Vauxhall Barges: You know you want to...

PH 'Barges for Britain' with the once-mighty Vauxhall Griffin

With his appetite well and truly whetted by Garlick's fantastic Royale spot (see SOTW), Shed takes a wander back to a time when big Vauxhalls ruled the road, and were more than capable of handing the established powers of Stuttgart and Bavaria a damn good thrashing.

After all, Shed didn't spend sleepless nights of his formative years wide-eyed in a cold, dank, Anderson shelter, just so he could throw the towel in later in life. Back in the day, Vauxhall shared this bold philosophy and, faced with the super-powers of Mercedes and BMW, they turned to sister company Opel for the fight back. (German in name undoubtedly, but owned by our allies across the Atlantic since 1929 thus justifying a place in Shed's scarcely credible - and certainly ill-advised - WWII analogy...)

In one fell swoop, and with the might of GM behind it, Vauxhall merged the German penchant for efficiency, over-engineering, dynamics and progressive foresight, with British mastery of the mild face-lift and badge engineering.

So, with a battle cry of 'they don't like it up 'em!' (especially when 'it' is one of their own), Shed mourns the demise of 'Vauxhall's' take on the luxury barge.

Where better to start paying our respects than with this white Senator? Plod's motorway choice in the early '90s - it looks every inch the range topper with its imposing grill, want for nothing CD spec and extra rear legroom over the Carlton. Of course, as a traffic cops' favourite, it can also shift at an enviable rate - nudging 150mph was (once?) a realistic proposition.

Much better-suited to such shenanigans is this Carlton GSi with its tauter setup. Endowed with a 3 litre straight-six that pumped out 204bhp, it could launch itsself to 60mph in around 7secs on its way to a 146mph full-pelt maximum, though Shed suspects this example's windscreen sticker will add a few mph onto that. Although the sprinkling of skirts and spoilers point to this being a performance variant, they also lend the Carlton an affinity with more the uncouth road user. An affinity Shed, in his recently dry-cleaned executive suit from Mr Burton, isn't necessarily keen to endorse.

Especially, when there's only one real performance Carlton - the Lotus Carlton. The police branded it 'an outrageous invitation to speed,' and Shed could give it no higher praise than that. Its 377bhp twin-turbo inline six gave the Lotus 175mph-plus potential, while the turbos saw to a healthy 419Ib ft of torque. All figures considered, it makes this splendid example of Anglo-German co-operation seem laughably good value. With its stealth almost-black paint work, unique alloys, bulging body kit and all important Lotus badging, £10,995 seems like a bargain, for entry into PH hero-dom.

While the Lotus was - and still is - the most impressive performance barge Vauxhall's produced, it wasn't the last. That notable honour falls to the Omega MV6, its quad-cam 3.2 litre V6 produced 213bhp officially, although this ex police example’s owner claims a useful 230bhp. This combined with its capacious estate form, means Shed can get to the antiques fair while the other punters are still wolfing down their bacon sarnies.

And, should Shed be pipped to that grandfather clock he's had his eye on (he doesn't like to miss a bargain), this fully liveried ex-police saloon should have his unfortunate quarry stopped in no time. Frankly, tearing around the countryside playing cops and robbers sounds link a fun - and potentially profitable - way to spend the weekend.

So providing rear-wheel-drive fun to the masses, we hope to have proved there's a big Vauxhall for everyone. With a range of power outputs, they offer superb value and rarity the BMWs and Mercs can only dream of. We knew you'd agree...

OP Posts Only

Prev 2 3 4 5 Next

OP Posts Only

Author

Discussion

UK952

Original Poster

768 posts

276 months