TVRCC - Yes or No?

[glow worm]

CQ8 said:

Another Devon TVR owner here

No exactly an event full of colour .... I bet the Cerbie owner wishes he'd bought a darker colour

[Tyre Smoke]

[CQ8]

glow worm said:

No exactly an event full of colour .... I bet the Cerbie owner wishes he'd bought a darker colour

The Cerb's mine, so it was nice to stand out!

[Mr.Grooler]

Tyre Smoke said:

Halfords discount, nope. I have a trade card. Racing Green, wouldn't use enough.

It’s worth adding that the Halfords discount gets you 10% off anything in store, whereas a trade card (mine at least) is just for tools and car maintenance / cleaning stuff. Some of the time when I go in I end up doing two transactions, as the trade discount is usually more than 10% for the items you can use it for.

I also enjoy reading Sprint (an excellent club magazine), the Racing Green discount from time to time, and the ticket deal with club stand parking for the Silverstone Classic weekend is great also. Clearly if you’re in another club you may get this same deal in other ways. I’m happy to be in this one!

[saxon]

The main benefits of the club as I see it are:

1. Sharing our passion for the marque and keeping up to date on latest developments.
2. Reading Sprint is very enjoyable
3. Attending meets and being given advance notice of events
4. Getting discounts on parts

If that lot isn't worth £50 a year to you then don't join, for me at least it is.

Saxon

[hxc_]

I'm a member purely because it reduces my insurance by more than it costs - this was after speaking to many insurers. I was 29 when taking out the policy and also live in central london, which probably makes me a slightly different risk profile.

[Tyre Smoke]

Oddly enough, I'm a member of the IFA Club for the Trabant and get a discount for the agreed value insurance. I added the Chimaera to the policy, also on agreed value and they asked if I was a member of an owner's club. I said not for the TVR, they said it didn't matter, a member of a club shows I am an enthusiast.

[HiAsAKite]

saxon said:

The main benefits of the club as I see it are:

1. Sharing our passion for the marque and keeping up to date on latest developments.
2. Reading Sprint is very enjoyable
3. Attending meets and being given advance notice of events
4. Getting discounts on parts

If that lot isn't worth £50 a year to you then don't join, for me at least it is.

Saxon

For me - this sums it up.

Having young family I use my TVR far far less than I used to, and attending events is a rarity, but the Millbrook event alone (which is the one event I have managed to attend in 3+ years) justified the membership.
Plus having access to car club valuations for agreed value.

In addition - in future years I will probably be able to engage more - so that the club is running, and vibrant for me is important, as often once these things are "lost" or lapse, they are difficult to restart.

[Gazzab]

I was a member back in 97/98 ish time. Found I was putting the mag straight in the bin and couldn’t think of a good reason to keep my membership. So cancelled over 20 years ago and I haven’t once regretted it.

[Tyre Smoke]

I'm struggling to see any benefit for me to be fair. I didn't do any more than skim read the magazine years ago when they were making the cars. Now that they have nothing to report I doubt there will be anything of interest. I always thought a bit of technical stuff would have been good, but no, liability innit.
Discount on parts doesn't interest me. And I really don't want to spend Sunday afternoon with a bunch of up themselves old men waffling about stepper motors and diff oil. Unless the local club has changed somewhat?
I'm happy asking questions on here where to be honest, the owners now know their stuff because they've owned the cars for so long. Much better resource.

[Gazzab]

Tyre Smoke said:

I'm struggling to see any benefit for me to be fair. I didn't do any more than skim read the magazine years ago when they were making the cars. Now that they have nothing to report I doubt there will be anything of interest. I always thought a bit of technical stuff would have been good, but no, liability innit.
Discount on parts doesn't interest me. And I really don't want to spend Sunday afternoon with a bunch of up themselves old men waffling about stepper motors and diff oil. Unless the local club has changed somewhat?
I'm happy asking questions on here where to be honest, the owners now know their stuff because they've owned the cars for so long. Much better resource.

I have been to a few meets, they aren’t my thing but I can’t say they have been ‘up themselves’ - they have a personality but it’s more pies and TVR flags etc than any level of snobbery.

[Tyre Smoke]

To be fair, I am going back perhaps 15 years. But Devon and Cornwall region back then was full of snobs. I have heard that other regions weren't like that at all.
All they did was drive along at 50 mph so everyone could get a good look, then park on a seafront or pub car park and drive back again. Not my thing at all.

I'm sure it's moved on, but I don't think I'm missing anything.

[Gazzab]

Tyre Smoke said:

To be fair, I am going back perhaps 15 years. But Devon and Cornwall region back then was full of snobs. I have heard that other regions weren't like that at all.
All they did was drive along at 50 mph so everyone could get a good look, then park on a seafront or pub car park and drive back again. Not my thing at all.

I'm sure it's moved on, but I don't think I'm missing anything.

I guess it’s all down to ones own perceptions etc - I have yet to meet a TVR owner at a TVR meet that I would call a snob (over the last 25 years) but I have only been to 6 or 7 meets and to be fair I’m probably the snob looking down at all the fleece wearing, teddy bears on dashboards etc

[Tyre Smoke]

In your cravat and driving gloves?

[sixor8]

My experience of the Porsche GB club in 2013 was of too many snobs. What, only a Boxster S ? Only went to one meeting but I learnt a lot about Ducati Monsters from one of the chaps doing the food...

Back in the pre-internet 90s when I had a run of Lotus Excels, the owners club and magazine was excellent for technical stuff, discounts etc. At the area pub meetings (Hampshire then), it was a bit cliquey with a bunch of amateur enthusiasts like us with old Elans, Eclats and Excels in one corner and the 'polish my Esprit and do 1000 miles a year in it' brigade in the other.

I've been to Neil Garner day twice, and David Gerald too (but not since 2019 of course) and got the impression that TVR owners tend towards the amateur mechanic and enthusiast, although there are the snobs that you get in any club but they are in the minority, IMHO.

TVRs (and to my mind motorbikes similarly) are about being a bit different, aren't they? Convoys of 20 + cars the same make, just like going to a bike evening where there are 100+ other bikers, isn't for me. Only the parts discount would encourage me to join and if I had a restoration project going, I'd likely join. but I searched for a good Griff for a while, so hope it won't be the case for a long time. Famous last words.....

[Gazzab]

Tyre Smoke said:

In your cravat and driving gloves?

Ha ha - anyone not wearing a fleece will look over dressed at a TVR meet.

[Byker28i]

Tyre Smoke said:

To be fair, I am going back perhaps 15 years. But Devon and Cornwall region back then was full of snobs. I have heard that other regions weren't like that at all.
All they did was drive along at 50 mph so everyone could get a good look, then park on a seafront or pub car park and drive back again. Not my thing at all.

I'm sure it's moved on, but I don't think I'm missing anything.

Not found that...
Worse meet we went to was the original Chatsworth even when we met up with the Warwickshire group who left the services at Mach 2, so we just fired up the sat nav and found our own way there, followed by other stragglers. Genuinely I've found most TVR drives are done at the speed limit.

Never found snobby with any TVR driver, in fact most want to talk about their cars

[Stever]

Tyre Smoke said:

I'm sure it's moved on, but I don't think I'm missing anything.

Well you missed Millbrook for one, not just access to the bowl and Alpine circuit but chance to chat to other owners about changes / perceptions etc?

I haven't ever met a TVR Snob I don't think the marque attracts those (there's always an exception granted) but everyone is, in my experience, enthusiastic about their cars and willing to share information that often only comes from experience. There's plenty going on, choose what interests you and you have the time for, if you don't like a trundle to the seaside don't go they're often slow because they try to keep the group together. Make you own way, meet them there have a chat maybe learn something useful, take a few photos and leave.
I've made several good friends (mainly through the early days of PH TBH) but we've attended CC stuff too, can't say it's been dull ever.

[Tyre Smoke]

Millbrook that's 237 miles and four hours away from me? Nah, not interested.

Was it a week day or weekend? Week day would have been a non starter with work commitments and I'm not sure I'd spend 8 hours of my weekend to drive around a test track. But, yes i take your point.

I still don't think I'm missing anything. Perhaps I will go along to the next local meet and see what it's about these days.

[Veg]

Read this and thought most clubs seem to be losing it. TVRCC once told me that my article on how to change a Griff 500 brakes "took work away from advertisers" - I kid you not!

When I joined in 1990 it was a club full of articles on how to keep the cars on the road then moved to a travel mag for jaunts across the EU. I remember for the last few years of TVR ownership I didn't even read the magazine. Now I moved to another car make and that "offical" club is truly worthy of the snob label - fix it yourself? dont you have a man who can?!!

Lastly the MGOC and Triumph Sports Six are stil great clubs........