E30, you can just sense the difference between it and any other three box car.

The only criticisms are the height of the boot (trunk) lip, and the fact that they can get tail happy when pushed very hard, especially the straight 6’s.

The M3..

Despite looking like one of the family, very little of the standard E30 was used. The front spoiler was lowered and designed to get maximum air to the front brakes. The bonnet, roof and sunroof were the only shared exterior panels. The trunk was raised to improve stability at high speeds.

The engine was a mix of parts and designs, essentially a four cylinder M10 with six cylinder technology added to it.

Front suspension was of the type used on the M5 as were the brakes, rear suspension was typical E30.

To help with 50:50 front rear balance, lighter panels were used, and even the battery was moved to the back of the car.

The end result, a car which absolutely deserved the title ‘Ultimate Driving Machine’. Of course, there is a price to be paid for a car which performs like the M3. I am not talking about money here. The M3 is a handful, a little bumpy and quite noisy, and may not suit everybody’s vision of an every day drive.

So there you have it. The E30 BMW, arguably the best ever small saloon, convertible, Touring (Estate), road racer and AWD.

Yes, AWD signified by an ‘X’ added after the ‘i’ in the rear badges..

That was a GTI?

A GTI what exactly? It was a VW Golf GTI.

This car almost single-handedly killed off the small cheap British sports car. It could manage almost 110mph, wasn’t drafty inside, didn’t shake, rattle or roll, didn’t get stuck on sleeping policemen, could easily seat two adults and two kids, and there was room for golf clubs in the back.

You didn’t have to fight with it to keep it on the road either. There were no nasty quirks like lever arm suspension, a la MGB, swing axles a la Spitfire, and cart springs a la Midget. It was built like a tank, and it didn’t lose bits to the side of the road. To add insult to injury, it would start every morning, first turn of the key.

What we were witnessing was the birth of the ‘hot’ hatchback, a sporting theme applied to a ‘shopping trolley’. This car could give a Triumph TR6 a good run for its money. What it lacked on the straight (a theoretical 7mph) was easily made up at the first corner.

As with all good things, they come to an end. The Golf put on weight, losing the crisp lines of the original, and some of the raw performance too. The sprightly character was lost, something that never happened to the British affordable soft-tops. They were originally designed as upholstered roller-skates, and stayed that way into oblivion.

The S’es

The year is 1961, and a man called John Cooper had been working with a BMC Mini. Having driven one and discovered the amazing handling and road holding of the car, he saw potential for a lot of fun and chequered flags at the end of rallies.

The first Cooper, an ‘848’ stroked to 997cc was the first. There was also a 1071cc version, and it is this one that was the first Cooper S. Two other S variants appeared, homologated for circuit racing, a 970cc and the famous 1275cc.

Unless you were a ‘club’ racer, the only S of interest was the 1275.

The photo shows an authentic ‘63 Cooper S. This car started a huge industry in customizing and tuning which still exists today. Regardless of what Mini you owned, a standard Mini, Clubman or Moke (if you were brave enough drive fast on what was essentially a floorpan with a windshield), there was a tuning company somewhere in the UK which had a mass of parts waiting for you to buy and collect.

OK. These cars were noisy, bumpy, uncomfortable, cramped, they let in water around the doors, the battery would rot its way through the boot floor, and they wouldn’t do 100mph on 10” Minilites.

Like any owner cared. These cars were as fast through bends as they were on the straights, the exhaust note was worthy of an engine with five times the displacement, and the induction roar from the wire pancake filters was better than anything on any car radio.

Torque from the 1275 was such that you hardly had to use gears below 3rd, and only really needed second for starting off on steep hills.

There are cars running around now with S badges pinned on them, but they are nothing like the originals. BMW may e build them well and I don’t doubt that they are way more comfortable and refined, but who ever bought a Cooper S for comfort and refinement.

The Cooper S was the most fun you could have in a cheapish car available straight from any BMC dealer showroom.

At age 60 and falling apart at the seams, I doubt that I could still get into and out of a Mini, but I would like the chance to once again take a ‘hot’ Mini over Hardknott Pass in Cumbria. Talk about excitement.. WOW.. 

Incidentally, it was the 1071 Cooper S which made the car famous on the Monte Carlo Rally, not the 1275.