Classic cars forum & vehicle restoration.

[exbmc]

[split from the Usernames thread]

[P3steve]

That brings back memories of the time I spent at a leyland garage it was in the mid seventies so it was at the tail end of the old Leyland but I was there for the launch of the Metro and the princes and SD1 Rovers and the Morris Ital but the surprising thing was just how many old now classic cars we still had on our books as service customers and not preserved cars as well as shed loads of Minors, austin 1100 and 1300s, minis and the such like I remember a Triumph Renown that used to belong to an old guy who brought it in every six months for a service, I recall doing a decoke on a Triumph Mayflower also frogeye sprites most being run on a budget by students etc an Austin Healy 3000 mk 2, wolsley 44/4s and MG Magnets lots of herolds and sixties triumph 2000s and front wheel drive triumph 1300 (minds gone blank on the name but you know which one I mean) I remember lots of P4, P5 and P6 rovers I recall our show room selling the our last P6 which was a 3500 S, white with a black vinal top and I recall fitting the spare wheel mount on the boot during the PDI check. I can remember one of the last XJ6C to be sold it sat in the show room for about six month it was a "sand" colour but the paint job was so poor that the wings had runs on them such was the standard at the time. The two P5s we had on our books both coups the last two sold by our garage belonged to local company directors one was burgandy with a cream roof and the other a dark blue with a gray roof both were kept in tip top order no expence spared infact I seemed they were regarded higher than the jags. as a young lad I didnt get to work on much of the top stuff most of my time being on austins and triumphs and such like (became a dab hand at pumping suspensions up and done more trunions than I care to recall) forgive me but i could go on all night good times though when we still fixed cars not just replaced parts, ps the chap who was in charge of the body shop had a 1934 Rover Ten and he took me to a few shows which with all the cars we had come in to the garage started my interest in old cars

[exbmc]

Steve, you seem to have similar memories to me, we should have a meet up some time. This thread is about our user names, but we have digressed a bit! The front wheel drive Triumph had no name, I am sure they were just Triumph 1300 and 1500. Names came back with the rear drive 1300, which was Toledo, then they were Dolomite 1500, 1850 and Sprint. The old 4/44 Wolseley was quite common for me too, even though the 15/50 had been superseded by the 16/60 and 16/60 farina's by the time I started work.
People just don't take old motors to main dealers now.

[P3steve]

On the FWD Triumphs I can remember doing the clutchs by removing the shaft from inside and changing the dougnuts on the drive shafts as well as general servicing. funny story we once took in a soft top herold as a trade in though to be fair it was an early form of the scrappage scheme as it wasnt worth anything at the time and was just taken to justify the dicount I believe. It sat behind the garage for six months and when I passed my driving test the garage owner gave it to me saying if I could repair it to MOT standard I could have it for free it being he said a good way to practice my welding etc. I took the key and went round to inspect my new prize but unbeknown to me over the six months it had been standing it had filled up with rain water - the door seals being so good they hadnt let any water out so when I opened the door gallons of water poured out and filled my boots before I could jump clear. After my mates had stopped laughing we dropped the top down pulled out all the carpets and layed them all over the bonnet to dry, it was summer so within a few days it had dried out and although a bit stiff as the carpets and seats had been under water they hadnt rotted the floor pan was ok after a wire brush and a bit of paint. When finnished I ran it for six month and sold it on for a profit as well, oh happy carefree days

[clan chieftain]

You two wouldnt have any marina bits lying about would you.....
I have enjoyed very much the origins of usernames. I used to use "The Clan Chieftain " as I started Marina Ecosse after we broke away from the owners club.
_________________
The Clan Chieftain

[Rick]

Great to read about your memories guys, keep 'em coming! Would you mind if I split this out into its own thread, I think it'd be worth it!

rgds, Rick
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[P3steve]

Go for it Rick as I said at the risk of boring every one I could go on for ages,
The Triumph Renown that we had in for servicing was owned by an old chap (most likly long gone now but I hope the car survived) who had I believe had it from new, at his age he didnt drive very much and I think only took the car out once a week to take his wife shopping (Thursdays because it was market day), not being very mobile he would park up and wait for his wife while waiting he would polish the car subsequently over the years the Renown being the razor edge model the paint on the edges of all the panals had been polished off down to the undercoat making the car look like it had coach lining all along the edge of every panal with the car being burgundy in colour this did I recall look quite good.
One must realise that things didnt go right all the time and I remember one mechanic (not me) who was replacing the front hubs on a wire wheeled Austin Healy sprite mk 2 because of spline wear and he put them on the wrong sides (the spinner threads being handed left and right thread so they wouldnt unwind, the car did about 30 miles before a wheel came off - there was hell to pay for that one.
The Austin Healey 3000 mk 2 we had in belonged to the wife of one of the P5 owners I mentioned earlier and in those pre health and safty days people would walk straight into the work shop and the first you would know of her presance was when you would look up from under the bonnet and she would be standing next to you (all the other older and wiser mechanic having hid when they saw her pull up) she always looked very glamerous and always wore a leopard skin fur coat and sunglasses what ever the weather and she would say something like "Oh hello darling would you be a good boy and come and have a look at the motor" which would end up with her driving at hair raising speeds round town with the top down (what ever the weather) while you tried to hear a squeak or knocking noise she claimed she could hear. I remember what a job I had setting the carbs up on it as they were a sod to get to with my big hands and a spanner and before the preservation specalists got going and general parts had started to dry up for it we had to build an exhaust for it using MGC boxes and pipes cutting and welding them up to fit the Healey. In the body shop they still lead loaded most of the repairs and I spent a spell in there and learnt to lead load quite well. Did I make mistakes - oh yes I could make boobs as well as the next chap one time while working on a Marina estate I left the tail gate up while raising it on a ramp the first sign of trouble being when I heard a crunching sound as the tail gate came into contact with one of the roof beams (not in the boses good books for that one) another time slamming a bonnet down on an MG Midgit after forgeting to check I had cleared all the tools away and left a nice screw driver shaped dent in the bonnet, oh well no ones perfect

[Rick]

Fascinating stuff. Interesting to read about the paint finish on the XJ6C. A lot of people say now that quality control wasn't really that bad in the 70s at BL, but a glance at the letters pages in old copies of MotorSport magazine would suggest otherwise. How bad did QC get??? eg did Dolly Sprints always break down? and were the "Friday afternoon" cars really that much worse than the rest???

Rick
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Rick - Admin
Home:https://www.oldclassiccar.co.uk
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[bob2]

Love this thread keep them coming!!!!

[Rusty]

Gee blokes this is an interesting thread !
A lot of your memories are simmilar to mine, I did an aprenticship with the Western Australian BMC distributors down in Perth, "Winterbottom Motors" ! They were the distributor and handled all the imported Jags Triumphs MGs ect as well as supplying the locally built and locally assembled Austins Morris's ect. I learned the trade on Minis, 1100s, 1800s, and other older BMCs like Wolselys Rileys and other imported models and some home grown Australian derivitives like the Austin Freeway / Wolseley 24/80 which were 6 cyl B series A 60 type sedans and the Austin Tasman & Kimberley X6 series that were 6 cyl E series OHC engined 1800s with a squarer body (I don't think they made it to the UK). As for Quality control (mentioned in an earlyer post), I remember one brand new Morris 1100 coming in from the distributors section (I worked in the "workshop") with a miss they couldn't find. After doing a compression test one of the blokes found no compression in number 3 cylinder. After getting a long piece of wire he poked it down the plughole and it dissapeared all the way into the gearbox, "no number 3 piston or rod assembly in the engine" or the P76 (local large V8 sedan from the 70s) with a vibration. Turned out to be the block mating surface to the bell housing only half machined. It had one side machined in the normal way but halfway across the mating surface it was just raw casting, no idea how it happened. As for silly things I did as an aprentice, I recon the silliest was accidentally topping up an XJ6 battery with brake fluid !! If you don't know when you introduce brake fluid to a battery it will bubble up spewing out frothey battery acid all over the rocker pannel and nearby components. (looks like shaken up lemonade coming out of a can)

I could go on for hours about those days but I have probibaly bored you enough already !
Graham

[Rick]

[P3steve]

I dont think that the BL car on the whole were no better or worse than any other make most of the cars built at the time Maxi's, Marina's and Alegro's would come in for servicing and you wouldnt see them for another six months the big Triumphs never giving any trouble either. The garage boss ran a series 1 4.2 Daimler which was kept immaculate and as an apprentice it was one of the few "jags" I was allowed to work on usally under the guidance of the garage forman. A father and son who owned a local insurance agents ran a nice MGC convertable in British racing green and a yellow Dolly Sprint which went like the wind and never seemed to go wrong. So impressed was I with the dolly that I brought a 1975 sprint which had been sold by our garage a few years before.
It was only four years old and I had often serviced the car and thought I knew it quite well zeibarted from new with full service history in White with no overdrive but bugger me it must have been the slowesr sprint Triumph ever made and the day I brought it I must have invoked a curse because anything that could go wrong did and even though it had been rust proofed it rotted from the inside out, it ate water pumps (ended up putting a sixteen vane rally pump on in the end) but also ended up putting a new block in it when it dropped its crank thrust bearings on the M1 motorway and before I spotted it it had ruined the block, The parts department did me a special deal and a new block complete with crank pistons etc sill in its packing cost me £100 all in. The trouble started when we tried to get the head off the steel studs had reacted with the alloy head and was stuck fast in the end we had to hang the whole car on the unbolted head for about two days on an engine hoist while I kept spraying penertrating fluid down the side of the studs on the third morning when we came into work the car had dropped and you could see a gap between head and block. The trouble didnt end there as after rebuilding the engine and starting it up the sump filled with coolant in the end we found the one of the water ways had corroded so badly that the coolant was leaking into and running down the side of the stud into the sump. with the head off and by now running out of money a cheap solution was found and a friend who worked at a local engineering firm (always good to have friends in areas like this) over bored the stud holes (three were suspected) and freeze fitted steel sleeves into them which worked a treat for the rest of the time I had the car. I vowed I would never own another Triumph but a few years later brought a TR6 but that's another story.

[P3steve]

One thing that sticks in my mind was when the 2.3 and 2.6 6 cylinder SD1 Rovers started to come through, we did a lot of warranty work replacing a spring and ball bearing in the oil pressurs relief valve which on some cars made a very noisy "buzzing" sound

[Penman]

Hi

[exbmc]