Classic cars forum & vehicle restoration.

[gresham flyer]

Hello,
Has anyone an Austin Devon.
A friend has one for sale,I am tempted to buy it.
It is a black four door model with a sunroof circu 1951. It is in good original condition,and on the road,what is the price guide I should be approaching him with.

Regards
Gresham

[Rick]

I had a '49 Devon until fairly recently, it was quite a nice one also in black. Value of that one? About 3k, although mine ended up with a dealer who was asking a fair bit more for it, and I'm sure it has sold on again now. The sunroof is a nice rare option that mine didn't have.

RJ
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[gresham flyer]

Hello,
I have been told he is looking for £2500.00,so it sounds good.
What are they like as a usuable classic car.I suppose with such a small engine the cruising speed would be about 45-50 miles an hour without revving the engine too much.
What is the ride like and handling like,?
I have not been in the one I was told about,so am unsure about them.

Gresham

[Rick]

They drive pretty well. Performance is leisurely from its 1200cc (pre-B Series) engine, and cylinder head gasket wobbles are not unusual.

The separate chassis means that they can soldier on for years even if the visible bodywork is suffering. Check the sills, boot floor and under the rear seats.

I tended to drive at 40-45mph but it would have done more. Shortly before selling it I switched to correct-size crossplies and I found it drove much nicer (lighter steering etc) though I suppose ultimate grip, compared to the previous radials, wouldn't be as good. I have read of people installing A70 diffs in them to up the gearing a bit, probably a good "mod" but A70 diffs aren't too plentiful.

Devons and Somersets aren't blessed with great suspension damping, so they can pitch up and down a bit on bouncy roads - but probably no worse than anything else of that age.

Mine had a four-speed floorchange gearbox, later ones (not sure of date) switched to Somerset-style column shifters, but I prefer floorchange.

Overall a nice car, and getting rare now in good nick. Devons are much rarer than Somersets too, rarest of the lot though is the 2-door Dorset.

hth, RJ

PS photos of mine here:
http://www.oldclassiccar.co.uk/a40_devon_photos.htm
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[Richard H]

They are not fast, imagine A30 type performance and you won't be far off. If it has a column change check all the gears engage easily (especially first) as they can be very awkward when the linkage gets a bit worn. As Rick says check for evidence of head gasket problems, the 1200 A40 engine is notorious for it. If there's a bill for head skimming with the car it can be a good sign.

[British heritage cars]

[Keith D]

Gresham,

I have the Australian built A40 tourer which is mechanically identical to the floorchange Devon. The Devons were all floorchange with mechanical/hydraulic brakes until mid 1950, then they were column change with full hydraulic brakes right through to and including the Somersets. Like Rick, I prefer the floorchange, but linkage problems notwithstanding, the column change gearbox itself was generally considered the better of the two.

I cannot tell you what a fair price would be in the UK, as me and my car live in Oz.

As far as are they a nice car to drive. I can answer, in my opinion YES! It is good enough for me to have had mine continually licenced and in use for almost 40 years and I have no intention of getting rid of it!

If the car is a floorchange model with mechanical/hydraulic brakes, this should not frighten you. Provided the bisector unit is kept in good condition and adjustment, the brakes are as good as the hydraulics. My car has completely standard braking mechanism and I have no plans to change anything.

I must be honest and say that I modified my car with the installation of a 1622cc BMC series B motor and the higher geared diff (A70) almost as soon as I bought it. In those days A70 diffs were freely available.

I have always run the car on standard sized cross-ply tyres and will not change this.

Rick has made a very good point regarding the front shock absorbers. They are very poor! I always reckoned you needed to be a sailor to drive an A40! However, back in the fifties in Australia, a company called Repco (after market specialists) offered a telescopic shock absorber kit that I have had on mine for the last thirty odd years and this solves that problem completely! I can prepare you full details and some dimensioned sketches of these if you require them. They would not be hard to fabricate.

Keith

[Nick.S.]

hello, new member here, i bought my austin devon for $10 from my uncle (thats what he paid for it)
this repco telescopic shock absorber kit, does it look like angle iron welded with a cap at the top to hold the tube shock? does it go just behind the armstrong shock? all rather nicely welded and bolted together? if that is what it is, i think thats what my car has.