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Keep up to date with the latest news and events from the world of classic cars.
MEET THE OWNER – CHRISTOPHER SHURLOCK AND HIS MG COLLECTION
- 27th March, 2023
I had no interest in MG cars as a young man and certainly not as a family man when other things were more important. It was only when I was approaching retirement in 2001 that I was looking for new interests. A chance trip to our local MG-Rover dealers had me looking at a new Solar Red MGF in the showroom.
Meet The Owner – Mark Lee-Kilgariff and his Peugeot J7
- 23rd March, 2023
Man, van, plan. That was Mark Lee-Kilgariff four years ago – and since opening his coffee shop to the locals around Knutsford, Cheshire, he hasn’t looked back. Tatton Perk is its name; while he now has two static locations around the town, the business began trading from a 1976 Peugeot J7 van outside the local railway station.
Meet the Owner – Alastair Fitton and his Rover 75, ‘Grace’
- 23rd March, 2023
It’s fair to say that Alastair Fitton, founder of the Bus Stop Model Museum in Rochdale, Greater Manchester, was in the right place at the right time when an early Rover 75 came his way. Not that he was on the hunt for an example of Rover’s last great hope, you understand; he’d simply handed over £120 to stop the scrap man from carting it away.
MEET THE OWNER – RUSSELL MACFARLANE AND HIS FORD ESCORT GL MK. III
- 23rd March, 2023
A few years ago, Russell was the proud owner of a Cortina 1300 ‘Base’ 2-Door Mk. V, but this classic Ford marked the pathway to decadence. No more would Mr. Macfarlane be satisfied with beige paintwork. But now, he craved the luxury of a dashboard with a quartz clock.
MEET THE OWNER – CHRISTINE LYNNE BROWN AND HER COMMER HIGHWAYMAN
- 23rd March, 2023
The Commer was once part of the fabric of life in the UK – delivering milk, bread and groceries, attending to a telephone box vandalised by the local scooter boy gang or even starring in one of the best-remembered public information films of the 1970s:
The Day I Encountered a Series 79 Buick Roadmaster Estate Wagon
- 23rd March, 2023
“Starting a 79 calls for a faintly disconcerting procedure; you turn the key and then press the throttle pedal to the floor, thereby activating a vacuum operated starter button.
The Lancia Fulvia Berlina at 60
- 23rd March, 2023
If you were visiting the Geneva Motor Show in 1963, the new model on the Lancia stand would probably have drawn your eye. The bodywork, by Piero Castagnero, was low-key in the manner of many bourgeoisie Italian saloons, but to lift the bonnet was to be mesmerised.
THE RELIANT KITTEN – THE 57.5 MPG CAR
- 23rd March, 2023
The name of Reliant is so associated with three-wheelers that its small four-wheel saloons are too often overlooked. They launched the Kitten at the 1975 Earls Court Motor to replace the long-established Rebel.
THE 2023 LONDON CLASSIC CAR SHOW
- 15th March, 2023
Last month’s London Classic Car Show at the Kensington Olympia was an event that put many visitors in a quandary – i.e. how could I afford one of many utterly tempting exhibits without putting my entire family on eBay? It was not just the Porsche display celebrating 60 years of the 911. It was not just the trio of Harold Radford-bodied Minis that were initially the property of George Harrison, Paul McCartney and Richard Starkey, aka Ringo Starr.
Meet the Owner – Amir Keshvari and his Sunbeam Vogue
- 15th March, 2023
When the Rootes Group introduced their ‘Arrow’ series models at the 1966 - London Motor Show - (49) EARLS COURT MOTOR SHOW - COLOUR - YouTube, they founded a dynasty. There were Hillmans, Humbers, Singers, Sunbeams and Chryslers, with a choice of saloon, estate, coupe and, for some markets, pick-up trucks. In addition, on 1 February 1965, Rootes and the Iran National Company signed a ‘technical assistance’.
SIR MICHAEL CAINE AT 90
- 13th March, 2023
And to celebrate Sir Michael’s 90th birthday – a very subjective ‘Top Ten’ of his best automotive moments on the silver screen: Blind Spot – 1958. Or, a typical 1950s British B-film, made with an apparent budget of 2/6d. MC is the caddish villain who tries to evade the Wolseley 6/80 of Justice in a Victor F-Type, only for it to magically transform into a 1934 Hudson Eight post-explosion.
The World Cup Escort’s legacy is still felt on classic rally stages today
- 8th March, 2023
‘Win on Sunday, sell on Monday’ – an apt phrase for the Ford Motor Company and none more so, in Europe at least, for the Escort. The Blue Oval’s small car contender was rallied from day one of its public career, picking up where the career of the Cortina MkII had left off.
Staying positive: when EVs go off the beaten track
- 8th March, 2023
In our last feature on battery converted classics, Lancaster Insurance Services met Matthew Quitter of London Electric Cars and his modified 1953 Morris Minor, now running as an electric vehicle in and around the capital.
Carbon offsetting for classics: two sides of the environmental coin flip
- 8th March, 2023
While the extent to which historic vehicles pollute is debated, their tailpipe emissions remain the most contentious issue. The continued burning of fossil fuels, for need of a better description, is what the aims of Net Zero environmental policies aim to stop – the curtailment of so-called ‘greenhouse gases’ heating up the planet.
