The Best of British (Cars)

[L1OFF]

I was having a conversation with one of my work colleagues (volunteers at the Haynes Motor Museum) regarding the "Best of British" cars and what would be your choice (significant but not necessarily a good car)?

My thoughts:

1. Austin 7, bought motoring to the masses.
2. Mini. Front wheel drive and transverse engine, most small cars have followed this design
3. Land Rover Series 1, most SUV's have come from this basic design
4. Triumph Dolomite Sprint 1st 16V engine (mass production) and alloy wheels on production car
5. E-Type Design Classic (even Enzo agreed most beautiful car)
6. McLaren P1 (1st Carbon fibre monocoque tub production car?)

and possibly the Jensen Interceptor FF (4 wheel drive & anti lock brakes)

What would you add?

[2xChevrons]

L1OFF said:

I was having a conversation with one of my work colleagues (volunteers at the Haynes Motor Museum) regarding the "Best of British" cars and what would be your choice (significant but not necessarily a good car)?

My thoughts:

1. Austin 7, bought motoring to the masses.
2. Mini. Front wheel drive and transverse engine, most small cars have followed this design
3. Land Rover Series 1, most SUV's have come from this basic design
4. Triumph Dolomite Sprint 1st 16V engine (mass production) and alloy wheels on production car
5. E-Type Design Classic (even Enzo agreed most beautiful car)
6. McLaren P1 (1st Carbon fibre monocoque tub production car?)

and possibly the Jensen Interceptor FF (4 wheel drive & anti lock brakes)

What would you add?

I would make two swaps:

Kick out the LR Series I and replace it with the original Range Rover. The LR was really just a civilianised and austerity-compliant version of the Jeep. It was the Jeep that did all the conceptual legwork and laid down the blueprint. And the Jeep CJ line sold in much greater numbers and across more markets than the Series Land Rover. The LR was a significant product for the British motor industry, and I love them (have owned several) but they are not really totemic. The Range Rover was and is. You can quibble about how much of the SUV concept it really originated (Ford Bronco/Jeep Wagoneer etc.) but the RR really was the first to genuinely combine the performance, comfort, engineering and prestige of a saloon car with the utility performance of an off-roader. And it became the first 4x4 that was a status symbol that people wanted to drive entirely on tarmac. Plus, in its original form, it's a masterpiece of industrial design.

I have more personal reasons to switch the E-type for another Jaguar - I just don't like them. Never got on with the looks and have found them 'meh' to drive. So I would swap in either the XK120 - a true epoch-making car that defined Jaguar in its new post-war form and a claim to be the first supercar when comparing its performance to the norm of the time - or the original XJ6 as something that redefined the standards of engineering and refinement for its class, was the fulfilment of William Lyons' personal vision for what a luxury saloon should be and started a dynasty that would be a kingpin of the British motor industry for the next 50 years.

I also think there has to be a 'classic British sports car' in there, since that was what much of the world thought of as the distinctive British motoring export and is something we've done particularly well over the years. I'd offer up either an MGA as the platonic ideal of the breed in the post-war golden age, or the Lotus Elise S1 as the modern perfection of the ideal of something light, simple, affordable and not outrageously fast but nimble and sublimely tactile to drive.

Edit: I think, if you want to get a bit meta, you'd have to include a British-built Japanese car like a Nissan Bluebird or a Honda Civic. A significant symbol of the changing nature and fortunes of the industry, as well as proof that British factories and British workers can make cars as reliable and durable as anyone/anywhere else when properly provided for, managed and incentivised.

Edited by 2xChevrons on Tuesday 5th August 13:52

[GeniusOfLove]

Rover P6 and/or Triumph 2000. Set the template for what an "executive car" would be for the next 40 years, both sold well right up to the end of production (particularly the P6) and made plenty of money for the manufacturer. The fact that money was wasted to keep Austin alive to continue making ugly crap cars so neither were properly replaced is sad but no reflection on the product.

Britain didn't produce another executive car that you didn't have to make apologies for until the XF in 2008. The SD1 was pretty but very shoddily assembled and the primitive suspension was more like something Ford would produce, the 800 was mediocre at launch and hopeless by the end, the 75 was a decent car named after the average age of someone who would consider buying one, and the S-Type was just a total misfire.

After the 1300 we never were any good at prosaic family cars, but between Jaguar, Rover, and Triumph we really knew how to do proper cars well until they all got fleas from BMC.

P6 3500 with a manual gearbox for me please. In dog mess brown

[daqinggregg]

5. E-Type Design Classic (even Enzo agreed most beautiful car)

Often quoted, but there’s absolutely no evidence of Enzo, having ever said that.

[L1OFF]

Some good shout outs there. I do agree with the E-Type, I've never liked them.

Good call on the Range Rover v Land Rover

Interesting on the Japanese cars. My first experience of them was my boss at the time (early 70's) had a Morris Oxford and turned up one day in a new Datsun 100A. That really was a revelation, Radio, Reclining seats, Heater! The CEO had a Datsun 240Z (that really was special)

[Stick Legs]

Money no object:

Bentley - 1929 4 1/2 Litre Supercharged.
British design and engineering prowess in a era when we genuinely were world leaders.



Mini Cooper S - 1960
Performance and ingenuity combined in a practical package.



Lotus 49 - 1966
The Ford/Cosworth DFV engine and the construction of the Lotus 49 set the standard for F1 cars, and really made the UK the pre-eminent F1 constructors to this day. I would argue that these cars represent the point at which the UK overtook Italy and Germany as the capital of Motorsport excellence.



Range Rover - 1971.
Not much more can be said about it's significance, a cultural touchstone to this day.



McLaren F1 - 1992.
THE Supercar.

[Stick Legs]

My alternative list because money is an object and these cars are no less deserving of their fame than the above list:

Morris Minor - 1948
More than the Mini this is the car that got Britain moving. Deserves more cult status than that horrid air cooled German thing.



Lotus Elan S3 - 1966
Set the template for Lotus going forward, and lives on in the MX-5 family, the MX-5 NA was a shameless crib of the Lotus design.



Jaguar XJ-6 - 1968
An astonishingly modern car that beat cars costing 2 or 3 times as much.



Range Rover L322 - 2002
The first Monocoque Range Rover, raised the standard and for the first time SUV's beat luxury saloons on their terms.



Jaguar XF - 2007
These are so common you forget just how astonishing they were, Jaguar discarding the Retro styling of the S-Type and X-Type and going for it!
Easily as good as the German rivals but keener financing and badge snobbery kept it from reaching it's potential.
A proper Jag, 200000+ sold worldwide and a cheap future classic if ever there was one.

[2xChevrons]

Mulled this over a bit more during a tedious afternoon at work.

I agree with the need to include either a Rover P6 or a Triumph 2000 - the spiritual progenitors of an entire breed of premium executive cars that would become the mainstay of the industry in the 90s/2000s. While I personally prefer the Rover and think it is the superior product, I'd probably choose the Triumph as the representative sample. With its Italian styling, six-cylinder engine and more conventional engineering it was closer to the breed that followed than the bold but dead-end P6.

I feel their should be a Rolls-Royce in there. One of the great marques, still a British icon and a literal byword for quality and luxury. Probably have to be represented by either an original 40/50 or an early Silver Shadow. Or perhaps the first BMW-era Phantom as a representation of the modern British car - the value is in the British name, heritage, style and craftsmanship but the engineering and management is all foreign?

The OP wanted significant cars rather than just good cars. How about an Austin Maxi as an embodiment of how the industry flailed and failed in the 1960s/1970s, yet also with an uncanny ability to make cars that were in many ways ahead of their time (5 doors, 5 seats, 5 gears, FWD, Hydrolastic, immensely spacious and comfortable, good roadholding, strange proto-SUV focus on utility) but which managed to miss the mark through poor quality, underdevelopment and a lack of customer focus?

Jaguar XF? (The original big-headlight one). Probably the last time an all-British car genuinely made a compelling, standard-setting case for itself without needing any excuses or buying it out of pure nostalgia or patriotism. An example of how much talent the industry had/has and what it can do when the wheels and stars align.

Edited by 2xChevrons on Tuesday 5th August 18:23

[BricktopST205]

L322 is the main thing that comes to mind from a modern perspective. Really a SUV that was class leading and peak RR imo.

Not really much else in the past 30 years though.