project 1972 Vanden Plas Princess 1300 - The Forum Bike VP

[PhilA]

1000-1500 miles recommended with an older engine bolted on top. Time to stock up in cheap oil. 

It should not be overly harsh. You'll feel the changes but at light throttle on the flat it should be in top by about 15 and those changes should be only perceptible by a change in engine rpm.

If it thumps the gears at anything less than ⅓ throttle then as Zel says, the throttle to modulator linkage is set wrong. They're fiddly to get right. Friend had a Mini and that was a bit of trial and error.

[High Jetter]

20/50? Duckhams or Castrol GTX, Sir?

[SiC]

58 minutes ago, PhilA said:

1000-1500 miles recommended with an older engine bolted on top. Time to stock up in cheap oil. 

I believe they really prefer JASO MA2 spec oil rather than your common garden 20w50 regular classic car oil. It's a motorbike grade oil that's designed for wet clutch applications - which this basically is.  Even 10w40 is the recommend grade too. 

[SiC]

First chance all day I've had to write sort of a proper post. This is going to be a bit of a wall of non-proof read text before I go to bed!

Most will know I have a strong fascination with ADO16s. Something about them gets right under my skin. However I've not really properly driven one. My first, the purple 1100 I never finished as a project. The second, the blue 1100, I absolutely loved but I owned it during COVID lockdowns and barely drove it. I sold it to buy a BMW E28. Big regret as I didn't gel with that car at all. Cool as fuck but just not me. I had a chance to buy that one back but didn't due to my silly rule of never re-buying a car I've owned before - always plenty of other cars to try so no point going back. 

Why this one? It's quite simple really and there are a number of reasons why this is perfect for what I'm looking for.

- Reliability. This is important as with the Dolomite and Midget to finish and two modern but older BMWs as dailies I really can't have another big mechanical project on the go. If a classic car gets to Scotland and back, you really know it's de-snagged.

- Automatic. Couple of reasons why I wanted one. I've never had an old auto. The AP box fascinates me. Different experience. Finally and most importantly, I'd like Mrs SiC to actually drive my classics for once and an auto gives her no excuse on worrying about working fiddly old manuals. She worries about breaking my cars (I keep telling her I don't care if she breaks it) and there isn't much to break on an auto except just normal malfunction. 

- Solid. Yes it will need a tickle again soon - it's a ADO16 after all. But it doesn't need it immediately.

- Poor paintwork. Sounds weird this one but there is a reason this is a good thing. My Midget needs painting. But I don't/can't want to spend many, many thousands getting someone else to do it. So this provides a perfect testbed to practice the art of coach painting on. Literally won't be making it any worse than it is already!

- Price. Realistically and reasonably priced always goes down well in my book. 

- Comical cutesy styling. Apparently these were all the rage in the early 90s in Japan and many got exported over there. Clique British upper class pretentious styling in a small economical car to show off to the neighbours. As a mate said, it's like a shrunk down Rolls Royce. Almost hilarious nowadays. Probably the equivalent now would be some premium German SUV that looks like it'll bite your face off. Utterly ridiculous but exists to show off. This is just from a different time and probably does quite the opposite.

Probably other reasons I've forgotten but they're the main ones. 

I've had a quick 5 min blast around local lanes and I bloody love it already. Ran out time today and probably won't get time tomorrow. But hopefully on Sunday I can give it a proper run. Maybe have a poke around too. 

What's the plan for it? Well use it for one. Mostly for local runs as I enjoy doing them the most in classics. Whether going to the gym, shopping or a local beach for a walk. Great time to jump in and enjoy the journey over there in an old motor vehicle. Likewise take it to classic car meets for others to look in curiously.

Mechanically I'm not going to tinker unless it actually needs it. Previous owners on here have put a lot of effort into the mechanicals and metalwork which is why it drives well, reliable and isn't collapsing. 

This particular car has a reputation for reverse being finicky. So far it's been perfect for me - including manoeuvring inside storage. Basically I selected drive or reverse and waited it to thonk into gear. Yeah it's not instant but it does go in if you wait long enough. It's old and just shouldn't be rushed. But I'll fiddle with the box if it does play silly buggers. I'm just going to drive it sensibly (i.e. not rag the tits off it like I do say with my Spitfire and BGT!) and enjoy it for what it is. 

Probably the main thing that needs sorting mechanically is the Speedo. It gets stuck at random speeds when going slowly and then maybe works at faster! I'll pull it out in the first instance and give it a clean up inside. Worse case send it off for repair.

Servicing of course will be done. But not a lot to do apart from regular oil+filter changes to keep that box happy. Tbh given my normal use of classics, 1.5k miles in the next year will be a big achievement for me!

The main thing it could do with now is some tarting up love on the visuals. Paint as mentioned above I'd like to redo. Interior is functional but tired. The veneer is a mess - I notice some replacement in the boot. Never done it before but that's how you learn! Headliner needs a good clean but tbh it's torn and worn in places, so maybe replacement is on the cards. Seats are pretty comfy but all ripped. I was going to get Mrs SiC on the case but I may source a set of replacements maybe. Then other bits and pieces just to make it look a bit sharper. 

I'm not going to go crazy but just a bit of work to give the old girl a freshen up. She's lasted this long and deserves to look a little better I reckon. All easy stuff to do and shouldn't cost big bucks either. 

[captain_70s]

15 minutes ago, SiC said:

I'm just going to drive it sensibly (i.e. not rag the tits off it like I do say with my Spitfire and BGT!) and enjoy it for what it is. 

I was quite surprised it never really held me up following in the Doloshite. I assumed it'd be mega sluggish going into top gear at 18mph but I reckon the 1275 A series has more low down torque than a Triumph 1300 as I was having to apply some revs to keep up...

[SiC]

Seats have been sorted for what I think is a reasonable £115. Almost certainly a lot cheaper than even the materials to DIY a new set of covers and foam. 

Not even that far away to collect. About an hour each way. 

Listing says stored in a loft for years and apparently in very good condition. At least no tears like the one on this. Probably needs a good leather clean and feed to fully bring it back to life. 

https://ebay.us/m/h1hgzM

[beko1987]

They look like they'll come round! Be even easier to do 4 or 5 rounds of leather feed too with them not in the car and in this nice weather! Let them sweat it in and absorb it before fitting

[purplebargeken]

What Beko said ++++

[MorrisItalSLX]

I remember an episode of Wheeler Dealers where they had a Maserati (?) with dry leather and they fed the seats, put them in black garbage bags and left them in the sun. After a couple rounds they were as good as new.

[bangernomics]

You might be lucky on the speedo and it be the cable not clicked in properly.

[SiC]

Oh no! Throttle cable has snapped.

 

[LightBulbFun]

Just now, SiC said:

Oh no! Throttle cable has snapped.

 

funnily enough that happened the last time you drive a 1970's Automatic! 

[Cookiesouwest]

3 minutes ago, SiC said:

Oh no! Throttle cable has snapped.

 

Need any help? Have you broken down anywhere near me?

[SiC]

 

 

[SiC]

Bodged the choke as the throttle by wrapping the remains of the old cable around the choke cable. 🤞

[SiC]

Home after that little adventure 😂

Sods law it broke. I've lost the little trunion thing that the choke cable goes into though 😒

[Zelandeth]

Always the way when a car changes owners!  It'll find some ways to play up!  Hopefully won't be too much of a headache to fix.

[2flags]

I remember these when they were new, cracking little car. Just as you say, a mini Rolls-Royce. 

[catsinthewelder]

On 09/05/2025 at 10:23, SiC said:

Insurance sorted. ETA I imagine sometime around lunch. Need to make a bee-line to storage soon as the delivery driver is taking my Dolomite on his truck as a next job for someone to do some more rust prodding on it.

I thought that was your Dolomite I saw on the M5 on Friday.

Loving the VP

[Matty]

Oh the joys. It's a bit like that BDSM shit in a way. Paying money to be humiliated and kicked in the nuts. But on the rare days when everything works correctly and the weather is good then old cars are a glorious thing.

it's the hope that kills you 😁

[GrumpiusMaximus]

54 minutes ago, Matty said:

Oh the joys. It's a bit like that BDSM shit in a way. Paying money to be humiliated and kicked in the nuts. But on the rare days when everything works correctly and the weather is good then old cars are a glorious thing.

it's the hope that kills you 😁

To continue the analogy, you also require copious amounts of lubricant.  Unless you want to risk it.

[lesapandre]

15 hours ago, SiC said:

Oh no! Throttle cable has snapped.

 

Lower picture a definite calendar shot.

[SiC]

I can tell you that driving home using the choke control as a throttle is quite a weird experience! It was only a few miles so my bodge held up fine.

Actually it wasn't the throttle cable that snapped. It was the cable holder on the bulkhead had fatigued cracked off. Like Zel says, cars have a funny habit of being really reliable with previous owners and then crop up issues with new owners. I guess for me it's a combination of bad luck and maybe I'm a bit heavier on the accelerator pedal. This happened just as I was going over a hump backed bridge and I accelerated harder to go over. Maybe I hit the end stop a bit hard and the force between the pedal and bulkhead being squeezed was enough to snap it off?

This bit should be attached to the bulkhead and it's where the throttle cable slides into. 

If I realised this was the issue, I would have not cut the cable. Tbh the cable sheath didn't have a whole lot of life left in it anyway. It's a nylon tube on this (rather than a coiled wire sheath) and it's just worn through enough that it pretty much snapped when flexing it.

I did try removing the cable from it but it promptly snapped off. As it's only plastic, drilling it out by hand was easy enough.

So I now needed to fix this. I've seen this done on previous cars where large washers are welded to the cable holder which then pushes against the bulkhead. It doesn't actually need welding onto the bulkhead as the force of the pedal pulling against it is enough to hold into place.

I cleaned up that holder with the wire wheel and wedged it between two sizes of washer. Then welded the lot together. I might have gone a bit overboard with the welds ...

Welding setup is using a sheet of steel as the ground connection, ground clamp held in place by a grinder pushing it against the sheet and then the work pieces just resting on the sheet. This allowed the back of it to stay flat.

I painted it with red oxide and then some Rover Pageant blue. Completely the wrong shade of blue and not sure why I bothered tbh. I sprayed some of the exposed rusted metal on the car with red oxide just to give it a bit more protection.

Throttle cable is a brand new Midget accelerator cable. Longer than the one that came off the car but fitted perfectly and tbh actually better. For £10 versus £25 for a 'proper' cable, I'll take that. Just I need to remember to buy a new one for the Midget when I get that far to finishing it...

 

On the carb end, it fits through this little trunion thing. I cleaned it up with carb cleaner before reinstalling the new cable through it. 

Attaching to the carb linkage was the fiddlist part of the job. Not a whole lot of room for fingers in there! Air cleaner is removed for a bit more access.

While rooting around for a throttle cable (I found a spare MGB cable but the end was different), I came across a set of MGB plug wires. These I replaced with new as I had these older ones left on a spare dizzy in the boot. They came with my BGT and only done a hundred or so miles before I changed with new shiny. Hence kept them as spares.

The plug leads on the VP were completely wrong and looked like for some sort of OHC engined vehicle. While they worked, they just looked wrong. They're from before Andy's ownership and probably been on there for years!

When removing the leads, cylinder 1 had the crimp come adrift from the cable. Maybe this poor connection was causing the occasional stumble I got at idle when it arrived?

Looks a bit more right with these on. Runs perfectly too.

All done.

 

 

With the throttle cable fixed, I had a bit of time for some more tinkering.

Clock doesn't work. Screws are missing from the back so someone else has been in there before me. Power is definitely getting to it - I found that out as I caught the positive spade on the negative body of the clock creating a spark! 😅

My suspicion is either the transistor or capacitor is dead. Not much else it can be! Quite a neat little design. Basically presumably a little RC circuit that pulses a coil on occasion. This moves an arm with magnets on which powers a winding circuit of the mechanical clock. Basically 70s technology to get around that quartz clocks weren't affordable/invented then. 

I'll come back to this clock later as it's going to need a bit of fine handed work to not damage anything. The garage isn't the best place to do that.

Not sure what this transistor is yet (haven't looked) but I imagine a common garden NPN or PNP will drop right in. Capacitor value might not even matter that much either. 

Next up was the horn. Factory operation is pushing the end of the stalk - a natural position and where my Spitfire horn is. At some point a hideous modern waterproof button has been installed on the switch panel. Presumably to get through an MOT back in the day (mid 2000s looking at MOT history).

While it worked, it was ugly and not in a convenient place.

Unfortunately the label took off the paint. Sad times. Might get a small humbrol satin black to touch it up. Or colour it in with a sharpy...

The switch contacts on these stalks can easily be got at by unscrewing the cap on the end. Contacts were clean and looked perfectly fine.

I removed the column cowling in the expectation of removing the stalk in case a wire had broken to the end. Following the wiring down I thought best to check at the connector.

First thing I noticed was some of the contacts had come adrift. Unfortunately not the horn connections but useful to see and fix nonetheless. I think they might be for indicators.

Bending the tab up on the terminal and pushing it back in gave a reassuring click. Now holds in place when you push the two halves together.

Checking the connection on the connector end found the stalk worked perfectly.

Hmm. I wonder what's wrong. Best check under the bonnet next and see if power is getting there when pushed.

The original wires were helpfully insulated taped together.

Pushing the stalk lit the test light. Perfect! That connection is just fine.

So I'm not sure why someone installed a button in the past. The horn that is in there is some french made unit - presumably it would have had Lucas originally. Plus only one horn not two that I imagine it came with (there are two horn spade connections). So perhaps it was assumed the horn wiring was dead when it was actually the horn? Then the horn was replaced at a later date.

Dunno but it works off the stalk now. 

I removed the aftermarket wiring and button. Easy enough as it was just one long wire to the horn and another to the fusebox - all going through the bulkhead to the button on the dash.

The big hole in the switch panel is too large to get a Lucas toggle switch in unfortunately. For now I've just stuck a grommet to cover the hole up. Not perfect but not tragically awful. Better than that stupid massive button which was in it before.

 

So quite a nice little, fun and simple evening tinkering session. A welcome reprieve from doing Midget bodywork!

[N Dentressangle]

Top tinkering and nice pics!

[PhilA]

The Midget cable was an AHA moment, by looks of it.

 

Nice work

[Dick Cheeseburger]

Is this the ex HMC VP Princess? Great to see lots of small tweaks happening already - it must be pretty refreshing working on something where fixes are relatively quick and not overly complex compared to working on modern Germanic tin, or welding up the Midget...

[SiC]

1 hour ago, Dick Cheeseburger said:

Is this the ex HMC VP Princess? Great to see lots of small tweaks happening already - it must be pretty refreshing working on something where fixes are relatively quick and not overly complex compared to working on modern Germanic tin, or welding up the Midget...

Ex @HMC (I think twice?)

Ex @Sigmund Fraud

Ex @Andyrew

Not sure who else?

 

Unfortunately I have no history with this little car which is always a shame. 

I did find these three Flickr pictures from a quick Google of it somewhere in London in 2020.

 

 

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/77492252@N05/50326606808/in/photostream/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/77492252@N05/50323286218/in/photostream/

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/77492252@N05/50324132122/in/photostream/

 

I might be wrong but if my memory serves me correctly, that Flickr user is on here? If so I can't remember the username.

Earlier today I bought a totalcarcheck check. I look to be it's 16th owner and it's been through a few in COVID.

https://totalcarcheck.co.uk/Certificate?id=WTJ735L-3tDHUIYP

 

I'd love to know more history on it. I notice in older pictures on here it has a Vanden Plas Owners badge on the grille. No idea where that went (I don't like those sort of badges on grilles and would have removed it anyway) but I did put a post on their Facebook page if anyone recognises it. Only one post and some chap saying it was for sale a few years ago by some "new age hippie" in the London area. 

[LightBulbFun]

39 minutes ago, SiC said:

I'd love to know more history on it. I notice in older pictures on here it has a Vanden Plas Owners badge on the grille. No idea where that went (I don't like those sort of badges on grilles and would have removed it anyway) but I did put a post on their Facebook page if anyone recognises it. Only one post and some chap saying it was for sale a few years ago by some "new age hippie" in the London area. 

WTJ735L is a Lancashire registration mark, so you could try their record office and see if they have any pre DVLA information on the vehicle?  

[N Dentressangle]

@SiC is this any use to you?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/396282055926

[SiC]

9 hours ago, N Dentressangle said:

@SiC is this any use to you?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/396282055926

It's a bit tattier than the one I already have on there unfortunately. Plus it'll be an absolute nightmare to replace. Thanks for finding it though!