Which we stumbled across by chance. It's on the last Friday of the month in the car park of Frankie & Benny's in Chingford. Basically, people turn up, park their cars, open the bonnets and then chat with whoever shows up. I liked the MG Midget (Good Grief those cars were tiny) and the red Camaro Z28 (an early 1970s model, see here, Good Grief, those cars were huge) best.
Just as we were about to go, an open top Triumph Stag in British racing green rolled up. He cruised round the car park until he had everybody's full attention, i.e. once, and then drove off again. What a bloody spoilsport. His engine didn't sound too healthy though, serves him right.
Picture pinched from here:
9 comments:
Are you a classic car enthusiast as well as an LVT one?
I've only owned triumphs- first car (2003) was a '68 Spit Mk3, now drive a '56 TR3, and a '68 Vitesse convertable. Also owned a couple more Spitfires, a TR6 and an excellent Mk2 GT6...
Never owned a Stag though...
TBH, for myself I go for "cheap and practical" when it comes to cars, but I can understand why others don't. Have you really owned seven cars in the space of nine years?
I only did it for the qualities you mention above. As a 6th former, I couldn't afford anything modern, and the classic cars has very very cheap insurance and no tax- with the added benefit of being simple to work on, and no intrinsic depreciation in value. I also quite liked having something different to the bog standard small cheapies my friends were getting.
Where I grew up we had a few out buildings, so there would be several old Triumphs in various states of assembly at any one time. More recently, the TR3 was meant to be an inflation hedge and a bit of fun at the same time.
In answer to your question though, yes- 7 cars, and my younger brother had 2 Heralds, and at least 1 old land rover at the same time! My poor mother wasn't best pleased!
TBH, cool, and how many of those 7 cars do you actually run at once, not counting ones that are up on blocks?
The first Spit was owned for about 4 years, and went for about 2 (with a 2 year restoration period in the middle), the GT6 was owned for about a year and went the whole time (I sold it for a decent profit with no effort), the second Spit was owned for about 4 years and went the whole time. The Third Spit never went and was pretty much stripped of useful parts and scrapped. The Vitesse went for about 3 years, then had a 3 year break, and has just passed its MOT again the other week. The TRs have only been in the last couple of years and have both been in good condition.
I think at one point, I had 2 Spitfires and the Vitesse all going at the same time, although that window was quite small, and my brother drove one of them full time.
Now, the TR3 is a super condition and drives superbly, and the Vitesse needs some cosmetic work, but is mechanically solid. I'm probably going to sell the Vitesse once it is tidied, as my wife doesn't really like the styling...
You have good taste, TBH. I had a second-hand Triumph 2000 estate for a while in the 1980s. Very nice car, although the fuel injection meant it wasn't as simple to work on as most cars of the time. It went pretty well for an estate car though.
TBH, I am deeply impressed. I'd even agree with your wife that the Vitesse looked a bit weird.
Triumph Stage - oh yeah. Needed two of them, one in the garage getting repaired ... not unlike Alfas.
Triumph Stag has a dodgy V8 with congenital cam and ignition problems.
TBH - very sensible motoring if I may say so.
I have owned and used daily since 1999 a Defender 110 - 179,000 miles and still in excellent mechanical order - all you have to do is to keep on top of them. But I am selling it now.
http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201220471727290/sort/default/usedcars/model/defender/make/land_rover/quicksearch/true/postcode/ip13ht/page/1/radius/10?logcode=p
One of the prime reasons that we race classic sportscars is that they actually appreciate in value (mostly).
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