Adrian_pt

Opel tried to flog their models here in the 50s and 60s - but must have been very few sold. Interestingly* London seems to have had a fair few of the more unusual foreign makes. Here's an Olympia Caravan. German makes also had a crack in the UK in the late 30s - a friend's great uncle was the Auto Union dealer in London and till a few years ago the family had an original 1938 DKW in the garage. DKWs were the most popular, I think, but hardly made an impact and then other events got in the way.

This 1938 Opel, with extended bootlid, was in regular "normal" use till a couple of years ago in rural Romania. There's a rebodied Willys Jeep from 1942 which was also going strong till recently - and quite a few prewar cars made it into the 90s. One guy bought a BMW 327 new before the war and kept it till 2005, having fled with it to West Germany in the late 60s. Stayed with a French family a few years ago who were still using Land Rovers they'd bought new in the 50s. I've kept the Saab 90 for 17 years and it was 20 years old when I got it...

There are three left, which is pretty impressive given only 481 24s made it over. Sadly the guy who took the photo can't remember where exactly, but there was a lot of interest around it last year. Here's the same car in the 80s.

Imagine the name had Ghia done it

Bucharest, 1974. Oddly proportioned sedan. I wouldn't be fixated on the Eastern bloc location - literally anything could be found on its streets back then. Opel Rekord perhaps?

Soviet bitsa. They made lots of them, some stylish, a lot complete lash-ups. Same kind of stuff was going on elsewhere in the Eastern bloc - and indeed in immediate post-war Germany and Austria. The most bonkers one I've heard of was this, made from two 125 motorbikes welded together with a home-made body up top - at some stage in the 60s it even had a facelift to give it quad headlights. Power came from ... both engines.

I daily a B reg, but by daily I mean weekend / skip / shop runs as I'm based in central London. About 5k a year, much more this year as I ended up doing a lot of travelling across the UK. For me it's doable if 1) it's a decently made car in the first place 2) you don't skimp on the maintenance and 3) it has enough poke to keep up with motorway traffic. Smiles per gallon easily offsets the lack of creature comforts (cold wet mornings are a pain) and the fact that things will at some point go wrong. Had it for 16 years, no real plans to change - I'll even take the Ulez hit. But I'll be the first to say it's not for everyone. I did, about three years ago, have to daily (as in 2000+km a month) a 1984 Dacia for a couple of months...

Behind the Iron Curtain it was simply that black was the colour for official cars and the use of one would advertise how, er, close you were to the powers-that-be. I remember reading that estate cars were similarly out of favour in the USSR due to their resemblance to ambulances.

Registered August 83, though sales stopped in 1980 or 1981. The seller claims it's a 1975 model, which it definitely isn't - but it does seem like it hung around unsold for a couple of years.

The Fiat 131 Marengo was a new one on me - two-door estate sold as a commercial vehicle for a couple of years. Lonsdales must be on every street corner by comparison.

One UK market Duster has survived in .... Murmansk. Apparently imported in around 1990 by a local sailor. Seems to be in nice nick too.

Suffolk, UK collector. Yeah it's a shame to see them leave the UK - I think the problem is that RHD cars are a bit of a holy grail for collectors over there, so they are prepared to seek them out and be top bidder.

Yes - one in as-new condition, unregistered since new, Suffolk IIRC, and another in the Highlands in dire nick. Another minibus recently died a death. They were actually imported (like the AROs) in two goes - one in around 1975 and the other from 1979 till around 1981. Not popular! Interestingly* the UAZ was being imported at roughly the same time, known as the Trekmaster.

Looks to be an original UK car. For some reason (am sure others can enlighten) lots of Euro and US cars imported from the 30s onwards had much shorter plates - ABC11, NUC9E etc. They crop up a bit in period photos and the odd survivor.

That's gone straight into the replacement steed (a JRG 2003 X-type)