A6G Maserati
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The first car to bring real grief into my life! I bought the car with a slight misfire/backfire which turned out to be bent valves due to a very slack timing chain. That cost an arm and a leg to fix and soon after it was back on the road the clutch went. At the same time problems were also looming on the personal side of life - courting for four or five years and marriage set for New Years Day 1966. Trouble was, after spending nearly £200 on a clutch plate and only months away from the wedding day I was broke. The finance company was about to repossess the car (I was three months behind with the payments) and I was made redundant.
I then took drastic measures, grabbed the first job that was offered to me (after two weeks on the dole - two pound seventeen and sixpence a week in those days) and joined a company called Bridges of Birmingham who had the contract for ripping up the railway lines at Toddington, near Cheltenham (The Dr.Beeching days) It was, and still is the hardest work I ever did but it was also one of my happiest carefree times. The big money (in those days) I was earning on the 'chain gang' paid off my debts, I sold the car for £750, (the same car sold at Auction in 2002 for close on a million!) landed a good job and then married.
A link to the history of the car can be found here (#2103 Coupé 1955)
Daimler 250
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One of the first fibreglass cars I bought. The two and a halflitre V8 engine was very economical and the performance (115 mph in third gear) was exceptional in its day. The problem I found was selling it - nobody found it stylish enough (1963-64 era) and I tried for months to sell. I eventually part exchanged the car (with a lot of cash as well)for an A6G Maserati.
XK150 SE
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This XK was the automatic version (with an auto holdswitch on the dash) and driving out of London late at night I switched the auto hold off about hundred miles an hour (my wife sat quietly in the passenger seat) and was greeted with a loud bang as the front nearside tyre blew out. More by luck the car slowed in a straight line and apart from a buckled spoke wheel we survived in one piece. That was my first dice with death!
De Tomaso Mangusta
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I bought a Mangusta in 1979 (green metallic and 10 year old)The name Mangusta (Mongoose) is strictly related to that of the contender Ford Cobra, since the Mongoose is the only animal feared by the Cobra. A mid-engined rear wheel drive two seater, the Mangusta was really a thinly disguised racing car. Powered by a 4.8-litre (5-litre in the US) Ford V8 (with iron cylinder heads and block) with 305bhp driving through a five speed ZF transmission, it had independent suspension and disc brakes all round. The steel backbone chassis was clothed in a steel and aluminium (for the hinged panels) body and designed by Giugiaro, at Ghia at that time. With its race track pedigree, the interior was rather basic although air-conditioning and electric windows were available as options. Aproximately 400 examples were built until 1971. Most memorable aspect was 165mph with ease!
Mercedes SL
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The 450SL, in it's day, had to be the best car around for long journeys. Comfort and speed with excellent fuel consumption. I purchased the registration number ORS1S in 1990 at one of the first DVLA registration number auctions. For some years I was a keen racegoer and the number seemed appropriate at the time! I failed to spot that if the letter 'R' was changed slightly to an 'A' (by inserting the plate fixing bolt in a suitable location) it would then look like OAS1S and that plate changed hands, in those days, for £30,000!
Most memorable occasion was driving back from a days sea fishing at Looe, with a friend driving the car, when he nodded off to sleep!
