mercrocker wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 8:02 am
Absolutely, do not apologise. The bloke who should be apologising to the Gods of Longbridge is the fella who neglected it. You have reached the point of no return the long way and have ensured a good future for what remains useable.
The Dutch car looks an excellent solution. All the Hampshires (3!) I have seen have been RHD black cars and as this was such an export-oriented period of Austin history it is extremely fitting to be represented by a LHD example. Hopefully this will work out for you and provide a giant leap into getting a roadworthy Hampshire. Good luck!
Thanks for the kind words. Genuinely, if LOB could be saved it would be, but as you say, the 30+ years outside have really taken their toll.
It will however be an excellent source of spares for the blue Dutch A70, which should make getting it back on the road relatively straightforward.
It will have to be converted to right hand drive. The current owner is quite insistent he keep the left hand drive bits. In a way it's a shame, but it's the way it has to be. I prefer right hand drive anyway for obvious reasons.
Both of us are looking for transport quotes. Lincolnshire to Holland is relatively few miles (if you take the ferry) but obviously quite time consuming.
Ah, I missed the bit about him keeping the steering stuff - or at least misunderstood the importance of it. Well, that's OK it will be a better drive over here and you will have a less-worn driving seat! I'm sure many an Austin was so converted back in the day as export cars were, I know, often intercepted to fulfil favoured orders from UK customers. In fact, there was an MO Morris where I grew up that was delivered here, LHD, as the buyer was desperate for a new car and paid a substantial premium to divert an export car but never converted it. It had a little black and white plaque warning following drivers about the left-hand steering and "No Hand Signals"
Hope you can get transport sorted and that this works out!
There's a great long bar in Rock & Roll heaven.......
I misread your initial post and understood you to mean that yours (or significant bits of it) were off to Holland. Having now grasped the nature of the undertaking, even better. Really shows the benefits of keeping these old things indoors if possible.
There is so few left and so little interest in them that any that make the road again isn't a bad thing. If you don't fix LOB, there is a very good chance no one else will and it'll end up deteriorating further. Then it'll be good for no one.
It's a shame that it's not going back on the road, given the history attached to it. But I'm not the one who has it on the ramp and would be doing the welding.
At the end of the day, these are just another piece of mass produced machinery that have a finite life. While they can be fixed up and got going on the road again, they need a procession of people over the years to keep them existing. As the years go by, the number of people willing to do this will reduce. So eventually there is a good chance there will be almost no classics left in a few centuries time anyway.
This is a good point and one I had considered.
I want to be able to use and enjoy a Hampshire before petrol gets too expensive.
At 21 mpg they're not the most economical of cars.
One working car with a real chance of an extended future v. two wrecks with only a past?
Exactly the right thing to do. Be good if you can retain the British registration / identity etc but with the rare blue of the LHD car.
A huge number of petrol cars will dissapear in the next 50 years. (I don’t care about Diesel cars) Those that do survive until the end of the century will probably have a life as long as “civilization”
The blue colour is extremely rare; most of the survivors being black. The Austin service journal gives the colour as Antrim Blue. Well it must be as it’s the only blue listed for the Hampshire.
I have only managed to find a picture of one other in the same colour, an Australian one. At least I think it is as it’s clearly been resprayed.
I think they look good in black but it’s certainly an even rarer survivor.
