Six Cylinders Motoring Notes - 40.7 mpg from my Mini.

[richardmorris]

8 minutes ago, GeorgeB said:

What is?

Lamborghini miura? Of some of the figony and flashy delages?

[GeorgeB]

This is close for me.

[Six-cylinder]

A breakfast car meet with the Manta today, 52 trouble free miles.

The meetings is more a car enthusiast meeting rather than a classic car meeting. Still well worth the trip to see what the next generation will value and treasure.

My car of the show as a yellow HA van in worse condition than my Manta.

[adw1977]

Agree on the HA, it's got that proper late 80s ex-BT look!

[Dick Cheeseburger]

Came here to say the same thing about the HA. It's literally perfect. The subtly widened steels look great, too. Want. 

Edit, it looks to be the Amersham HA which was abandoned for years. I guess it's had a sympathetic resto with plenty of the patina left on show. Shiny HAs never looked right anyway- they were always rough as rats before their fifth birthday, and lucky to reach a decade. 

[Six-cylinder]

45 minutes ago, Dick Cheeseburger said:

Came here to say the same thing about the HA. It's literally perfect. The subtly widened steels look great, too. Want. 

Edit, it looks to be the Amersham HA which was abandoned for years. I guess it's had a sympathetic resto with plenty of the patina left on show. Shiny HAs never looked right anyway- they were always rough as rats before their fifth birthday, and lucky to reach a decade. 

Wow!

You can have the front for that.

Is it Ex BT or Ex British Rail?

[Dick Cheeseburger]

1 minute ago, Six-cylinder said:

Wow!

You can have the front for that.

Crazy to think the HA is five years newer than the Manta. Vauxhall certainly got their money's worth out of that platform. 

[High Jetter]

1 hour ago, Dick Cheeseburger said:

Crazy to think the HA is five years newer than the Manta. Vauxhall certainly got their money's worth out of that platform. 

Yup, saw an HA saloon at a show yesterday, like my Uncle's C reg one in period. 

[quicksilver]

2 hours ago, Six-cylinder said:

Wow!

You can have the front for that.

Is it Ex BT or Ex British Rail?

I'd say BT as the white bumper with a Serck numberplate above it matches the usual BT spec but BR ones appeared to have chrome bumpers with the plate below. It reminds me of the scruffy ex BT HA driven by James Bolam in The Beiderbecke Affair.

[Momentary Lapse Of Reason]

13 hours ago, Six-cylinder said:

You can have the front for that.

Is it Ex BT or Ex British Rail?

Above the windscreen there are two marks that look like filled in bolt holes.

They would be for the front mountings of the ladder rack that BT used and we (BR) didn't.

There also appears to be a mesh bulkhead behind the seats, I don't remember any of our vans having that.

10 hours ago, quicksilver said:

I'd say BT as the white bumper with a Serck numberplate above it matches the usual BT spec but BR ones appeared to have chrome bumpers with the plate below

Some of the BR vans had white bumpers, I think it depended on which batch they had been bought in.

I worked for BR Telecomm Dept out of Bedford Midland Road in the very early 80s.

 

[quicksilver]

1 hour ago, Momentary Lapse Of Reason said:

Above the windscreen there are two marks that look like filled in bolt holes.

They would be for the front mountings of the ladder rack that BT used and we (BR) didn't.

There also appears to be a mesh bulkhead behind the seats, I don't remember any of our vans having that.

Some of the BR vans had white bumpers, I think it depended on which batch they had been bought in.

I worked for BR Telecomm Dept out of Bedford Midland Road in the very early 80s.

 

Wikipedia suggests the basic 6cwt vans had white bumpers and the 8cwt versions had the chrome ones and a few other refinements, so this one is real poverty-spec and might not even have had a passenger seat originally. Good spot on the bolt holes for the ladder rack.

[Momentary Lapse Of Reason]

5 hours ago, quicksilver said:

Wikipedia suggests the basic 6cwt vans had white bumpers and the 8cwt versions had the chrome ones

Sure I remember there was an HA van with a chrome front bumper and a white rear one.

Mind you absolutely anything could have happened when it had gone into Luton Garage for "maintenance" ! 😀

[adw1977]

10 hours ago, quicksilver said:

Wikipedia suggests the basic 6cwt vans had white bumpers and the 8cwt versions had the chrome ones and a few other refinements

Vauxpedia has brochures that confirm this was the case, for at least part of the production run.

[Six-cylinder]

Small local meeting tonight of 25 cars, back out with my Mini Mayfair.

I topped the fuel up on the way home and was very pleasantly surprised that over the last tank it has managed 40.7 mpg

[High Jetter]

52 minutes ago, Six-cylinder said:

Small local meeting tonight of 25 cars, back out with my Mini Mayfair.

I topped the fuel up on the way home and was very pleasantly surprised that over the last tank it has managed 40.7 mpg

That VDP is an unusual gold colour?

[Six-cylinder]

1 hour ago, High Jetter said:

That VDP is an unusual gold colour?

It is my friend Colin's mucky brown one.

There were two of them at the 1100 club spring meeting.

[High Jetter]

8 hours ago, Six-cylinder said:

It is my friend Colin's mucky brown one.

Must have been the way the light caught it before then. 

[Six-cylinder]

39 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Must have been the way the light caught it before then. 

It was the golden hour with the lowish sunlight streaming on the pub.