Adrian's Morris 8s.
Firstly, a big thanks to Adrian for putting finger to keyboard and sending over his happy memories of owning and driving various Morris Eight saloons in the 1950s and 1960s. First-hand memories of driving pre-war cars, at a time when they were (relatively) cheap modes of transport, ie during the '50s and '60s, I find really fascinating. While owners of brand new cars, such as Ford Zephyrs, Vauxhall Crestas and Jaguar 3.4s for instance, may have found small 7hp and 8hp cars from the pre-war years an inconvenience due to their sedate turn of speed, the availability of affordable pre-war cars enabled many people to take to the road for the very first time.
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One of Adrian's Morris 8s, with Series II wheels fitted.
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Adrian's first Morris 8, reg. BLN 644.
In all I had three Morris 8s. I bought BLN 644 for £32.10s in 1958
from a chap down Gasworks Road
in Reading. I did not then have even a Provisional license.
I've a view of me in BLN 644 with L plates but I can't find it. The
vendor drove it to Brock Barracks, the other end of the town, down
the Oxford Road, and I had a few miles of barracks roads to drive on.
I'd learned how to operate a car years before, driving recently
arrived cars in a scrap yard.
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I was stationed in Albany Barracks,
Newport, Isle of Wight, when my driving test came up so I had a
couple of lessons from the BSM and passed the test in a 1959 Standard
8. A tinny little thing compared to a Morris 8. I learned to repair
electrics and mechanicals with the Morris, taking the engine out,
changing a clutch, grinding in the valves, adjusting them - 3 hands
ideally required for that job. Being able to do all the necessary
work on your car was definitely part of the enjoyment.
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In the bitterly cold winter of Jan-March 1962, 15 degrees below freezing for
weeks, I was a signalman at Uffington signal box, being required on
duty at 5.50 a.m, 1.50 p.m and 9.50 p.m. I was never late for work
because of the Morris 8. Being a sidevalve engine the cylinder head
was exposed - 13x 5/16th Whitworth nuts on protruding bolts - and so
I used to place an electric iron, plugged into the mains by a long
lead, on top of the nuts and thus the engine was always warm and
started instantly. There is so much I could write about BLN 644 and
BKX 865 - they were absolutely part of my life.
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Being a shunting engine driver prior to the Morris' arrival.
I am a steam engine person and was from a very young age. I always
rode on steam engines at Reading station and later I was taught to
drive one when we moved out to the west end of the county in 1953, I
was 12 - so I was a competent shunting engine driver a bit before I
started driving motors cars in the local scrap yard. Driving a
shunting engine is very skilful requiring a good sense of timing. I
picked up a lot about driving steam engines on long distance trains
from my footplate friends, and when I became a motor car driver (a bit
of a come down) I found that I drove steam engine style - shutting
off and coasting, anticipating gradients and getting into hill
climbing mode prior to the ascent. One hardly needs to bother
nowadays but with a weak, sidevalve engine and a 3-speed box skill
was needed to get the best b.h.p out of the little engine, and this
again was a source of much enjoyment.
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The thing to do was to 'learn
the road' as a steam engine driver did, learn what speeds bends can
be taken at, what 'line' to take around bends, how to come down a
hill fast but with the throttle eased off so that as you got to the
bottom of the downhill you began to press the pedal down until you
hit your best torque just as you started to climb. The engine needed
to be pulling up to its maximum bhp just as you started the climb and
then keep it at it - but as speed fell off ease the throttle slightly
so as not to choke the engine.
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Camping trip with the re-painted Series I Morris 8, BKX 562.
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My favourite road in those very early
days of car driving was from Reading to Wantage and especially the
length from the left-hand fork after Streatley, across the roller
coaster along the edge of the Berkshire Down. I could really make my
'8' fly and I once beat a new, Mk.1 Cortina between Streatley at
Harwell, Rowstock crossroads because I could judge the bends and the
hills better than him. Today I occasionally get the chance, usually
late at night, to let my 2 litre turbo Citroen off the leash and make
Fakenham from Barton Mills in 'even time', especially after I've
cleared Brandon. It's a matter of knowing just
how fast I can take each bend without getting over the white line.
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Driving is not a lot of fun these days. Too much traffic and there's
no point in burning vast amounts of diesel to overtake and them run
up behind the next car a mile up the road. So one just has to follow
along - but, as I say - occasionally I can do a Morris 8 over 50
miles of road I know absolutely intimately. In Morris 8 days I had
the car's engine perfectly timed - using a couple of wires and a 6
volt bulb across the points and the SU adjusted just so. I have read
that one of these cars top speed was 45!! I used to get mine up to 70
over Cotswold main road, long and straight with long down grades.
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I could go on! There were no worries, I had a good job on the
railway, I was only 20 or so and all I had to spend the wages on was
the car and me.
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The view of RD 8568 (at the top of this page) I took after I'd worked out a plan and driven her
about 12 miles across Berkshire Downs grass and plough - no roads of
any kind - cutting the barbed wires fence I came across here and
there. That was quite an epic but the little old car handled it
perfectly. The weather was fine and dry and had been so for some
time. 'RD' was the Reading registration.
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There is a picture of BKX out camping in Gloucestershire. I think I
was on my way to the Forest of Dean - I was having two day week-ends
photographing railways. I'd painted BKX in battleship grey because
she was 'a wolf in sheep's clothing'! Oh dear! 'KX 'was the Buckinghamshire registration.
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The third view shows two extremes - a mass produced Morris 1935/6 and
a 1952 Lanchester with a coachbuilt Barker body and of course a pre-
selector gearbox. Carefree days!
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All the best, Adrian.
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One of the Morris 8s, parked with a post-war Lanchester.
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Thanks again for your story Adrian!
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Visit the motoring memories pages at oldclassiccar for more stories like this, including another owner's recollections of owning a Morris 8.
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Various pre-war Morrises feature in the vintage gallery on this site, to see more photos similar to Adrians simply visit the Morris 8 Series 1 and Series 2 pages in the gallery.
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