When it came to trying to wreck MG’s heritage you had to award Rover ten out of ten for effort. Bar chucking the MG badge in a skip the company had tried everything to dilute it and destroy all that it stood for.
The brand had become known across the world as a maker of sports cars: small, compact convertibles that wouldn’t look out of place cruising a Californian boulevard. So what did Rover do? Glued it onto Montegos, Maestros and even the Mini Metro.
Somehow, however, through all this the little red and white MG badge survived and still managed to muster up connotations of a glorious motoring past. So, after over 30 years the first all-new MG finally arrived – the mid-engined MGF sports car. And the most surprising part about this final twist was that the car wasn’t a pile of crap like people expected, it was actually rather good.
Starting at £15,995 it was affordable and the layout was certainly exciting. After all a mid-mounted motor with double wishbones at each corner was something you would normally associate with Italian exotica and made other two-seaters seem a bit boring.
To drive it might not have been as exciting as an MX-5 but it had good, dependable, even safe, handling for a mid-engined car. I seem to remember Jeremy Clarkson likening the handling to that of the Mark 1 Golf GTI, but I may have imagined that. Interestingly it had Hydragas springing courtesy of Alex Moulton which meant the ride was pretty good too.
OK, so the image is a little dubious now but when it came out it was as fresh as a mouth full of Polos and the 1.8-litre twin cam 16-valve engine gave lively performance. The MGF lived on in the TF and quite frankly who knows whether we will see it again now that Rover has disappeared, but you just never know.
So now that summer’s here and it’s raining 23 hours a day there is no better time to grab yourself a slice of drop-top motoring. MGFs don’t crop up that often for Shed money and if they do they tend to be grotty examples. But the purple VVC (that’s the more powerful 143bhp version don’t you know) that we found on Autotrader looks half-decent. It’s got a low mileage at 61,000 and is on a P plate (1996).
A few new bits thrown in and it looks like a bit of a bargain, as long as you can source some original rear lights that is. The only dark cloud looming is the dreaded ‘TLC’ and the ad says it was damaged on the driver’s door and repaired and the passenger window doesn’t work. But from the pics it doesn’t look at all bad and, as when the MGF was new, you have to buy one with your heart not your mind. After all that’s why you didn’t buy an MX-5 like a sane person would…
Ad reads: 'Manual, 61,986 miles, Taxed till 31/08/2008. MOT till 10/12/2008. Good runner, new cat, new tyres, new back brake pads, new stainless crash hoops and lexus style rear lights. Needs TLC. The car has been damage on the drivers side front which has been repaired, and the passenger side window doesn?t work. But it is still a bargain at £999 for a quick sale, so no tyre kickers. £999.'
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