The golden buttery base Astra

[greengartside]

Top work Trig, I think the round headlamps made it look better than the square ones. Very much looking forward to the progress on this one.

[dozeydustman]

Can only echo other’s sentiments. Can’t remember last time I saw a Mk1 Astra which wasn’t a GTE let alone a round headlamped saloon!

[ETCHY]

Fantastic, absolutely brilliant thing & cool history.

Can't remember the last time I saw one, let alone one with round headlights. Great colour too.

Did the saloons come out first & the hatch a little bit later ? I have a vague (probably wrong) recollection of that.

Very well bought, watching this with interest !

[Daviemck2006]

Mk1 Astras are still a good looking car. I loved the two I had back in the day. I think if I ever get a working modern classic again an astra would be high on the list of wants, followed by a mk1 cavalier or a mk2 pre facelift cav saloon.

Sent from my SM-T585 using Tapatalk

[dave j]

That's brilliant! I remember my brother's MK1 astra 1200 he had when I was 16 and I really liked it. I would have had it for my first car but he sold it cheap to a mechanic who had condemned it.

[stuboy]

good to see an unmolested example

[Spottedlaurel]

Excellent! I hope to see at some point this year.

Isn't the 1200 engine in these an update of the RWD Kadett unit?

@triggeryou probably know the person who owns/owned this one?

Pogweasel used to own this 4-door, don't know if the non-round lights were original:

The late '70s Cherry was the only other car I can recall where the 4-door ssaloon looked just like the hatchback:

 

 

[D.E]

20 minutes ago, Spottedlaurel said:

Isn't the 1200 engine in these an update of the RWD Kadett unit?

Correct. Which was based on the 1000cc that made its debut in the Kadett A of 1962, increased to 1100cc with the introduction of the Kadett B, and then again to 1200cc for the Kadett C.

[NorfolkNWeigh]

Love a car with a good backstory.

I'm sure I’ve mentioned before on here, but I bought a yellow MK1 Astra from an auction for a workmate’s wife. They’d just had a baby and needed a little hatchback and I was going to take her Mk2 Escort in p/ex, it was only when I was cleaning it ready for sale that I discovered that booted Astra’s were a thing ! 
Got an Escort hatch the next day and punted the Astra on through the Autotrader, in the days when they came out to take the picture.

[trigger]

Wow, i didn't expect that response! It is the same 1196cc unit as was in my old Kadett

I'm not sure if that's a good thing or bad think but at least it should be simple to work on and reliable, the car is basically a Opel Kadett D i believe, the body is made in West Germany and the engine is Kadett so for all intents and purposes it's a rebadged Kadett.

I've not had chance to work on it yet as we had a car meet today but I've ordered a new water pump, thermostat and fan belt for it at a grand total of £28 delivered so that i can at least get it running and outside to wash the dust of it.

1 hour ago, Spottedlaurel said:

Excellent! I hope to see at some point this year.

Isn't the 1200 engine in these an update of the RWD Kadett unit?

@triggeryou probably know the person who owns/owned this one?

 

This belongs to a lad called called Paul who told me yesterday that he's still got it so that's two we know of in Ipswich now, i hope to get a photo of them both together one day.

[andy18s]

Fun fact

Both the Manta A and B were sold with the same 1.2 engine,which must have been an interesting drive...

[Austat]

Great find Trig! If only I could come across gems like the ones you find. 

[Richard_FM]

14 hours ago, andy18s said:

Fun fact

Both the Manta A and B were sold with the same 1.2 engine,which must have been an interesting drive...

I imagine these were only sold in countries with tax based around engine size.

[hairnet]

On 3/20/2022 at 8:47 PM, stuboy said:

good to see an unmolested example

wont be for long (right @trigger  )

 

[Zelandeth]

That's a lovely little car.  I've never actually looked at an Astra of that era up close.  Cavalier yes, both Mk I and II, but never really spent any time with an Astra until the mid to late 80s models.

Nearly bought one of the early to mid 90s ones on several occasions on account of several of the staff at the garage running them and that was always a big recommendation in my book.  We were running mostly clapped out mid 80s Metros and Fiestas at the time, so an L plate Astra in a decent trim level felt worlds away from our cars!

Would be nice if we could get this parked up next to the Cavalier I will hopefully be dragging back into the land of the living at some point soon.

[New POD]

I have a sudden thought with mention of cavaliers.  I believe that the attaching points for all rear beams on Novas, mk2 and mk3 cavaliers, mk1,2,3 and 4 Astras is all identical, so that you can actually swap them around. Not sure if that's true, but if it is it would make fitting brake upgrades to the rear much easier. 

It's probably true, because you know GM.  

I know that people with tuned mk2 cavaliers have fitted mk3 V6 rear beams to get 5 stud wheels and discs. 

My son, learnt to drive in a 1.8 cavalier mk3 and now owns a mk4 Astra which he says is almost the same car to drive. 

Not sure why it's relevant, but I think it was @Zelandeth's last post that just brought it to mind, and at 4:30 am, it's going to stop me sleeping if I don't share this amazingly irrelevant fact. 

[New POD]

On 20/03/2022 at 21:15, Spottedlaurel said:

 

 

The late '70s Cherry was the only other car I can recall where the 4-door ssaloon looked just like the hatchback:

 

 

 

I've often.thought that the Allaggro should have been a hatch. 

[rainagain]

On 3/20/2022 at 10:14 AM, D.E said:

Ah, seems you're correct!

 

Whats the wee screen with 'EQUIP' written on it for?

[RoadworkUK]

21 minutes ago, rainagain said:

Whats the wee screen with 'EQUIP' written on it for?

It's a device that displays how much of a winner Trig is at any given moment. It usually reads 8888.

Either that or it's a giffer-installed aftermarket digital clock.

[D.E]

51 minutes ago, rainagain said:

Whats the wee screen with 'EQUIP' written on it for?

Some sort of trip computer or digital clock, originally there would be an analog clock there (or just a small plastic plate in bASe spec):

Edit: btw that wasn't a picture of trigger's Astra, just a random one from the interwebz.

[Timewaster]

Ah yes, Equip accessories. 

Utter shit. 

That would be a £1.99 clock that I am willing to bet doesn't work. 

[rainagain]

41 minutes ago, Timewaster said:

Ah yes, Equip accessories. 

Utter shit. 

That would be a £1.99 clock that I am willing to bet doesn't work. 

I love the 'giffer crafted' holder for it

[Macscrooge]

What a great find!  When I were a lad a friend’s dad had a similar poverty spec Astra (in 80s fleet beige)  as his company car. He reckoned it a much nicer drive than the Viva HC  which preceded it. Which isn’t saying much really. 

[GeordieInExile]

12 hours ago, Richard_FM said:

I imagine these were only sold in countries with tax based around engine size.

Capri 1.3s were UK market though! So maybe not.

[Noel Tidybeard]

On 20/03/2022 at 13:38, hairnet said:

obvs a joke relating to the fact its got the old ohv in it

never driven one with that in it only the later ohc cars wonder what theyre like

sound like a chevette?

im not looking at the nice one in serbia that someone posted in the ebay thread

no, i would imagine it sounds like a Kadett

[Spiny Norman]

A pal had an old  V reg one of those back in the day in that brick-y terracotta colour they did. Sweet little thing to drive and a homage to the old Alfasud with the exposed boot lid hinges. 
This one's faired a bit better than its Italian equivalent thankfully.

[quicksilver]

That's a cracking find! Reminds me of one that belonged to a friend's mum who we used to lift-share to primary school with. Hers was custard yellow and I'm pretty sure was a 5-door hatch but the interior was very similar. I do remember her husband had a BX and therefore was a winner.

Wasn't the existence of the saloon something to do with that weird transitional period when GM had decided Opel would be responsible for designing all new cars but Vauxhall still had a small design team at Luton? I'm sure I read somewhere that the saloon was pretty much created to give the Luton lads something to work on, although they clearly didn't do much.

[adw1977]

Luton actually did a lot of work on both a three box saloon version and a different front end for the Vauxhall version, but all their work came to nothing because of cost cutting.

There are some pictures of their work on Vauxpedia. 

Vauxpedia link

[mk2_craig]

I never cease to be amazed at the information that’s available on that Vauxpedia site, shame it’s still stuck in 1998 from a web design perspective and therefore more or less completely unreadable on a mobile device, not helped by the stupid white on black text. 

[Muniphobia]

It's a great site but all the text is stored as images - viewing it at work is painful as the connection is awful.  The site could be as good as AROline but for Vauxhall's with a redesign, I'm still surprised nobody has done a similar site for Fords.