Classic Diesels

[sierraman]

Standard did a Vanguard Diesel, did any of them survive? Likewise did any A60 diesels get preserved? Apart from the occasional Rover SD1 2.4SD you rarely see any pre 85 diesels left. 

[lesapandre]

There is an A60 diesel for sale on Ebygum at the moment. But yup hardly any pre-85 British diesels. 

[Squirrel2]

Does this count? Rolls-Royce with Gardner 4LW power...

Squirrel2 

[sierraman]

Converting to diesel was a big thing in the 60’s and 70’s. Dropping Perkins engines in Rovers etc. 

[adw1977]

Mercedes were early adopters of diesels, although I doubt they sold many in the UK.

I've seen these two in the wild.

[sierraman]

A new Mercedes Diesel in the sixties would have been about the same price as a semi detached house. 

[adw1977]

Even further back is this 1958 example, UK registered from new, that I saw in 2013.

[lanciamatt]

When I was a kid we had a merc 240d, that was a 1976 car, sold it in 1986 due to severe rot 

[martc]

The Austin Maxi Diesel must be a classic by now.

[MiniMort]

12 minutes ago, martc said:

The Austin Maxi Diesel must be a classic by now.

The caravanner's choice

[Datsuncog]

Peugeot 404 was sold in the UK in 1.9 diesel format in the mid-60s. Over £300 more expensive than the petrol version, mind (£1,396 against £1,093).

(Pics of UK-spec examples are hard to find...)

Autocar reckoned it was pretty good, in their 3-way diesel car test in 1965, up against the Austin A60 Cambridge oil-burner and the much more expensive Merc 190D.

(The Cambridge came first, based on miserly fuel economy and a low price of £875, but the testers acknowledged that the big Pug offered much better performance. You could have bought two derv Austins for the price of the Merc, and still had change for a slap-up weekend at the caravan at Broadstairs, with all the pickled eggs you could handle.)

[sutty2006]

I nearly bought an 84 diesel mk2 carlton. No turbo. Epically shite. 

[MiniMort]

I always thought that Peugeot Citroen offered the first truly popular diesels, or at least ones that could be described as a little more than 'not much cop'. My family's first diesel was a 1981 Citroen CX 25D Super Safari in '83

[djoptix]

Yep, we had a 1983 Peugeot 305 GLD.

[wuvvum]

My diesel CX is only a year beyond 1985.

I nearly bought a diesel Vanguard a few years back.  Unfortunately negotiations coincided with me losing my storage, so it never happened.

[somewhatfoolish]

3 hours ago, Squirrel2 said:

Does this count? Rolls-Royce with Gardner 4LW power...

Squirrel2 

That's a 4LK rather than a 4LW; a few homebrews with those in the 1950s, but not that many as the 4LK was a wartime-only engine for midget subs and anything else that needed a small(relatively) light diesel.

[sierraman]

1 hour ago, sutty2006 said:

I nearly bought an 84 diesel mk2 carlton. No turbo. Epically shite. 

Epically slow as well, didn’t the 2.3D top out at something like 85mph? The 2.0 Diesel Record must have been even worse. Maybe 75mph maximum? 

[Lankytim]

There used to be a black A60 diesel on a driveway near me, I had a chat with the owner and he showed me his large garage in the back garden with a lovely 1920's Rolls Royce (I think, it was a while ago now)  I think the guy said the A60 was minicab spec. 

 

Imagine ringing for a cab and a diesel A60 turned up! amazing!

 

The A60 was for sale and disappeared not long after, I'm not sure what happened to it. 

[Spiny Norman]

One of only two diseasels I've ever owned (The other one I drove fewer than 200  miles in, so doesn't really count) was this gloriously comfy, amazingly stylish but catastrophically leisurely non turbo CX which had had its broken Douvrin replaced with an engine from an older car. When new it would have had 70-odd bhp, to propel about 1500Kg...
I think I beat a 2CV in it once.

 

[adw1977]

I posted a guide to new car prices from December 1976 in this thread two years ago.  Looking at it now, I can only see three models with a diesel option for sale in the UK :

Citroen CX 2200 diesel at approx. 5% more than a 2400 petrol (also available as an estate)

Mercedes 240D saloon at approx. 9% more than a 230 saloon (also available as a long wheelbase limousine)

Peugeot 504 L saloon and estate at £504 (around 15%) more than the equivalent petrol engine cars.

[adw1977]

JeeExEll posted a 1974 price guide in this thread and it only shows the Merc and Peugeot 404 and 504 with a diesel option.

[Tadhg Tiogar]

16 minutes ago, Spiny Norman said:

One of only two diseasels I've ever owned (The other one I drove fewer than 200  miles in, so doesn't really count) was this gloriously comfy, amazingly stylish but catastrophically leisurely non turbo CX which had had its broken Douvrin replaced with an engine from an older car. When new it would have had 70-odd bhp, to propel about 1500Kg...
I think I beat a 2CV in it once.....

If you had the 2.2litre D installed, then you would have had a whole 66hp to play* with. When N/A diesels were the norm, walking might have been faster.

[LightBulbFun]

surprised no ones mentioned The Austin FX3 and FX4

[Bren]

BMW 524d. Spanish taxi drivers cannot be wrong.

[Dirk Diggler]

4 hours ago, sutty2006 said:

I nearly bought an 84 diesel mk2 carlton. No turbo. Epically shite. 

had a bonnet bulge though ?

A funeral director in Aughrim, Co. Wicklow bought a new Merc 200d in 1977, w116 and it's still in regular use by him today. I must try and get a picture, it's immaculate, still with its original number plates

I've known the car all my life; and it still sounds so rough even comparing it to 80s / early 90s jap, pug or vag 1.6d that would have been very common here at the time

Not unusual to see diesel 70s and 80s stuff for sale here; prices can be a little crazy though

[Amishtat]

2 hours ago, Lankytim said:

There used to be a black A60 diesel on a driveway near me, I had a chat with the owner and he showed me his large garage in the back garden with a lovely 1920's Rolls Royce (I think, it was a while ago now)  I think the guy said the A60 was minicab spec. 

 

Imagine ringing for a cab and a diesel A60 turned up! amazing!

 

The A60 was for sale and disappeared not long after, I'm not sure what happened to it. 

I went to Crich tram museum about fifteen years ago and saw a black A60 diesel taxi, fairly well wobbed but still going with its second engine. The owner's dad had run a taxi firm in the sixties, bought it new and it had been lain up in the mid Seventies for some reason. He said it was so slow it was painful.. Racking my brain to try and remember where he'd come from in the hope it's the same car, I think it was South Wales. 

[Timewaster]

Diesels were pretty rare until mid to late 80s. Taxis, trucks and tractors.

The Cavalier and BX were among the first mainstream models. Still dog slow pre turbo era but getting there.

PSA really lead the way with the  turbo XUD in the BX and 405 .

Prior to that nothing sold in great numbers and those that did buy derv would be planning to do high mileages so unlikely to survive tucked up in a garage somewhere.

When I was a kid, most petrol stations didn't sell diesel and the ones that did had one black pump tucked up a corner.

[Tadhg Tiogar]

1 minute ago, Timewaster said:

....When I was a kid, most petrol stations didn't sell diesel and the ones that did had one black pump tucked up a corner.

I can remember filling station price boards marked "DERV" instead of "Diesel"

[artdjones]

Has anyone mentioned the MK1 Golf,which started to be sold in the UK some time around 1978 in 1.5 and 1980 in 1.6 form.I'm not really a VAG lover,but the Golf was probably the first car that made diesel totally mainstream.They also did a 1.5 MK1 Passat.I still regret not buying a 1979 estate in brown that I was offered in 1991.

[Asimo]

I was a pump boy in 1973 and we had just one customer with a Diesel car: a BMC Farina. There were a few Diesel LandRovers but that was pretty much it. Even vans were mostly Diesel. Almost all Transits and Bedford CFs were petrol, the Diesel Mk1 Transit with it's "big nose" was then quite a rarity,  now disproportionately represented amongst the surviving vans of that era.

My '86 Diesel BX estate was the first oil burner, and the first foreign car my employers had run. I never thought of it as slow, with it's 65hp? XUD. The first Diesel car in this village was a Wplate Audi 100 Avant with about the same NA horsepower as the BX. The XUD engine was the start of succesful Diesels in GB, a real turning point.

Portugal always has a Marina D for sale:https://www.custojusto.pt/porto/ligeiros-passageiros/austin-morris-marina-1-5-diesel-15520609