Blasts from the past. Some more

[bigstraight6]

Yet another great update 55bloke, and a jaunt down to the Costa Del Sol in a 'three main' Mk1 Corty is truly epic!

[Mr_Bo11ox]

Fookin ell, what ace photos! Brilliant work there 55man.

[seth]

Seeing those shots of a Spansih driving holiday trip in '67 and that caravan programme last week ahs really made me think its about time I ventured abroad in an old car...That Victor has done well to be looking so good into the late seveties!

[j-j]

My good gracious 55bloke, you deserve some sort of Autoshite award for this lot - absolute gems the lot of them.And I can't help but think that there was just so much more variety back when these were taken Much appreciated thanks!

[55bloke]

J.J., Seth, Mr_Bo11ox, BS6 and everyone else, many thanks for the positive comments, very glad you're enjoying. I'm really enjoying the memories these pics bring back- which is kinda the point of photography, I guess. I have to agree, there was soooo much more variety back then- you could actually tell which country you were in just by glancing out of the window at the traffic! Those trips down to Spain were epic adventures, and my dad still maintains that the drive there and back was the best part of the holidays for him. So many tails to tell. We loved that old Cortina (actually, it was only a couple of years old at the time!) but it really wasn't designed for hammering across Europe. It was well and truly shagged by the time it was replaced by the Alpine, though to be fair it never let us down in any major way.

[andrew e]

55 Bloke, those epic voyages are like a cortina trip in the early 70's that was in Popular classics a while back, maybe you should pen/blog those trips

[55bloke]

Interesting thought..... hmmmmm!

[Split_Pin]

Brilliant pics - love the Ford 8!

[55bloke]

As well as photographing "ordinary" cars all those years ago, I was attending car shows too. I'm not sure if these will be of as much interest as the street scenes, but all the following pics were taken at a Custom Car Show in 1978. It's kinda scary that that's 30 years ago !! There's always been a debate between resorers and customisers as to the rights and wrongs of customising- the argument being that restored cars tend to survive, whilst rodded/customised ones probably don't. It would be interesting to know how many of these cars are still around, if they're still on the road, and if they're still customs or if they've been restored back to original. anyway, here goes- and sorry for the slightly iffy quality, slides just don't seem to scan too well.

Pops have always been popular (pun intended ) and these are all fine examples, I think:-

A rather tastefully done '35 Hillman

A very unusual choice for rodding, because they're so small, this Austin 7 is a stunner. Called Small Fry.

I love this Mk 2 Zephyr, called Blue Moon and beautifully detailed, and with a 5ltr V8

I've put up a picture of this before- still the best Consul Capri I've ever seen

Tri Chevys are always favourites, 2 very different treatments here, a more or less stock '55 and a drag racing '57

Barely recognisable TR 7. According to the lable on the slide, Dolly Sprint powered.

Back then there was some absolutely stunning air-brush work on show- doesn't seem to be so popular these days. The Humber was nice, and the work on the Mustang was a jaw-dropper!

As always, there were gems in the car park too:

That's the lot for now, hope you enjoy.

[andrew e]

Bang on!!! You should check out the url on the motfair thread, some cracking customs on there too.

[bigstraight6]

Great stuff, I was an avid reader of 'Street machine' and 'Custom car' magazines in the day, in fact I seem to recall that the drag racing 57 Chevy featured on the cover of one of these publications at the time and was named 'Roarin rat'....

[garycox]

Nothing I can make out the plate of is still on the road according to the DVLA...The Mk2 Zephyr is the only one that's SORNed, it's now listed as 2553cc.

[Guest]

Ah, the days before plate raping, a gathering of similar cars today would probably mostly be on their second registration marks.

[scruff]

Bump to the top for one of the best threads on here.Great stuff Mr. bloke, thanks for posting.

[bassman77]

I am absolutely loving this post, the photos bring back a lot of memories for me, ok I was only born in 1977, but these are the type of cars I remember on the roads when I was a nipper.

On the subject of the custom car show, there is definetly one car that is still around and that is the 57 Chevy (looks to be a gasser drag car), the reason I know this is because it was at the classic car show at the NEC last year, Ive put a pic below, with the original pic .

 

 

 

 

[55bloke]

Fantastic!! Good to see the "Rat" is still looking great.