Standard Triumph – Driven To Write

Fin de Siècle

We compare a pair of late ’50s fintails.

1959 Ford Anglia (c) favcars

Nobody quite realised at the time, but 1959 would mark peak-tailfin – this styling device falling out of fashion almost as abruptly as it emerged. But while the tailfin’s retreat would be particularly rapid in its country of origin, the European industry, having been slower to adapt in the first instance, was equally tardy in abandoning it.

Of course, it’s worth reminding ourselves of motor industry lead-times – the period between styling sign-off and job-one. Certainly, when Ford’s UK arm conceived the 105E-series Anglia, nobody could possibly Continue reading “Fin de Siècle”

Shadowing Beams In Winter Throw Paths Of Inky Black

We will conclude this small inspection of a modestly sized portion of a fraction of Europe’s motoring history by reviewing what the Daily Express said about Triumph and Rover cars in the late 60s.

Every year the Daily Express published a guide to coincide with the annual London car show (which took place in London, England). Basil Cardew edited the guide. The book I am quoting shows an image of a fellow in a studio photograph who is actually wearing a hat. But let us Continue reading “Shadowing Beams In Winter Throw Paths Of Inky Black”

Past Shadowed Beams Lean The Wintry Rays

The ostensible initial aim of this small article was to find out how many engines British Leyland had around about the mid-1970s. I didn’t answer that question at all. So, what did I discover?

Before getting very far (as in reading one single page of the internet) I learned that truck and bus maker Leyland Motors Limited owned Triumph (acquired 1960) and Rover (acquired 1967) before LMC got merged with the British Motor Corporation in 1968 (bringing Austin, Morris, MG, Mini, Wolseley et al to the party). That puts a slightly different light on the later fate of Triumph. Conceivably LMC might have been able to Continue reading “Past Shadowed Beams Lean The Wintry Rays”

Wintry Shadows Creep As The Beams Fall Aslant

Today we have a small lesson in what amounts to a leafy cul-de-sac off a side-road in a dead-end of British motoring history.

For me the Rover SD1’s is a story starring the Buick-derived V8, a car known as the 3500 or 3500S. That’s the car that gets much of the press, it seems to me. That being the case, I have but a vague, passive knowledge about the 2300 and 2600,meaning if you asked me to Continue reading “Wintry Shadows Creep As The Beams Fall Aslant”

Mutiny About the Bounty

S.V. Robinson discusses the political and industrial shenanigans that presaged the Triumph Acclaim, sired by Project Bounty.

“Would the Government be prepared to throw away this pioneering agreement between a British and a Japanese motor company, which might encourage wider moves to transplant the benefit of Japanese technology and efficiency to Britain?” Sir Michael Edwardes, ‘Back from the Brink’.

As a car, the Triumph Acclaim can claim little of note that is ground breaking. It is a car that, infamously, was not conceived as a Triumph. More subtly, by the time Acclaim came to be, Triumph itself was a brand without a range of cars, just a single model, built in Morris’s Cowley factory to design, engineering and production specifications developed in Tokyo.

Were it not for BL’s product planners’ persistent and ultimately futile attempts to Continue reading “Mutiny About the Bounty”

Another “Triumph” for British Leyland

In what appears to be a verbatim transcript of a period review motoring correspondent, Archie Vicar, drives the 1981 Triumph “Acclaim” saloon.

_{The article first appeared in The Executive Motorist, August 1981. Original photography by Griff Piddough. Due to water damage to the original material, stock photos have been used.}

Many drivers will regard the Triumph Dolomite with much fondness. It was launched as the Toledo in 1965, which by my reckoning is now fifteen years ago, back when BL was known as BMC and Harold Wilson was prime minister. It is a tribute to this feisty little vehicle that only now has BL has reluctantly decided to put it out to pasture. We wish it a long and happy retirement!

To replace the Dolomite there comes a bold new design, one created in collaboration with the Honda motor company of Japan. Ringing the changes are modern front-wheel drive, a passenger door-mounted mirror and an all-alloy, twin carb overhead-cam 1.3 liter motor. Cleverly, the new car is called the “Acclaim” as it is this with which the car will certainly be greeted by one and all. Continue reading “Another “Triumph” for British Leyland”

An Early Case Of Retro

Recently we’ve been looking at the Lancia Y10 and asking whether luxury and compactness are compatible.

Here’s one they made earlier. Image : autoshite.com — Image : autoshite.com

Seventy years ago Triumph thought so. Introduced in late 1949, like most of the UK Motor Industry production of the time, the Triumph Mayflower was chasing exports. As the chosen name suggests, the United States was a prime potential market but it seems that the UK’s image of the US’s image of the UK is forever distorted. Just like Ford’s stewardship of Jaguar, Triumph felt that a traditionalist approach was what US buyers expected from a UK company, this at a time when everyone was looking to the future. Continue reading “An Early Case Of Retro”

Sideswipe

Driven to Write takes aim at Triumph’s putative TR7 successor and gives it both barrels.

1979 Triumph Broadside proposal. Image: Driven to Write

The Triumph TR7 is one of those unfortunate cars that if it hadn’t suffered from bad luck it would have had no luck at all. Created as the former BLMC slid towards bankruptcy and public ownership, its development was bedevilled by financial and regulatory uncertainty. Once in the public gaze its appearance proved divisive, enthusiasts criticising its performance, the lack of a convertible version and ‘soft’ road behaviour. Triumph engineers had remedies for all of these matters, but time and again events would prove the car’s undoing. Continue reading “Sideswipe”

Opening Up the TR7 Envelope

Spot a Triumph TR7 in a car park and you may well experience something rather strange.

triumphtr7-01

Unenlightened passers-by won’t give it a second look, whereas examples of most of its boxy contemporaries would attract their immediate attention. The last of the TRs shares with its Rover SD1 stablemate an ability to blend into the 21^st century carscape, despite originating over forty years ago. Continue reading “Opening Up the TR7 Envelope”

Ashtrays: Triumph TR8

In the Triumph naming system, the TR numbers indicated a new body. Not the TR8.

The ’65-67 TR4a had a four-cylinder 2.1 litre unit. The ’67-68 TR5 had a straight six 2.5 litre unit as did the TR6 which ran to 1976. Then Triumph reverted to a 2.0 litre four with the TR7. Oddly then the TR8 name served to indicate a new engine, the Rover V8 and not a new body. But it’s the disappointing ashtray that we’re here to Continue reading “Ashtrays: Triumph TR8”

Micropost: 1963-1969 Triumph 2500 PI

The series 2 looked better with the single-frame front end, one of Michelotti’s triumphs, if you’ll pardon the pun.

1963-1969 Triumph 2500 PI: fuel injected, straight-six, rear drive.

The car here still has a lot going for it: great detailing around the glasshouse and smashing proportions, power and comfort. Was it British or Italian? The Italian cars never looked so strong and the British cars seldom so imaginatively detailed. Continue reading “Micropost: 1963-1969 Triumph 2500 PI”

1976 Triumph Toledo

This is what I have in mind when I think of a Toledo/Dolomite: one in flat burgundy paint parked outside a damp Victorian house.

There are lots of houses like this in Dublin.

It’s 1983 in the inner suburbs of Dublin and these are parked on every other street. You know the owner hates it and the next car will be a Corolla. The image is from aronline, of course.

Theme: Benchmarks – From Standard to Acclaim

The only constant is change.

What once passed for normal, becomes a rarity (think: Renault 12). Usage debases the value of language so while our words remain set on the page, the meanings attached to them drift off and new meanings, hunting for home, attach themselves. So it is that the world outside our head is unstable and shifting and the words inside our heads lose value like sweating gold coin in a sack or drachmas, lire and roubles in wallets.

This is getting very post-modern, isn’t it? The word for a fixed reference changes its meaning and the thing it refers to changes as well. It’s all relative now, kids. Continue reading “Theme: Benchmarks – From Standard to Acclaim”

Theme : Engines – The 1970 Triumph Stag V8

Ah, the Triumph Stag V8, the stuff of classic car legends.

It’s all there for a long chat at the pub: dashed hopes, shoddy Midlands workmanship, the dark days of British Leyland’s decline. There’s even a bit of Italian in there, as Giovanni Michelotti styled the car. The bit we’re interested in is the V8 though.

This unit was conceived in the middle of the 60s in response to the growing demands of the UK market for more powerful engines as the motorway system expanded. Continue reading “Theme : Engines – The 1970 Triumph Stag V8”

Triumph Dolomite Review

Archie Vicar tests three sporting saloons: Triumph’s Dolomite, Lancia’s Fulvia and Alfa Romeo’s evergreen Giulia.

_{From the Driving & Motoring Weekly Guide, 1972. Photos by Nigel de la Warr. Owing to the unfortunate theft of Mr. De la Warr’s Nikons, stock photography has been used.}

Small sporting saloons are becoming an important if quite tiny part of the market place. Naturally, the large family car will always remain the most popular choice for the suburban motorist and business-man on the move. But, for the fellow who likes energetic driving and who also needs to Continue reading “Triumph Dolomite Review”