8000 mile Sunbeam Lotus

[2172cc]

DAC53Y was bid up to £43K but did not sell.
Also on display at the NEC but not for sale was the recently fully restored DAC99Y

A stunning car that reputably cost a whole lot more to restore than the estimate on 53Y

Edited by 2172cc on Sunday 11th November 11:09

Edited by 2172cc on Sunday 11th November 11:10

[POORCARDEALER]

Decent value at 20K

[xyyman]

Brings back some good memories for me. Had a Moonstone series 2, DAC **Y cant remember the digits, in the early '80's as my daily driver sold in '84 when I moved abroad.

Had a black series 2, RIA 740, as a weekend fun car when I returned to UK, sold in the mid '90's due to a redundancy. Often wondered of they are still around.

[Maulden7]

The 8k mileage car is now shown on the auction site with a bin price of £52.5k

[wilksy61]

Lovely cars indeed, I used to own a Sunbeam Ti reg no. RAC 136W drove it around in the early 80's before selling it on to buy a Cortina Estate - needed to transport my Zip kart to meetings - sold it to a guy at work who took all of about 3 months to write it off.

[aeropilot]

wilksy61 said:

Lovely cars indeed, I used to own a Sunbeam Ti reg no. RAC 136W drove it around in the early 80's before selling it on to buy a Cortina Estate - needed to transport my Zip kart to meetings - sold it to a guy at work who took all of about 3 months to write it off.

Wow.................!

RAC 134W was the number plate on Des O'Dell's specially painted, personal Sunbeam-Lotus owned while boss of the Talbot Comp Dept, which was presented to him after Henri Toivonen won the 1980 RAC Rally in a Sunbeam-Lotus, with 2 others finishing in 3rd and 4th, hence the RAC 134W number plate.

[wilksy61]

Yes I know I found out about 30 years too late, I actually bought the car from a used car dealer near Windsor at the time who had described it as a Sunbeam GLS with twin 40 Webers, I knew that it was a Ti from the webers so I got my dad to drive me to Windsor and bought in for about £1500.00.

One of many cars I owned that I wish were in a large garage somewhere that only I knew.

[aeropilot]

wilksy61 said:

Yes I know I found out about 30 years too late, I actually bought the car from a used car dealer near Windsor at the time who had described it as a Sunbeam GLS with twin 40 Webers, I knew that it was a Ti from the webers

Was it a real Ti though.....?

I had a genuine Ti in the early 80's, a rare Series 2 one, and my cousin had a silver Sunbeam GLS (originally bought new by his FiL) with a set of Webers fitted (as well as some other Group A Sunbeam bits incl LSD)

[wilksy61]

Yes it was genuine, white with black stripes, correct alloy wheels, little spoiler on the back etc it was only 18 months old when i got it.

[aeropilot]

wilksy61 said:

Yes it was genuine, white with black stripes, correct alloy wheels, little spoiler on the back etc it was only 18 months old when i got it.

Aah....yes, sounds pukka one then.
Given the big Ti letters on the rear spoiler, you'd think the dumb dealer would have realised it wasn't a GLS

The 2.5 years I had mine was probably the most fun daily driver car I owned, looking back. Such a fun car, although mine wasn't standard. It had been a high mile company car when the guy I bought it off got it, and he had the engine rebuilt as a couple of pistons were knackered. He had the bottom end all balanced etc., and had a Group A cam and big valve head fitted, but still wan't very impressed so wanted to sell it to buy a Lotus. When I went to view it, I quickly worked out why it wasn't performing so struck a good deal and drove it home without saying anything.
He'd made the mistake of putting the old Webers back on it, and they were knackered. I bought a set of new ones, with a K&N and a Group A exhaust manifold and system, and after tweeking on a rolling road it was giving out 115hp at the rear wheels............happy days

[2172cc]

Sold yesterday.

[aeropilot]

[200Plus Club]

Wow. Is that a new record?

[aeropilot]

200Plus Club said:

Wow. Is that a new record?

For a production road car, I think so.

[200Plus Club]

aeropilot said:

For a production road car, I think so.

Yes I thought it was the highest I'd seen. Good news for club members if that's the trend.

[sideways man]

An upward trend is no good if you want to buy one. I sold mine for £4200 which was the going rate for a good, not concours example. I’d have another tomorrow for similar money.

[200Plus Club]

sideways man said:

An upward trend is no good if you want to buy one. I sold mine for £4200 which was the going rate for a good, not concours example. I’d have another tomorrow for similar money.

That must have been a long time ago then.

[aeropilot]

200Plus Club said:

sideways man said:

An upward trend is no good if you want to buy one. I sold mine for £4200 which was the going rate for a good, not concours example. I’d have another tomorrow for similar money.

That must have been a long time ago then.

I was thinking the same, but then I remembered it's now 15 years since I sold mine for 7k which included about 2k's worth of spares including body panels.......!
It will be the 30th Anniversary of the Owners Club next year

[200Plus Club]

aeropilot said:

I was thinking the same, but then I remembered it's now 15 years since I sold mine for 7k which included about 2k's worth of spares including body panels.......!
It will be the 30th Anniversary of the Owners Club next year

I think good cars have been £20k+ for a few good years now. That's what mine went for in 2016 so I'd expect it's £25-30k min for a restored car now?

[2172cc]

£51.750 was the hammer price. Apparently, by the time you've added the auction fees and VAT it works out at around £60k. So definitely a record road car price.