TVR Smell

[cloggy]

I know there is a certain smell in a TVR and I love it, I do not know what it is (leather, wood, glue?), but it is definetly a TVR smell.
I can never put my finger on it, and still can't, and have never mentioned it to anybody.
I had two new TVR's in the nineties and just bought a 99 Chim with very low mileage in October which looks and smells like new.
When I took my daughter out for a spin, and I did let her drive it as well, she was elated.
What really surprised me,that the moment she got into the car she said, Oh dad it smells TVR (she had not been in one for nine years !!!).
I know what she means and every time I get into my Chim I smell TVR, I love it and that is even before I fire her up.

[dodgey_rog]

cloggy said:

I know there is a certain smell in a TVR and I love it, I do not know what it is (leather, wood, glue?), but it is definetly a TVR smell.
I can never put my finger on it, and still can't, and have never mentioned it to anybody.
I had two new TVR's in the nineties and just bought a 99 Chim with very low mileage in October which looks and smells like new.
When I took my daughter out for a spin, and I did let her drive it as well, she was elated.
What really surprised me,that the moment she got into the car she said, Oh dad it smells TVR (she had not been in one for nine years !!!).
I know what she means and every time I get into my Chim I smell TVR, I love it and that is even before I fire her up.

You're right, it was certainly a while since i'd been in a new TVR and i was in a photographic shop of all places and the aroma took me back to the early 80's when i used to climb into them when they rolled off the transporter, it must have been a chemical smell as there was no leather in sight.

[jmorgan]

Burning oil, petrol, exhaust fumes, burnt rubber...... yep, love it.....

[jollygreengriff]

Jeff - you've forgotten glue, hot fibreglass and a touch of damp to add to the collection.

[edt]

I know what you mean. When I got my blue GRiff it had it.. faded over the years though. If only it cold be bottled & reapplied !
Ed

[v41ley]

jollygreengriff said:

Jeff - you've forgotten glue, hot fibreglass and a touch of damp to add to the collection.

..... and money.

Has NS flogged this off as well - the rights to market TVR as a new scent.
What's it called .............'Brut-ish'

[hut49]

Having immensely enjoyed the Factory Piccies thread and seen the 'real' people who hand built our P&Js in more of a local garage workshop environment that in a super-glitsy factory a la Maclaren/Lotus etc, that smell is just as likely to be a mummified cheese and pickle sandwich stashed inside a fiberglass panel somewhere!

[Derek Smith]

When I drove the Gatwick TVR Tuscan Convertible demonstrator, Paul asked: 'What's the first thing you notice?' I said: 'It doesn't smell like a TVR.' In fact, there was no smell. They'd evidently changed the smelly component - glue, fibreglass, whatever - as it was the thing most potential buyers who were non TVR-people criticised. It felt very strange.

Mind you, not much of a criticism, and I soon forgot all about it.

I sat in an MG TC today. I owned one when I was a kid and this one smelled so different that a lot of the nostalgia went missing.

[gretchen]

cloggy said:

I know there is a certain smell in a TVR and I love it, I do not know what it is (leather, wood, glue?), but it is definetly a TVR smell.

[rs mexico]

That would be John he always put a bag of Pot Pourri under the trim when fitting it,or the cyanide based super glue activator reacting with the cilicon.

[anonymous-user]

[edt]

So, what is that smell then ?! Anyone know?

[purpletvr]

rs mexico said:

That would be John he always put a bag of Pot Pourri under the trim when fitting it,or the cyanide based super glue activator reacting with the cilicon.

To be a bit picky, the activator isn't cyanide-based, it is merely a solvent- have a look at the date sheet:

www.chemence.com/files/RITELOK_AC11.pdf

I wouldn't have wanted you inhaling anything too bad- not during work's time, anyway! How you doin Mr A? Only just realised rs mexico is you!

Just realised how sad it is that I can remember the supplier's part number for the activator- I've been left YEARS!!- but I also remember the company's rep, and not for good reasons!!

[targarama]

I love the smell of my TVR too. When I get in and its cold it smells of leather. When its nice and warmed up it smells of a mixture of leather and hot GRP cooking away nicely (I assume this is where journo's get the canoe smell idea).

Different to our new VW Golf which smells of new plastic inside.

[Don]

Our Chimaera still smells quite unique. Just lovely...

[purpletvr]

I think they smell of leather and glue and new carpet- the backing on the carpet has a particular smell, and the older wool carpets smell a bit damp-sheepy if (when!) they get wet. Leather mainly, I think.

[big_treacle]

Mine have both had a kind of leather & oily smell, its great. And with a bit of high revs overrun with the window open you sometimes get a nice racetrack smell - must be some sort of petrol/oil burning thing.

[lordgrover]

A friend of mine had a Griff then a Chim, both kept outside with no cover - they both smelt of damp, mould & mushrooms. He reckoned they all do!
Mine's kept outside, but under a shower cap and a full cover and it smells sweetly of leather and oil.

[rev-erend]

It's fibreglass resin - my shed stinks of it..

To cure properly - it needs a good few months in the sun..
then you don't get the smell.

[Ireland]

It's the smell of melting clutch