Harris Mann – Driven To Write

Running With Scissors [Part Three]

Questions of style.

There are certain irrefutable qualities which help determine successful product design. Of these, appearance, while arguably the least important in absolute terms, is the most easily perceived, and clearly the most subjective, but it goes without saying that in the absence of a robust visual appeal, even the best wrought product will struggle. The Allegro’s appearance forms an essential component of its subsequent notoriety, but like most aspects of the car’s iconography, this aspect of ADO67 remains subject to varying levels of hysteria.

The Allegro’s style garnered little overt press criticism^[1] at its introduction. This would not have been unusual behaviour from the home team – but in this instance the UK press may have been a little over-keen to Continue reading “Running With Scissors [Part Three]”

Disappointment at the Ambassador’s Reception

The 1982 Austin Ambassador was a poorly executed attempt to update the BL Princess and was met largely with indifference in the market. DTW examines why the Ambassador was such a flop.

The old axiom that “You never get a second chance to make a first impression” may be literally correct, but that does not stop people trying. The British Leyland 18-22 Series is a case in point. It was launched in February 1975 under three different BL marque names, Austin, Morris and Wolseley, each distinguished with its own bonnet and front grille treatment, but nothing else in the case of the Austin and Morris versions. The Wolseley had a light dusting of the more upmarket fixtures traditionally associated with the marque, including its rather twee illuminated grille badge.

The 18-22 Series was a quite stylish wedge-shaped four-door D-segment saloon, replacing the spacious but frumpy 1800/2200 LandCrab. It was designed under Harris Mann, Head of BL’s Longbridge design studio. Despite its profile, it did not have a hatchback, but a conventional boot. At the time it was launched, BL insisted that its research showed this was what the market wanted, but a more likely explanation is that BL didn’t want to Continue reading “Disappointment at the Ambassador’s Reception”

Two Word Epitaph

The Triumph TR7 Convertible embodied the BL charter in microcosm.

“If only this could have been the TR7 that was launched five years ago instead of the poorly-assembled and inadequately developed Speke-built versions that so quickly acquired a tarnished reputation.” [Howard Walker, Motor – August 30 1980.]

If only. Those two simple words perhaps most poignantly encapsulate the British Leyland charter. Because amid the egos, the politics, the industrial strife and lost hopes chiselled onto BL’s cenotaph, there were also well-conceived, rational motor cars which deserved a better fate. Continue reading “Two Word Epitaph”

Period Road Test: 1975 Morris 2200 HL

In what might very well be a verbatim transcript of a period road test, legendary road-tester Archie Vicar takes a closer look at the 1975 Morris 2200 HL and considers its chances in the market of the time.

The article (“Another new car from Morris!”) first appeared in the Scottish Daily News (November 1, 1975). Douglas Land-Windermere is credited for the original photos. Due to sun damage, the original images have been replaced by stock photos.

As Morris settles into its third quarter century (founded in 1912) it is a distinct pleasure to see it marque (!) the occasion by the presentation of this fine car which will no doubt help take the venerable firm forward into the late 70s and thus also help it Continue reading “Period Road Test: 1975 Morris 2200 HL”

Waiting For the Miracle

Today we posit something of a counterfactual. What if Maestro had preceded Metro?

Madge and Maestro – Downing Street 1983. Image credit: (c) BBC

Picking over the bones of long dead car companies is one of the more futile pastimes one can engage in, but in the case of British Leyland, it’s irresistible. So many factors contributed to the British car giant’s demise however, that to single out one area is to grossly over-simplify the larger, more nuanced, and far more depressing picture.

A former Jaguar engineering director once told me that BL’s senior management were in his words, ‘not of the first order’ and given their respective track records, both during the latter stages of the BMH period, in the years leading up to BLMC’s collapse in 1974, and during the post-Ryder era, it’s difficult to Continue reading “Waiting For the Miracle”

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”