Getting Ridicoulous

when i was but a slip of a lad, my favourite uncle was uncle bert, my mum's youngest brother, single at the time. he was a bit of a hero for me, had a great stereo, used to play Led Zeppelin & Rory Gallagher, loud. His best trick was to turn it up to 11, put on Time from Dark Side of the Moon and scare the living crap out of my Gran when all the chimes kick in...
Anyway, i've wandered from the original purpose of the post which was to detail Uncle Bert's cars back then.
Mk II 1600E
Mk I Lotus Cortina. White / Green Stripe. Minilites
Mk II RS2000
I thought Uncle Bert was just about as cool as you could be.
Conservative guess at £7-9k, £40-50K & £20-25k respectively...

 

Somebody has put a lot of TLC into this car, but £31k really?
Wessa

 

As some of the other posts have already said, these cars were never great even when they were new, why anyone would want to pay silly money 40 years on is beyond me.
I had basic stuff like Vauxhall Vivas and Ford Escorts in the 70s and when I look back they were shite!
Rust buckets with engines that no matter how you looked after them would only do 100k miles.
6" diameter shit clutches that would only last about 30k miles.
Plastic sweaty seats, shite suspension, I could go on all day!
Easy to work on, which was a good job because you had to!
I did move on to the old Jags and Rovers in the 80s which were much better all round and with petrol at
£1ish per gallon, it was ace!

 

We're absolutely right DD the basic motors were F****ed at 100k
The better motors like Rolls would last forever, look how they were used in the First World War etc.
The Bradford Jowett company went bust because their motors lasted forever so it was possible even back then to make the engines last even in cheaper cars. There is a great video showing the test runs for Bradford Jowetts through the Yorkshire Dales.
It's a combination of several improvements that make most modern engines last now, oils, fuels, improved materials, machining accuracies and surface finishes etc.
But buying an old Viva, Escort or similar, I'll leave them for the nostalgic enthusiasts, I had my share of them in the 70s!

 

So do I Havit.
chalk and cheese to the shite cars DD mentioned, Allegros, Marinas, Avengers, Princesses, Maxis, etc.
Absolute piles of shite, so bad they allowed Skoda, Lada and Moskovich onto the streets of Britain.

 

the Mk2 Jag is one of my favourite cars too.also like the Rover P5 i think they were known as the poor mans Jag

 

I had one of these a few years ago, including Webasto folding sunroof. Magnificent stately car.

 

Suit you sir!!

 

It's all gone mad - if you think Ford Escorts are silly money ....
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Porsche-9...511048?hash=item46454eecc8:g:qnwAAOSw8-tWWdgS

 

Totally agree......................

 

I paid £175 for my Mk2 used it as my main mode of transport for 8 years and sold it for £800 about 30 years ago.
Underpowered at 2.4 but a beautiful comfortable car with all the chrome plating like new.
I had a complete second car for spares that I paid £90 for.
Happy days!

 

Just on the subject of old sheds worth a fortune, this is my daytime paid hobby, making these pretty for an invested who'll never use them, and that's only half!!