invacar LightBulbFun's Invacar & general ramble thread, index on page 1, survivors lists on Pages 24/134 & AdgeCutler's Invacar Mk12 Restoration from Page 186 onwards, still harping on...

[MT606]

17 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

indeed I believe this is one of driving reasons Adam got his 4 on the road when he did etc 

which reminds me how could I forget this photo, this is the building (whats left of it) where they where found a few years ago and almost flattened along with the rest of the building!

heres the riverside shot from pavement side

and some close up/diagonal shots of each of the 4 for the survivors list finally  

Having 4's just greedy, he has to give me one of them in penance......

[Jon]

Great to see some shots of my home town of York, as I haven't been back since 2014 and was due to make it back last year but had to cancel my trip for some reason or other - can't remember why....

Anyway, I'll span this thread with another image you've most likely seen before:

 

 

[LightBulbFun]

27 minutes ago, MT606 said:

Having 4's just greedy, he has to give me one of them in penance......

haha yeah he has 5 if you count KPL139P being assembled using bits from TPE376S  

(im hoping I can find RRE20L for him, as I know going by how well he got these 4 and is getting KPL on the road, I know he would be able to do RRE20L good despite how bad it might potentially be! and I know Scott has been making murmuring of selling 1940PE so id like to see if I can convince adam to get that one too and at least save it from being robbed of its plate)

1 hour ago, Jon said:

Great to see some shots of my home town of York, as I haven't been back since 2014 and was due to make it back last year but had to cancel my trip for some reason or other - can't remember why....

Anyway, I'll span this thread with another image you've most likely seen before:

 

 

glad you enjoyed the shots  

haha yeah indeed I have seen that photo before  but I appreciate the heads up nonetheless incase I had not  

On 28/06/2019 at 13:29, LightBulbFun said:

 

I imagine the conversation at the DVLA office for this one went down something like this

 

"hey m8 what the hell is this thing?!"

"I dunno m8 some sort of AC car?!"

*sees its 4PM on a friday afternoon*

"good enough for me!"

 

for those wondering I came across the JPH-K (JPH251K-JPH450K) block via this chod-tastic picture I discovered while trying to find any new to me P plate Model 70s to try ID the Unknown Spares car LOL (I know its somewhere between the KPC-P and KPK-P blocks)

 

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/71592768@N08/6939378661

 

 

 

On 02/07/2019 at 03:13, LightBulbFun said:

here's a fun one for me, when I came across this picture, I thought to myself the reg block awfully familiar, but couldn't quite place it, so I just figured must be because its similar to the JPB-K block

well I finally figured it out

the reason it was so familiar was because it was of the same block as the one in this picture I had come across a good while ago

 

 

[MT606]

''haha yeah he has 5 if you count KPL139P being assembled using bits from TPE376S  

(im hoping I can find RRE20L for him, as I know going by how well he got these 4 and is getting KPL on the road, I know he would be able to do RRE20L good despite how bad it might potentially be! and I know Scott has been making murmuring of selling 1940PE so id like to see if I can convince adam to get that one too and at least save it from being robbed of its plate)''

reckon he'd do a swap for a 68 beetle project ? ;-).... cough cough

 

 

[somewhatfoolish]

On 4/26/2021 at 7:18 PM, busmansholiday said:

Some interesting pictures there. You / they'll not get to repeat the one outside Bootham Crescent as the ground has been sold for redevelopment and is due to be flattered shortly.

Should be possible to blag a go on the pitch then if it's getting bulldozed for yuppy flats; recreate a genuine touchline scene.

[LightBulbFun]

as if there are not already enough slightly* broken Invacar Mk12's on this forum

who here wants one of their own!  

 

I have been contacted by the chap https://www.facebook.com/george.amberson.58118

who recently bought this one from big al, , so after contacting me for help with regards to a few things, he suddenly asked me to stick it up for sale here because he has a bunch of other projects that also need attention (sounds like he would fit in well here!)

(well initially he asked me to directly offer its chassis to @AdgeCutler but I figured it would be a shame to not try and see if the complete car could be saved via the forum, so I asked if I could just stick up a post for the whole car which he said yeah please!)

I have been informed that the chassis is in apparently surprisingly good shape, but if you are buying it/interested, I would insist in giving it a good looking/poking at, as we all know how crispy Invacar Mk12 chassis can get!

as you can see its quite a bit of rear body damage and I dont know the state of the engine but the front end looks good and it does have a Chassis plate and I know/figured out its registration mark so it is viable in that regard thankfully

so yeah figured id offer it up here for him dont think theres any harm in trying at least! he says he wants £700 for it and will need it shifted/collected pretty quickly and he is located in Portsmouth

 

if this one can be found/rescued it could probably yield a good rear end to help restore the above or such

although it in itself also has a chassis plate and known registration mark! so might be restorable in its own right depending on if theres anything else left of it!

[High Jetter]

18 minutes ago, LightBulbFun said:

quite a bit of rear body damage

Understatement of the day! What rear body?

[st185cs]

55 minutes ago, LightBulbFun said:

 

 

Model 70 Steyr-Puch engine in top right of photo? - one for @adam1db??

[LightBulbFun]

48 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Understatement of the day! What rear body?

well there is a rear end its just somewhere in the 100 acre wood...

9 minutes ago, st185cs said:

Model 70 Steyr-Puch engine in top right of photo? - one for @adam1db??

indeed! 2 in-fact and at least 1 transaxle I think, perfect for fixing up KPL (and GTW if its engine failure is terminal)

I have already let adam know about them the other day, but I think I need to chase up big al about them personally (Edit: so have just dropped him a message hopefully I can get a response, I am also curious about them just for my own research etc)

[Mrs6C]

3 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

ell initially he asked me to directly offer its chassis to @AdgeCutler 

You might want to offer it first dabs to @AdgeCutler anyway as I believe he is already in possession of its missing rear end!!!

The crispy chassis isn't so much of an issue now, as there are now patterns in place on the metal cutting machine to produce new chassis members. At least two sets have been made already and I gather that more could be produced if needed.

[LightBulbFun]

4 minutes ago, Mrs6C said:

You might want to offer it first dabs to @AdgeCutler anyway as I believe he is already in possession of its missing rear end!!!

 

oh cool! I was wondering what the Mk12 bumper was about in this photo! 

and I did notice looked like on MPU that someone had actually sliced off the other tail fin rather then it being broken off

which goes with this photograph I had showing the other tail fin still intact

nice to have that mystery solved  

by all means @AdgeCutler is welcome to it on a first dibs basis if he wants it (no one else has been mad enough to express interest in it any how LOL)

7 minutes ago, Mrs6C said:

The crispy chassis isn't so much of an issue now, as there are now patterns in place on the metal cutting machine to produce new chassis members. At least two sets have been made already and I gather that more could be produced if needed.

that is a good point, and something im very pleased/happy about  

[busmansholiday]

This picture has been on my wall for years, bought it  from a second hand shop. Only just realised whats in between the trolleybuses.

 

For the none locals, it's Denaby railway crossing (between Mexborough and Conisbrough) looking towards Conisbrough and it still exists today (albeit very different and with a by-pass over the track to the right) as it's the main Sheffield to Doncaster line. The Mexborough and Swinton trolleybus system  ended in 1961 with the chassis of some of these shown above were purchased by Bradford Corporation and re-bodied with East Lancs double deck bodies and survived to the end of UK trolleybus operation in March 1972.

 

[plasticvandan]

Yes I had seen the rest end less invacar appear on Facebook,given the seller has no off road parking or storage or garden I wasn't surprised to see it for sale lol. The car in the trolley pic is a Gordon,a non disabled car,but based on an invalid carriage design.

[LightBulbFun]

Blood hell iv just had a bit of a bomb shell drop for me

im sure I have mentioned in this thread about how I first came to know of Invacars when I was about 3 when I came across one parked up and I asked my mum "why does that car only have 3 wheels"

to which she responded "because its a car built for disabled people" (which kind of lead me to think for a while that ALL 3 wheelers where cars built for disabled people but I digress)

and this is what set the seed for my obsession many years later (note worthy for being the first car that ever stood out to me, on account of it having 3 instead of 4 wheels!)

and of course I have always wondered what was that Model 70 exactly that I saw,

well I just came across this during my research

and whats so significant about that you might ask?

well its a parking permit for the Invacar Model 70 MHJ22P, a parking permit for the area I saw the above Invacar in back in 2003!

now this parking permit was supposedly found stuck to one of the doors of the car, to say someone peeled it off the windscreen and just stuck it somewhere while applying a new one to the screen after this one had expired

and if we check the keeper history of MHJ22P, it has a tell tail Keeper change on the 9th of December 2002 which tells me this car survived into 2003 or 2004 (only late ministry survivors  had this December 2002 keeper change)

so this fits in with when I saw it, and by this point in time, very few Model 70's where Ministry service by the 31st of March 2003, only about 32 for the WHOLE of England, so I highly doubt there was another Model 70 in the area!

now you may have noticed hang on there are Keeper changes from 2007-2017? indeed, this Model 70 survives !

it is in-fact @st185cs's Model 70!

so you can imagine my reaction when I read "MHJ22P" LOL this is a massive thing for me, not only have more then likely identified which car it was that I saw way back then, but that it survives and that I have unknowingly known about it for a few years now!

and its so surreal to think both of the Model 70's from my childhood likely survive and are even on this forum! (and then @Zelandeth's KPL which reignited the old memories when he uploaded the first start video to his youtube channel which is now with Adam)

I mean what are the chances of that!! the only thing of note is supposedly MHJ22P was found in a barn with a 2nd car and so I have to wonder what was/happened to that 2nd car (but as above I highly doubt there was another Model 70 in the same area as I saw mine in by 2003! but you never know!)

[barrett]

1 hour ago, busmansholiday said:

This picture has been on my wall for years, bought it  from a second hand shop. Only just realised whats in between the trolleybuses.

 

For the none locals, it's Denaby railway crossing (between Mexborough and Conisbrough) looking towards Conisbrough and it still exists today (albeit very different and with a by-pass over the track to the right) as it's the main Sheffield to Doncaster line. The Mexborough and Swinton trolleybus system  ended in 1961 with the chassis of some of these shown above were purchased by Bradford Corporation and re-bodied with East Lancs double deck bodies and survived to the end of UK trolleybus operation in March 1972.

 

Invacar-connected, but not an actual invalid carriage!

[RayMK]

Looks like a Gordon to me.

https://www.shutterstock.com/editorial/image-editorial/the-gordon-englands-lowest-priced-three-wheeler-car-the-gordon-every-enthusiast-of-british-motor-cycles-must-surely-be-familiar-with-the-magnificent-shaft-driven-sunbeam-machines-often-described-as-the-rolls-royce-of-the-motor-cycle-world-how-2169047a

Edit: I've just seen Plasticvandan's earlier reply saying the same.

Edited April 28, 2021 by RayMK
Acknowledging earlier reply.

[AdgeCutler]

3 hours ago, Mrs6C said:

You might want to offer it first dabs to @AdgeCutler anyway as I believe he is already in possession of its missing rear end!!!

The crispy chassis isn't so much of an issue now, as there are now patterns in place on the metal cutting machine to produce new chassis members. At least two sets have been made already and I gather that more could be produced if needed.

I'm fine for another Mk12, Brian will have my restorative attentions for a while yet and then after I'm pootling around in him on the road, perhaps that elusive model 70 will come to join him?

[Mrs6C]

2 hours ago, busmansholiday said:

This picture has been on my wall for years, bought it  from a second hand shop. Only just realised whats in between the trolleybuses.

That is a fantastic picture, in so many ways. Thanks for sharing it!

[mitsisigma01]

20 hours ago, somewhatfoolish said:

Should be possible to blag a go on the pitch then if it's getting bulldozed for yuppy flats; recreate a genuine touchline scene.

Picture this... 4 Invacars do co-ordinated burnouts and drifting on a footy pitch

..... 😲😲😲

[Mrs6C]

2 hours ago, RayMK said:

Looks like a Gordon to me.

I laughed to see that, in the  image at the link, it has a (very obviously!) fake 'radiator grille' bolted on the nose!

3 hours ago, plasticvandan said:

The car in the trolley pic is a Gordon,a non disabled car,but based on an invalid carriage design.

In the trolley bus picture, it can be seen how some of the contemporary four wheeled cars were of a very similar size to the Gordon or indeed any invalid carriage or three-wheeler of the era.

[Eyersey1234]

18 hours ago, High Jetter said:

Understatement of the day! What rear body?

It's hiding behind the 4th tree on the right under a pile of leaves 😂

[Heidel_Kakao]

@LightBulbFunDez how common and cheap are spare Model 70 engines? I was thinking if I get one I will remove the original engine and put it in the corner of the unit. Then modify a spare engine to get 650CC. That way just by putting the original engine back in it would be 100% original again.

[LightBulbFun]

1 hour ago, Heidel_Kakao said:

@LightBulbFunDez how common and cheap are spare Model 70 engines? I was thinking if I get one I will remove the original engine and put it in the corner of the unit. Then modify a spare engine to get 650CC. That way just by putting the original engine back in it would be 100% original again.

its a good question, Model 70 engines themselves dont show up very often on the open market (Model 70's in general dont!)

but I know these guys could probably hook you up a Steyr puch flat twin, but I dont know how much they cost

https://prokschi.at/

(when Model 70's where being withdrawn they flew over here and helped themselves to 18 Model 70 engines and 1 complete Model 70, plus the general Steyr Puch engine was used in Austrias own licence built Fiat 500 and the Haflinger, so its a well known and supported engine)

I would probably directly try and find a 643cc or 660cc engine, you can fit those larger piston and barrels to a 493cc engine block but you need to enlarge the holes in the block and the head the barrels go into from 85Mm to 90mm IIRc (its not a direct swap like @dollywobbler's 652cc 2CV piston and barrel upgrade was)

and then from there you could fit a 761cc kit if you wanted to

https://prokschi.at/puch-500-500-s-from-1968-1973/tuning/straight-shank-piston-cylinder.html

I also recommend checking out this youtube video, and the channel in general, its all in German, but if you turn on captions there are english subtitles

https://www.youtube.com/c/PROKSCHIat/videos

 

I would perhaps recommend finding JPA319N as that one last I knew of it had no drive train, so you dont have any original engine to worry about LOL

On 23/02/2019 at 12:15, LightBulbFun said:

JPA319N, AC, Date of first registration 22 May 1975, Current status Unknown, last spotted for sale on ebay around 2012? minus drive-train, Date of last V5C (logbook) issued  6 December 1994

 

for those a bit confused heres some context LOL https://autoshite.com/topic/44152-autoshite-chat-over-zoom-800pm-tuesdays-pm-brownnova-for-the-link-if-you-don’t-have-it/page/13/

 

 

[LightBulbFun]

On 31/03/2021 at 20:50, LightBulbFun said:

you have no idea how excited I am to see this, but a Picture of a J Reg Model 70! holy shit! Woo! (edit: before anyone gets confused I was writing this before @Eyersey1234's post above so its not in the piston head thread link above if your confused as to why you cant find it in there!)

https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/small-invacar-a-single-seater-microcar-for-disabled-drivers-news-photo/1300571476

finally 2 years after I theorised the existence of then discovered the existence of J Reg Model 70's via my DVLA bashing, all the way back on (fittingly enough) Pages 70-71, I finally have photographic proof to go along with with my research  

GPE130J 

is part of the 2nd of the 2 J reg Model 70 blocks GPD781J-GPD830J and GPE121J-GPE170J (which then leads to the GPG711K-GPG910K the first full block of Model 70's)

which makes it the 60th Model 70 off the production line!

 

Now I just have to find a public photo of one of the user trial BPE21H-BPE40H Model 70's  

 

guess the holy grail would be finding one of these H or J Reg Model 70's surviving somewhere still! can you imagine that!

kicking it up a Notch check out these 2 Photos I just found/where posted in an Invacar facebook group I lurk in

yes its a couple pictures of a Prototype Model 70!

Taken (rather topically given the posts on the previous page)  outside the Steyr puch works in Austria apparently! check out the tell tail Prototype Model 70, Lucas L572 rear lights and tow bar too  

its really interesting/quite the find, as not only is it a picture of a Prototype Model 70! but I thought the BPE-H cars where User trial cars from BPE21H-BPE40H

but this is clearly BPE19H! which tells me that it is likely Prototype number 9, and that the BPE-H cars go further back in the registration range then we thought!

I have to wonder is it a user trial car and there where more then we thought, or if this one of the last Prototype Model 70's

from what I understand Prototype 6, 7, and 8 where the first styre puch cars being constructed some time starting in 1969, details are sadly very scarce  on those 3

but supposedly Prototype 8 was a 650cc Car (I dont know if 643cc or 660cc however) and was used to to test the drive belt to destruction (destructive wear-testing around a race track basically)

what was between those cars and the User trial cars is(was?) unknown, but seeing BPE19H is very interesting as that falls right into that gap  (its like the Missing chassis numbers and NI cars all over again LOL)

and its really awesome to have another Picture of a Prototype Model 70 and one that I can share, I just need to find a picture of one in use somewhere  

(as I have mentioned before several of the User trial cars remained in use and one even survived all the way until 2003! would be amazing if one survives hidden away somewhere!)

[LightBulbFun]

19 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

kicking it up a Notch check out these 2 Photos I just found/where posted in an Invacar facebook group I lurk in

yes its a couple pictures of a Prototype Model 70!

Taken (rather topically given the posts on the previous page)  outside the Steyr puch works in Austria apparently! check out the tell tail Prototype Model 70, Lucas L572 rear lights and tow bar too  

its really interesting/quite the find, as not only is it a picture of a Prototype Model 70! but I thought the BPE-H cars where User trial cars from BPE21H-BPE40H

but this is clearly BPE19H! which tells me that it is likely Prototype number 9, and that the BPE-H cars go further back in the registration range then we thought!

I have to wonder is it a user trial car and there where more then we thought, or if this one of the last Prototype Model 70's

from what I understand Prototype 6, 7, and 8 where the first styre puch cars being constructed some time starting in 1969, details are sadly very scarce  on those 3

but supposedly Prototype 8 was a 650cc Car (I dont know if 643cc or 660cc however) and was used to to test the drive belt to destruction (destructive wear-testing around a race track basically)

what was between those cars and the User trial cars is(was?) unknown, but seeing BPE19H is very interesting as that falls right into that gap  (its like the Missing chassis numbers and NI cars all over again LOL)

and its really awesome to have another Picture of a Prototype Model 70 and one that I can share, I just need to find a picture of one in use somewhere  

(as I have mentioned before several of the User trial cars remained in use and one even survived all the way until 2003! would be amazing if one survives hidden away somewhere!)

and after some personal correspondence with the chap that posted those photos

I just got a whole bunch more of the same machine and they have been very interesting to study!  

never have pictures of a Prototype machine been seen in such relative detail before, so its very awesome to see

I wonder what the device mounted to the dashboard is in this picture for example

and a couple shots with everything open  (interesting to note the round hole in the rear "bathtub" transmission access cover)

I do wonder how it got to the Steyr puch works, Stuart recalls one was driven overland to the SDP (Steyr Daimler Puch) works as part of the testing programme, but he needs to check his notes to see if he is remembering correctly

I also wonder what it was doing there!

[plasticvandan]

Im pretty sure Steyr had one to check for overheating,how it coped with the transmission etc,as it was their engine they would have wanted to check it was satisfactory before allowing it to be used

[martc]

I'm not sure those photos are at the SDP (now Magna Steyr) factory. I've driven past it on several occasions and there was very much an industrial park vibe about the place, with buildings in all directions. The factory was surrounded by busy autobahns and I seem to remember that what greenery was about was very scrubby. Those photos are very much open countryside. I'm not saying the photos are not in Austria, and Graz is in an unusally flat part of the country, but I don't think it's at the factory.

[LightBulbFun]

24 minutes ago, plasticvandan said:

Im pretty sure Steyr had one to check for overheating,how it coped with the transmission etc,as it was their engine they would have wanted to check it was satisfactory before allowing it to be used

interesting, I did wonder such, if Steyr puch wanted a machine to check over for themselves etc

and Its funny you mention the check of suitability because I have been wondering overtime, if this is why Fiat refused to supply engines, perhaps there was something about the Model 70 that made the fiat engine unsuitable and FIat could see that so told AC "Sorry this just wont work go to Steyr puch"

(certainly I know the steyr puch engine is much more robust then the fiat engine and I know the Ministry wanted a vehicle with fairly long service intervals etc etc)

23 minutes ago, martc said:

I'm not sure those photos are at the SDP (now Magna Steyr) factory. I've driven past it on several occasions and there was very much an industrial park vibe about the place, with buildings in all directions. The factory was surrounded by busy autobahns and I seem to remember that what greenery was about was very scrubby. Those photos are very much open countryside. I'm not saying the photos are not in Austria, and Graz is in an unusally flat part of the country, but I don't think it's at the factory.

heres a direct quote from the email I was sent with the photos etc  

Quote

This location was a helicopter landing space at the Steyr-Daimler-Puch factory in Thondorf near Graz that was often used when vehicles were photographed.

I understand the photos came from a large collection of photos from the Steyr puch Factory a collection a bit like the Greeves collection from what I can tell

 

[Mrs6C]

Interesting that the air filter points to the RHS on the prototype but to the LHS on all of ours...

[LightBulbFun]

19 minutes ago, Mrs6C said:

Interesting that the air filter points to the RHS on the prototype but to the LHS on all of ours...

Oh yeah I completely missed that! wonder if its something to do with the aforementioned hole 

but one thing I did notice is the windscreen wiper parks on the same side as the production cars and unlike the User trial cars

 

another thing I noticed is something is weird about the tax disk, it does not look like a regular tax disk

is it some sort of Temporary export thing I wonder? or some sort of vehicle under test/trade plate thing?

(of note there are no GB stickers, which I would expect if it was driven Overland...)