For those interested in old cars.

[Rugd1022]

Just imagine how good that Lamborghini Riva sounds - two Bizzarrini designed V12s at full chat.... 

 

Another dose of Italianate loveliness which I came across earlier today from the Frankfurt Auto Show in 1973, and some Lamborghini factory tour shots from one of the facebook groups, taken around twenty years later....

 

 

 

 

 

[alastairq]

I have to admit to a liking for the first Lamborghini grand tourers [the 350 & 400 Gts...]

 

I remember reading about them as a teenager, when the were first presented.

Somehow, these days, such a car is more appealing to an oldie...easier to get in & out of, less brash, more tweed jacket...

[boxbrownie]

2 hours ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

One of the highlights to me of visiting Venice is seeing lots of beautiful launches like that. But if I had to choose between the two, it would have to be the Maserati. What a truly stunning looker of a car!

The Dutch, as a nation, seem to be very into classic cars.

Probably because they have no stunning countryside to look at.....so instead.....

[Rugd1022]

The Maserati Merak belonging to ABBA's Benny and Frida....

 

 

[Enterprisingwestern]

 

Oi, don't lean on the bloody car!

 

Mike.

[steve1]

1 hour ago, Rugd1022 said:

The Maserati Merak belonging to ABBA's Benny and Frida....

 

 

 

Who got it in the divorce settlement I wonder....

 

steve

[Rugd1022]

It came up for grabs in a recent Bonhams auction....!

 

Back to business with this lovely Motorail shot at Snozzell in the early '70s....

 

 

[alastairq]

1 hour ago, Enterprisingwestern said:

 

Oi, don't lean on the bloody car!

 

Mike.

 Was this why the divorce was granted?

[alastairq]

9 minutes ago, Rugd1022 said:

It came up for grabs in a recent Bonhams auction....!

 

Back to business with this lovely Motorail shot at Snozzell in the early '70s....

 

 

 Such a pity this sort of service wasn't continued in a more widespread manner? If costs could have been kept low, then I can imagine how many long motorway journeys could have been avoided? How many kernackered drivers would have been saved? How many crashes avoided?  Given the deplorably short ranges of cheaper electric cars....such a service up & down the country...if cheap enough, could have all sorts of benefits?  Oh well, I'll dream on.....

[Mountain Goat]

1 hour ago, Rugd1022 said:

The Maserati Merak belonging to ABBA's Benny and Frida....

 

 

 

 

Look at the background to the middle photograph. Two lovely Volvos (Amazon and a 240) and a Mk1 Renault 15...! Wow, I loved those cars. I had an Amazon and my Grandad used to have a rather special Renault 15. He worked for a little while as a designer for Renault here in the UK and when he bought his car, they made it for him to his requirements. Basically it was a Renault 15 with the top of the range Renault 17 engine.  A bit of a sleeper in those days! He used to take it out on a certain stretch of straight road once a year and if he didn't get 120mph from it, he would be dissapointed and start tuning it. Now 120mph may not seem a lot, but if you saw the road and how short it was where both ends to this stretch needed one to break hard due to the curves and downhills, even when I travel today in a more modern car, I realize how that car could shift.

It was not my Grandads first Renault. He had two Renault 16's and I believe he had a Dophine or it may have been a Renault 8? I remember my Mother recalling when he worked for Parsons Pickles as he designed a machine which was the first machine in the world which could take food in its raw state, and process it where the food would come out packed in its jar... In this case it was onions. It would top, tail, peel and pickle them, and seal them in jars in one single machine. During his time working there, my Grandad and the boss of the factory had both purchased new cars. My Grandad was out tinkering with his new car to tune it up. His Renault 16. The boss had bought a Mercades SL with those gullwing doors. His boss was bragging about how fast his car was and it ended up them having a race between Pembrey and Kidwelly ad back which has some long straights with a few corners. I believe this was in the late 1950's to mid 1960's at the latest? Anyway. My Grandad tuned his car up and the Mercades had not only been beat, but had been beat by quite a margin. 

He always did enjoy tinkering with his cars! 

[Fat Controller]

17 minutes ago, Rugd1022 said:

It came up for grabs in a recent Bonhams auction....!

 

Back to business with this lovely Motorail shot at Snozzell in the early '70s....

 

 

A wonderful mixture of ages and types of car. I like the roof rack on the last car- it seems to be a repurposed ironing board. A shame the economics of these trains were so poor; stock utilisation was poor in many cases, whilst the single deck 'Carflats' were limited to about four cars each.  Most similar workings have disappeared on the Continental as well; when I started with Eurotunnel, 25 years ago, there were half a dozen departures to destinations around France (I could reel directions to the terminal off by heart). Now, you have to drive to Brussels, and the trains only take vehicles lower than 1.80 M, which rules out roof-racks and 'granny-boxes', and even popular types such as the Picasso and Discovery.

[Mountain Goat]

13 minutes ago, alastairq said:

 Such a pity this sort of service wasn't continued in a more widespread manner? If costs could have been kept low, then I can imagine how many long motorway journeys could have been avoided? How many kernackered drivers would have been saved? How many crashes avoided?  Given the deplorably short ranges of cheaper electric cars....such a service up & down the country...if cheap enough, could have all sorts of benefits?  Oh well, I'll dream on.....

 

They once tried motor rail services for a few yearsand I believe it was between London and Fishguard to meet the ferry to Ireland. They also stopped along the way at places like Carmarthen where the old car loading ramp can still be seen alongside what is now a taxi firms headquarters (It was an undertakers before that and may have been a BR building before that? Anyaay. The reason why they had to stop it was twofold. One was that the lineside had to e kept clear as the occasional branch leaning over would end up smashing car windows, and the other was kids would throw stones at the cars and also caused damage, so after paying out compensation for repairs to the vehicles, the service made a loss so was withdrawn. I was told this by train drivers who used to work the trains. They also said that Freightliners werw tried for a year or two out of Fishguard and one of the drivers said to me that they were heavy things to tow. He said he only just managed to get the trains up the hill out of Fishguard. They used class 47's on those trains.

[Fat Controller]

1 minute ago, Mountain Goat said:

 

They once tried motor rail services for a few yearsand I believe it was between London and Fishguard to meet the ferry to Ireland. They also stopped along the way at places like Carmarthen where the old car loading ramp can still be seen alongside what is now a taxi firms headquarters (It was an undertakers before that and may have been a BR building before that? Anyaay. The reason why they had to stop it was twofold. One was that the lineside had to e kept clear as the occasional branch leaning over would end up smashing car windows, and the other was kids would throw stones at the cars and also caused damage, so after paying out compensation for repairs to the vehicles, the service made a loss so was withdrawn. I was told this by train drivers who used to work the trains. They also said that Freightliners werw tried for a year or two out of Fishguard and one of the drivers said to me that they were heavy things to tow. He said he only just managed to get the trains up the hill out of Fishguard. They used class 47's on those trains.

The Fishguard trains used open Carflats; the Swansea and Carmarthen ones used bogie GUVs, attached to normal service trains. I remember the Freightliners, as they passed my school just before lunch. It was a 5-wagon set, coupled to passenger stock; not sure where it was attached or detached.

I'm glad I didn't encounter your grandad when I was learning to drive on Kidwelly Flats; I would be going over the speed limit as well.

[Mountain Goat]

1 hour ago, Fat Controller said:

The Fishguard trains used open Carflats; the Swansea and Carmarthen ones used bogie GUVs, attached to normal service trains. I remember the Freightliners, as they passed my school just before lunch. It was a 5-wagon set, coupled to passenger stock; not sure where it was attached or detached.

I'm glad I didn't encounter your grandad when I was learning to drive on Kidwelly Flats; I would be going over the speed limit as well.

 

I remember my Dad on new years day when it was tradition as his Mumwas supersticious, that before 12 mid day she was not allowed to see a woman, and we would all have to go in the morning (All the males so that is my Dad and me and my bother and my Uncle and my male cousins, and we would have to kiss a piece of coal and have a small glass of wine each. 

But as it was a rare event where my Mum was not with us to tell him off for speeding, he would drive the car (A Reliant Regal saloon) flat out at 80+ MPH down there, though he would drop down to under 70 for the curves. He could really handle those 3 wheeled cars! I remember the engine would get noisier and noisier but just before they would reach the point of going flat out, the engine would go quiet and smooth... I have noticed one or two other cars do this as well but not many do it. It is a wierd thing that I have heard used to happen to some steam locomotives. I have heard loco crew saying Castles used to do this when one touched around 104-106mph or greater. I remember reading about the Castles and Kings. The Kings were said to touch 112mph on good coal in the right conditions, but I am not sure if they had the quiet moment at speed.

I do recall a strange event while working class 143's when they were lighter weight with the bus type seats. While in the back cab they would shake like mad at just below 70mph onwards. (Strangely when speaking to the drivers they did not notice this even though 143's were naturally rough riding due to the 4 wheels per coach). But though officially they were not supposed to go beyond 75mph, occasionally I was with a driver who had not noticed his speed, and with a few of those sets, when the thing touched around 82mph or above, the shaking would go and it was dead smooth. It was like we were skimming on the rails. It would remain like this with the engine running quiet until the speed dropped back down to 80 or below and the think would shatr to shake like mad, and stay shaking until we would drop below about 65mph. But those memorable events were surreal. It was like one was in another special world...

[Northmoor]

5 hours ago, Mountain Goat said:

 

They once tried motor rail services for a few yearsand I believe it was between London and Fishguard to meet the ferry to Ireland. They also stopped along the way at places like Carmarthen where the old car loading ramp can still be seen alongside what is now a taxi firms headquarters (It was an undertakers before that and may have been a BR building before that? Anyaay. The reason why they had to stop it was twofold. One was that the lineside had to e kept clear as the occasional branch leaning over would end up smashing car windows, and the other was kids would throw stones at the cars and also caused damage, so after paying out compensation for repairs to the vehicles, the service made a loss so was withdrawn. I was told this by train drivers who used to work the trains. They also said that Freightliners werw tried for a year or two out of Fishguard and one of the drivers said to me that they were heavy things to tow. He said he only just managed to get the trains up the hill out of Fishguard. They used class 47's on those trains.

I believe the Freightliners to Fishguard (it's 1 in 50 for four miles to Manorowen by the way) were a temporary replacement for the Holyhead service, while the Britannia Bridge was rebuilt after the fire.  

The potential damage costs are just a small part of why Motorail doesn't wash its face economically; it was a concept created before the motorway network opened so the time saving of not driving was significant.  Once the M4 and M5 were built (and with continued improvement to the A30/A38 routes), the time saving almost disappeared.

Even with modern design you aren't going to get more than about eight vehicles per wagon.  Couple ten together and that's still barely five coaches full of passengers but you're hauling fifteen, while a car-full of people can probably travel cheaper than by train.  HOWEVER.... if people continue to move away from ownership of big-ticket items like cars, in future they may return to going to Cornwall by train for their holidays and hiring a car while they are there and only when they need one.

[boxbrownie]

My mate used to go to the South of France several times a year with his family and used their “motorail” but he had many issues with dirt and marks on the roof of the car, apparently he was told it was dirt and debris from the OHLE system, In the end he decided to ditch them and drive after that, must have been in the early to m9d 70’s.

[peanuts]

I Have no words other than F.A.B. Virgil 

[sandwich station]

56 minutes ago, peanuts said:

I Have no words other than F.A.B. Virgil 

 

I wonder what that started out as.

[PhilJ W]

31 minutes ago, sandwich station said:

 

I wonder what that started out as.

I can't quite read the registration otherwise I would put it into the DLVA search.

[steve1]

2 hours ago, sandwich station said:

 

I wonder what that started out as.

 

VW Camper?

 

steve

[sandwich station]

Saw this back in March in Melbourne.

[Northmoor]

The Batmobile?  This turned up at our local car show last year, I believe it's drivable:

 

I've not seen it for years, but locally there was also someone who drove a motorised sofa, complete with standard lamp and occasional table.....

[PhilJ W]

3 hours ago, sandwich station said:

 

I wonder what that started out as.

 

1 hour ago, steve1 said:

 

VW Camper?

 

steve

There is a louvred grill at the front which suggests that it is front engined. Going by the size it could be on a Transit or similar base.

[big jim]

I was thinking Toyota previa? 
 

EDIT: and a quick google reveals it is indeed a Toyota previa.....

 

https://www.designboom.com/design/thunderbird-2-toyota-car-for-sale-03-26-2019/

Edited June 5, 2020 by big jim

[Mountain Goat]

You mention Previa. I happen to have an Estima which is rather rare. It has 4WD and a 2.2 diesel engine and it shifts. But what is rare about it (Apart from the extras like factory fitted radar etc. Rare for a 25+ year old vehicle) is it has a manual 5 speed gearbox and no one seems to have heard of a manual version of these Japanese imported vehicles. 

I am not sure what to do with it. My brother owned it and used it until about just over a year ago when he bought an old Shogun as it was more sutable for his back as his spine is crumbling. The Toyota does need a bit of money spending on it as it has a few things needing to be sorted out for its next MOT. (It has been off the road now for over a year). I bought it off him as he was going to scrap it, and it looks far too good for that, but no one seems to want it.  Due to lack of space it now sits outside and it is looking sorry for itself.