The Wedgister - Princess and Ambassador Records

[HMC]

^ unsure if suspension fail or pot hole ?

[theshadow]

they drove onto sand dunes,deffo  no droopy suspension?

[quicksilver]

Only two Princesses to report from the BL Autumn Rally and both well-known cars: XUH 535T (still looking great in Reynard) and our very own Retr0naut's MPC 389W.

[flat4alfa]

Fetched today

Saved from a ‘webuyanycar’ phone call threat. Yes, you read that right

It has the PAS

[flat4alfa]

Then borrowed this to get home from the lock-up hideaway

[vulgalour]

I have been very busy updating ALL the pictures.  I'm just going back through now and seeing what I might have missed in more recent posts so I can update again.  Thank you everyone for keeping an eye out and updating on new finds.  Eventually I will go through and make a survivor list to get a better idea of which ones are still out there.

Good luck with SUD, F4F, that looks a bit of a gem.

[Avensis Verso]

Absolute lustfest for me i have always had a thing about the Princess and Ambassador ,  underated car

[dozeydustman]

Next time I'm at my parent's I'll see if they have any photos anywhere with our old Princess in them. Grandad bought it new in 1976, 2200HLS on a P plate, then gave it to us in 1984 when he bought his 505 estate (giving my aunt a Chevette at the same time). In 1986 the princess went back to grandad as it had something wrong with it, so he gave us an Avenger he rescued.

Princess was a month or so old when it was mum & dad's wedding car in September 1976

[ETCHY]

The Princess story is so sad. It could have been a major hit, it looked great,rode well,had tons of space but somehow BL managed to fuck it up by making customers do the development work so it got a bad name early in it's life. If Ford had released it,it would have done well, with BL in charge it didn't (sadly) have a hope.

Defeat snatched from the jaws of victory!!

[quicksilver]

40 minutes ago, ETCHY said:

The Princess story is so sad. It could have been a major hit, it looked great,rode well,had tons of space but somehow BL managed to fuck it up by making customers do the development work so it got a bad name early in it's life. If Ford had released it,it would have done well, with BL in charge it didn't (sadly) have a hope.

Defeat snatched from the jaws of victory!!

Substitute Princess for Maxi, Maestro, Metro, SD1 or anything else from the BL stable. Releasing under-developed cars was the story of BL's life and they never seemed to learn their lesson

[ETCHY]

10 minutes ago, quicksilver said:

Substitute Princess for Maxi, Maestro, Metro, SD1 or anything else from the BL stable. Releasing under-developed cars was the story of BL's life and they never seemed to learn their lesson

Yep totally agree, add Allegro,Marina & TR7 to the list too. The level of ineptitude is shocking and very sad. It could all have been so different as basically they were good cars & certainly no worse than the opposition.

[dozeydustman]

41 minutes ago, ETCHY said:

The Princess story is so sad. It could have been a major hit, it looked great,rode well,had tons of space but somehow BL managed to fuck it up by making customers do the development work so it got a bad name early in it's life. If Ford had released it,it would have done well, with BL in charge it didn't (sadly) have a hope.

Defeat snatched from the jaws of victory!!

That could be said about a lot of BMC/BL products during the 60s and 70s. Designing cars that didn't really appeal to the masses (Landcrab) necessitating its predecessor to remain in production (Cambridge/Oxford); spending far too much on developing the ultra conventionally engineered Marina and not enough on the Allegro. Too much in-house rivalry during BMC days with up to 6 different marques being applied to the same car (1100/1300, Farina A55/A60), then even more with the advent of British Leyland merging the BMC marques with those from Leyland Motors.

The Princess really would have benefitted from being badged a Wolseley all the way through, the small grill & twin headlamps was and still is an attractive look, with a ultimate peeled cow VdP version instead of a posh Allegro.

Keeping models soldiering on for a long time with very little from launch spec, when Ford & Rootes regularly tweaked, improved, facelifted and listened to what their customers wanted, whereas the impression I get from BMC/BL era is we want the customer to have this.

I don't think it was until the Facelift Metro and the S-series engine replacing the R-series in the Monstro that things started to get better, by which time the damage and rot was terminal and anything with a link to the BL days was seen as old hat/unreliable.

Thing is it's easy to say how you'd make things better if given a second chance/time machine.

 

[quicksilver]

BL really were the mad house of the industry. Case in point: the Marina was designed for the E-series engine but when they realised they weren't making enough Maxis to use all the engines, instead of putting them in the Marina they ruined the Allegro design to make them fit and left the crappy old B-series in the Marina. Why, just why?

[vulgalour]

Don't be sad, enjoy all the lovely content here.  Also, the Around The World section has finally been populated now, so do go and check that out: https://autoshite.com/topic/11411-the-wedgister-princess-and-ambassador-records/?do=findComment&comment=1466765

 

[Skut]

I saw a dark red 4 headlight Wedge heading north on the A90 near Errol today. Too far away to get a reg plate. Must be pushing 20 years since I last saw one in the wild. 

[666jjp]

On 3/30/2018 at 3:12 PM, vulgalour said:

TIB4796 - Hearse

Vulg, you have this hearse under Ireland but it is a uk hearse with a private plate.

[LightBulbFun]

Real/original registration of YVH614Y if it helps  

[vulgalour]

Thank you for that info, I've amended accordingly.  Good to know the original reg too, I wasn't sure if YVH612Y was the same car, looks like it was just in the same block of registrations so that means there were two Ambassador hearses built.  To my knowledge, no Ambassadors limousines were made.

[MorrisItalSLX]

It really is excellent work you are doing here Vulg, but I noticed an omission, perhaps the most famous Ambassador of them all.

Which I can confirm from the music video is GPP 649Y.

Note: The badge is upside-down, AAARRRGGG!!!

[666jjp]

7 hours ago, vulgalour said:

Thank you for that info, I've amended accordingly.  Good to know the original reg too, I wasn't sure if YVH612Y was the same car, looks like it was just in the same block of registrations so that means there were two Ambassador hearses built.  To my knowledge, no Ambassadors limousines were made.

definitely 2 different hearses ?

[vulgalour]

How could I omit Reg's car?  How remiss of me.

[dozeydustman]

HPL41N seen in the wild recently by a member of a F*cebook group I follow.

[clayts450]

My boss's boss told me yesterday her fella has acquired a Plah Princess  - I'll try to get the reg and a photo if I remember !

[clayts450]

Just realised it's probably one of the older ones - doesn't look like the 70s ones came in VDP flava ?

[sdkrc]

NGF 696Y

It's white according to the DVLA so that could be an original driver's door

[Lankytim]

1 hour ago, clayts450 said:

My boss's boss told me yesterday her fella has acquired a Plah Princess  - I'll try to get the reg and a photo if I remember !

 

I think the there was a VP based on the Austin 1300 called a Princess. 

[Dj_efk]

On 3/23/2019 at 7:07 PM, Dj_efk said:

Just popped up on eBay from very long-term slumber: 1977 1800HL in one of the browns (Reynard?) WGK 220R.

 

Looks quite solid and could live again.

It’s on eBay again in much the same decrepit condition but now with a MOT!

[sierraman]

Did any of the ministerial Princess survive? The government used loads of them for ministers working in London. 

[Retr0naut]

On 2/5/2020 at 4:00 AM, Dj_efk said:

It’s on eBay again in much the same decrepit condition but now with a MOT!

Internet search shows no record of the car let alone an mot?

[Vince70]

My fathers old Ambassador Vandenplas finished up scraped it looks like around 1998

I remember it fondly as I took my test in it and it was an immaculate low mileage example and I think it was bought new from a doctor in Wales.

It did stay immaculate as it rarely worked as a car and was more an ornament on the drive and even broke down on my driving test back in 87.

The auto choke packed up on my test just like when dollywobbler went to test drive the first one on his video.