Thread of Rover Borrowage NOW with Rover Returned.

[Guest Breadvan72]

You may recall that the vent pointing at the passenger's tum was there to save wonga, as it is the slot for the steering column on a left hand drive car.  The instrument binnacle would just be moved across.  

 

The bird, er... didn't make it.

[eddyramrod]

Some years ago I was delivering to a customer in Fleetwood about 6am, when the customer himself turned up in his Atego 7.5 tonner... with a pigeon's head sticking out from the grille.  Seems it had flown in front of him on the motorway and he thought he'd killed it, but no, it was still alive.  As I had my diesel-gloves on, which were quite thick, I gently reached in and eased the bird to a point at which I could withdraw him relatively easily.  I put him down on the ground expecting him to take time to recover, but no, he flew straight off to the roof of the shops where he found some new friends.

 

That's why I asked.

[Guest Breadvan72]

I was once driving a Saab 900 Turbo along a straight bit of a country road very early one morning.  A young blackbird only just got out of the way, and in the mirror I saw it flick into a spin and crash, because of the wake vortex of the car. I managed to whack a couple of gulls once while taking off from a coastal farm strip in a light aeroplane.  They took out the landing light and one external instrument sensor.  Bill Oddie thinks I'm a knob.

[320touring]

First service I did on mah burds old clio involved removing most of a pigeon from the airbox (located to the rear of the engine)

 

That sd1 has a modicum of awesome

[urpert]

You may recall that the vent pointing at the passenger's tum was there to save wonga, as it is the slot for the steering column on a left hand drive car.  The instrument binnacle would just be moved across.  

 

The bird, er... didn't make it.

Classic BL. Brilliant.

[Grundig]

I'm guessing that Joan Didion was an inept hairdresser?

 

I'll go google

 

..... I thought "rear axle on a Rover P6" 

[Magnificent Rustbucket]

One of my Granduncles was corrupt enough to ride on the gravy train of the Stalinist regime our poor Alpine republic had to endure in the Seventies.

This enabled him to trade in his P6 V8 for a new SD1 V8 in 1977, right when it became available at BL Austria. It was screaming yellow with a brown interior.

The car caused a sensation when it was launched, something that actually hasn't happened since, so younger readers may not understand that there once were times,

when a new car launch could actually cause a sensation.

I loved the car and used every opportunity to have a ride in it. It did indeed cause quite some stir wherever it was parked, even in a metropolis like Vienna.

Even my father, who is not a car guy at all (he had taken delivery of a new screaming yellow R16 TX just weeks before), was impressed and liked it,

but it was severely out of his reach, him being a commoner having to fend for a family in the private sector.

My paternal grandfather bought one of the first SD1s in 1976, so would have got it at about the same time. It is one of the first cars I clearly remember (I was a small child) but I also remember the attention the Rover attracted wherever it went. It really did cause a stir. I posted a couple of pictures something about it in Skizzer's original thread.

 

http://autoshite.com/topic/15402-my-sd1-tomorrows-car-yesterday-wet-boot-part2-p5/page-5

 

The site has gone back to not allowing me to post pictures again, unfortunately.

[Magnificent Rustbucket]

I also remember the launch of the 3500 back in '76. They attracted a lot of attention wherever they went. My Grandfather bought one of the first ones delivered (he was told it was the first car delivered to a customer in the North of England - so presumably there were cars delivered to customers before it in the Midlands, South of England or elsewhere in the UK. In mid August we went to Abersoch in it. A Ferrari Daytona wouldn't have got more attention and as a kid, I loved that.

Here are some photos of it which I found after my Grandfather died in 2010. They were taken on a trip to Scotland he and my Grandmother made immediately after the car was registered on 1st August 1976. I'd guess they were taken a few days into the trip. SDM999R broke down on the way home.

The car should have been delivered on a 'P' registration as a very early car, but he had the dealer (Drabble and Allen in Knutsford) store the car until the first of August for an 'R' plate.

 

Much to his annoyance, Drabble and Allen displayed the car at the Rover 3500 launch in their Knutsford showroom.

 

Sadly, the car proved catastrophically unreliable, even breaking down on the way back from its first trip to Scotland. It set a pattern, and within six months he was so sick of the problems he was having with it (particularly the ventilation that was on permanent max cold and gave him conjunctivitis) that he traded it in for something else. I was devastated!

Despite the unreliability, he still loved the shape of the SD1 and years later he bought another SD1 - a Moonraker blue one in 1982. This was to be his last Rover, since he didn't like the 800.

[Guest Breadvan72]

Posted Today, 10:08 PM

barefoot, on 12 Jun 2014 - 5:06 PM, said:

I'm guessing that Joan Didion was an inept hairdresser?

I'll go google

 

..... I thought "rear axle on a Rover P6" 

 

 

Nar, that's a Dionne Warwick.

[Junkman]

Ms. BV is Susan Shaw.

CICMFFPN?

[Guest Breadvan72]

Cooo!  Top stalkage!

[Guest Breadvan72]

Moar betterer shot of the interior.  Also washage of bugs and dust in readiness for poshing it up.  

 

Have been a mega doofus and forgot to send Skizzerthe key for my 156, but it is on my desk at work so will be sent to him now.  I R mong.

 

 

 

[NorfolkNWeigh]

Wow, I'm back in the 80's.

A Rover SD1 driving yuppie is biking the key to an Alfa across London to another yuppie.

Pity it's not an Alfetta GTV6 for maximum red braces effect.

I hope the courier is riding a filthy CX500 with a broken fairing,although I fear it will be a Lycra warrior on a push bike or a flat capped porter that looks like David Jason and says 'God bless you guvnor' to all the posh barista types.

[Junkman]

I could spend years in that velourtastic sea of caramac.

[Skizzer]

Yuppie B has now picked up the keys to Yuppie A's Alfa, yah, and is on the train to Wiltshar, yah?

 

Have a train picture for now:

 

More breaking news as it breaks. The news, I mean - obviously the Rover and the 156 won't break, at all. Oh no.

[Skizzer]

Feeling slightly guilty about not having washed and hoovered the Rover myself, ready for poshness. It was indeed quite dusty and buggy. Sorry.

 

I'm not very good at getting around to washing cars, which is why I like it when they are already painted the colour of road dust.

[Skizzer]

Swindon is Our Next Station Stop.

 

Here we are not stopping at Didcot:

[Skizzer]

Gotcha!

 

 

 

V sexy V6. Great alloys. Gotta drive it now. More later.

[Guest Breadvan72]

Feeling slightly guilty about not having washed and hoovered the Rover myself, ready for poshness. It was indeed quite dusty and buggy. Sorry.

 

I'm not very good at getting around to washing cars, which is why I like it when they are already painted the colour of road dust.

 

It was pretty clean but the rear screen was a bit dusty, that's all.  Also v clean inside, whereas the Alfa is full of half eaten Ginster's and scrunched up receipts from the knocking shop, IIRC.   

 

Lots of failage on photos at Glynders, yuppie dahleengs, but a fabby trip (we took a great route along some Kent and Sussex B roads through spiffy scenery).  Perfect weather, stunning performance of Eugene Onegin featuring the best Lensky and the best Gremin in evah.  I was astonished to be reminded by Mutha BV that I took her to see the same production a whole twenty years ago, when I really was still a yuppie.     One moment of OMG when wifey made me stop at a garage to buy an e ciggy and the hot start was a bit hesitant, but luckily I have experience of starting hot V8s on hot days.  Some window faffage.   Number plate lights not on but avoided being thrown in jail for this.  

 

MPG not calculated because gauge stuck at 3/4, but it's really not bad at all, thanks to streamlineyness and the relaxed gearing.

 

Home just before epic, Hammer Horror style thunderstorm so car even cleaner now.

[Guest Breadvan72]

Mutha BV, louche nephew, and Mrs BV in non car related summer Britishness action.

[beko1987]

Did you get home before it fucked it down with rain?

[Guest Breadvan72]

Yes, we arrived home just ahead of the storm, which was truly spectacular.   Light rain started to spatter the windscreen as we passed Wycombe, but we were indoors before it really started to bucket down.

[Guest Breadvan72]

The car has been out East, and parked up in an appropriate location for us lot.   Viz below.

 

Also, the windows have been producing much delightfulness.  They both stopped working.  Fuse, methinks.  There is no fuse.   Fusebox says option fuses are behind dashboard.  Lecky windows were an option, but no fuse.   Ah ha!  HBOL is HBOT:   there is a circuit breaker, with a RED reset button. Guess where it is?  Hidden invisibly at the very back of the passenger glove box.  You have to do Pilates/Yoga/KarmaSutra to find it.  Who designs this stuff?

 

Now the driver's window is going up all in one go.  V suspicious.   

 

Alas, soon I must part with this luxo-shed of cred, and return it to Skizzer, but I is haz the LOVE for SD1s now.

[Skizzer]

Who designs this stuff?

 

Didn't your father have a hand in it, for one? 

 

 

I haven't done much driving in the Alfa 156 this weekend, partly because all trips have involved Keith The Dog who is incompatible with tan Italian leather upholstery (although a good colour match) and partly because Mrs Skizzer refuses to go in it because she doesn't trust a car that hides its door handles.

 

This is a shame, as I really like it.

 

The V6 24v engine is a cracker.  It's very flexible with loads of oomph all round the rev range, and (cliche alert) it makes a great sound.  The car also feels quite small, in a good way - nimble and pointable.  I didn't encounter any actual understeer on my personal test track (the tight, swoopy on- and off-ramps of J42 of the M4), but you can feel the weight in the nose enough to believe it'll be the front wheels that would let go first.  It wouldn't put me off having one over the four-pot.

 

Breadvan's example is in fine fettle, with only one real comedy feature: the gearshift.  The box itself is fine, but the lever passes through a phase of 'wey hey, I'm not attached to anything!' on its way from odd-numbered gears to even ones.  It's very alarming at first, but once you get used to it the frisson of fear that the stick will come off in your hand is actually quite exciting.  It makes up for me not being able to figure out the tiny buttons on the 90s stereo.

 

I did contemplate buying a V6 Alfa GT once.  Now rather wishing I had.  Still, it's never too late and they're a bit of a bargain now...

[Guest Breadvan72]

The car has a pooch in the back quite often so fear not about dogging in it.  Er....

 

Wife objection more profound, but glad yer like it.

 

I have challenged Fatha BV about the red button, but he just laughs.

[garethj]

That SD1 looks really lovely.  I had a mate at uni who had an early V8 which was a total shed, and a mate just after uni who had a smarter one.  Which was a complete shed too.

 

Despite their tales of breakdowns and terminal rust, I still like them

[Guest Breadvan72]

Chiltern Railways has done EXPLODO today, so I went all 70s executive commuter dude and drove the Rovaaaaaah into that Lunnun at 5AM.   Went down Park Lane and along the Mall, because flash git,

 

I reckon this car is about the same on MPG as me Lancia HPE is. 

 

Skizzer says I can keep the lovely thing for one more week.  Wootage.

[Guest Breadvan72]

Once long ago this car park would have had a fair few SD1s in it.  Now there is but one.  Bazzers of a certain age do a double take as they walk past the car on the way in from Temple tube.

 

[Skizzer]

Excellent!

 

Once long ago this car park would have had a fair few SD1s in it.

Must have been a while ago - the oil stains have faded away nicely

[Guest Breadvan72]

I have parked many of my own heaps in that spot over the last few years, so there are oil stains aplenty, but you can't see them as some oaf has parked an old Rover on top of them.