HMC architecte britannique

[captain_70s]

23 hours ago, HMC said:

Its here!

 

What a nicely proportioned car. How far we've fallen...

[HMC]

Been for an early evening potter. My seat is very firm. Thats because, its not a british effort to make a saab rivalling level of ergonomic comfort, but as i discovered, the webbing had partly collapsed and im sat on a block of wood 😂 Suprisingly comfortable!

I Love driving it. It seems to have a special smell- leather, vinyl and eau de longbridge?

[plasticvandan]

All the tickets 

[danthecapriman]

10 minutes ago, HMC said:

Been for an early evening potter. My seat is very firm. Thats because, its not a british effort to make a saab rivalling level of ergonomic comfort, but as i discovered, the webbing had partly collapsed and im sat on a block of wood 😂 Suprisingly comfortable!

I Love driving it. It seems to have a special smell- leather, vinyl and eau de longbridge?

One of those cars I’d never get bored of looking at if nothing else. Lovely.

[lesapandre]

On 28/01/2025 at 20:55, Yoss said:

The Landcrab is actually shorter than a Farina, it just looks longer because of the odd proportions. It is slightly wider and heavier and certainly has a lot more room in it. 

It's not unusual to offer an outgoing model for a short while alongside a new one but people kept buying the Farinas so BMC kept making them. For seven years. It's a strange business model but there you go. 

I think a lot of people were scared of the newfangled technology in the Crab which is odd because it never worried them in the mini or ADO 16 so that doesn't make a lot of sense. I guess people buying bigger cars were generally older. 

As someone there in the 1970's and with direct experience of a Landcrab - our neighbours had one and I travelled in it - their criticisms were:

High fuel consumption. - uncomfortable driving position (difficult to reach all the controls) - heavy steering - austere interior and just so ugly - a bit too big and wide to manoeuvre easily (down to the steering again).

[HMC]

1 minute ago, lesapandre said:

As someone there in the 1970's and with direct experience of a Landcrab - our neighbours had one and I travelled in it - their criticisms were:

High fuel consumption. - uncomfortable driving position (difficult to reach all the controls) - heavy steering - austere interior and just so ugly - a bit too big and wide to manoeuvre easily (down to the steering again).

I wonder if the 2200/6 had PAS? otherwise that would have been a work out!

[lesapandre]

Some of the later ones did I think. I'm not sure it was even an option originally.

[HMC]

Thats just triggered a memory….an admission of how different i was. As a teen i didnt have max power posters on my wall (circa mid 90s) i had this, amongst other things. Im yet to own a landcrab (whats the origin of the name?) but i nearly bought a wolseley 6 automatic just after covid lockdown.

 

[adw1977]

Power assisted steering wasn't originally an option on the 1800, but it was available by 1969 and was an option on the 2200 from the start.

[lesapandre]

Yes once they had a bit of development they matured into a nice car. BMC had a bit of a habit, and BL after, of releasing cars with snags that subsequently got sorted.

'Landcrab' will have come from some car mag review I'd guess.

The Rover P4, for example, was nicknamed 'Auntie' - by Denis Jenkinson in in an article - and the name rather stuck - though it seems to have dropped out of use a bit recently.

[comfortablynumb]

Dad's mate had a landcrab when I was small.

I remember sitting in the back seat, and thinking the front seats were in the next county! 🥺

[Yoss]

PAS was an option on the 1800. The pump was stuck on the back of the dynamo meaning you couldn't convert it to an alternator which was quite a common conversion for any dynamo equipped cars back in the day (I have done my Triumph) 

The six cylinder cars had a more conventional  separate PAS pump run off the auxiliary belt. I'm not sure if the 1800 mk3 was available with it, as these were sold alongside the six cylinder cars but had alternators. Maybe as they were lower spec cars they just didn't offer it. 

Best car I ever had (or at least the one I miss the most) was a Wolseley 18/85S auto with optional power steering. I fitted Rover SD1 alloys and Maxi HL (or Austin 1300 GT) steering wheel which was much smaller so gave better feel. It was properly chuckable. Being an S it had the MGB spec engine and the auto worked brilliantly because when you floored it the kickdown dropped it in to just the right rev range to pick up and go. It was faster than any manual Landcrab I had. And with the handbrake being under the dash you could use the centre armrests on the front seats to full effect. You could drive it with one hand and one foot leaving your left hand free to eat pies and the rover wheels meant it would go round any corners at any speed you wanted. 

So I might be a little biased. 

[Christine]

My dad had 2  .An 1800S ,  TKP 338H  and    TKK 338N  an 1800 run out model ..resprayed and oversills fitted at 3 years old .. with power steering . Far too light ..

[adw1977]

1 hour ago, Yoss said:

The six cylinder cars had a more conventional  separate PAS pump run off the auxiliary belt. I'm not sure if the 1800 mk3 was available with it, as these were sold alongside the six cylinder cars but had alternators.

The 1800 Mk3 was available with an alternator or power steering as an optional extra, but not both together.

1972 brochure

 

[Joey spud]

Didn't the 'Landcrab' tag come from when BMC took the 1800 Rallying and the car when viewed from above appeared to move sideways when cornering.

[Yoss]

17 minutes ago, Joey spud said:

Didn't the 'Landcrab' tag come from when BMC took the 1800 Rallying and the car when viewed from above appeared to move sideways when cornering.

Yes. 

[High Jetter]

6 hours ago, HMC said:

It seems to have a special smell-

{Hilda Ogden} Austin, Stanley - Austin /{Hilda Ogden}

[lesapandre]

[bezzabsa]

can i throw my hat in the ring for when this comes up for sale?

[Lankytim]

It was spotted!

[lesapandre]

And what a very handsome vehicle it is. 

BMC - why did you not retain Pininfarina for all your later cars?

Carrying a GB plate - wonder where it went on it's holidays?

Italy 🇮🇹 ? 😉

[danthecapriman]

3 minutes ago, lesapandre said:

 

Carrying a GB plate - wonder where it went on it's holidays?

Italy 🇮🇹 ? 😉

Isle of Wight!😄

[HMC]

Ive got a few old “THE MOTOR” road test yearbooks, always a good read with carefully recorded data to a level thats simply not done anymore, following by a road test. 

Theres a mechanically identical oxford on test in this edition…

Quite an interesting mix of cars….

Apparently a 6.2 litre Facel  does 14 mpg at a constant 110mph, with a one way max of 134mph.  Sounds like a fun test!

A diesel oxford was also tested… 0-60 ? 40 seconds (!)

[danthecapriman]

A guy I used to work with was a taxi mechanic years ago. He told me they used a fleet of diesel Oxford’s for a long time. He said they were incredibly slow and absolutely gutless but they coped with the mileage and were more fuel efficient than the petrol’s. Apparently the last one he worked on there was replaced by a mk2 Cavalier so that gives an idea how long they were in use. 
He did tell me what the mileage was (I’ve forgotten now) but it’d gone round the clock multiple times. The only time they were switched off was to refuel or for maintenance/servicing as one driver clocked off another jumped into the drivers seat! Pretty sure he said it was body rot that finished them off in the end.

Wasnt the BMC diesel of that time actually originally a small marine engine?

[captain_70s]

There were deffo marine variants, you see them in narrow boats sometimes. Not sure what came first though.

37mpg for such a glacial car seems unthinkable now, but I suppose it was different times and a full size saloon car cracking 30mpg wasn't really a thing...

[artdjones]

A former boss of mine had taxied Farinas in Blackpool in a previous life. They used to do about 50k miles a year.

[somewhatfoolish]

Plenty used as boat engines but it's just a B series converted to diesel.

[HMC]

Longbridge brethren ; an old relic from our industrial past. And an Austin Cambridge.

 

[Dyslexic Viking]

2 hours ago, HMC said:

A diesel oxford was also tested… 0-60 ? 40 seconds (!)

I want one of these so bad.

Did these come with column shift?

[lesapandre]

2 hours ago, captain_70s said:

There were deffo marine variants, you see them in narrow boats sometimes. Not sure what came first though.

37mpg for such a glacial car seems unthinkable now, but I suppose it was different times and a full size saloon car cracking 30mpg wasn't really a thing...

Cracking 25 or even 20 was good for a full-sized saloon in the '60's unless driven very carefully.

The Austin 1800 was about 25 mpg.

The Cambridge was probably no slower as a diesel - than the equivalent MB Ponton and Fintail 180's or same-size Peugeot diesels.  It just failed to capture world markets in the same way - probably not quite as durable as the aforementioned on rough roads.