Visited the Heritage Motor Centre in Gaydon...

It is such a shame that British Leyland were never able to deliver on the interesting research that was done.
There are many interesting and really quite exciting industrial projects that never happened in the UK during the 70's and 80's.
Facing a uncertain budget and too much interference to be comfortable certainly encouraged some interesting thinking!

John
 
Hi John, that is very true. A really pity it wasn't produced.

A lot of the figures are similar; the Cd figure; the MPG; and the fact that they worked with Alcan.

Didn't Audi work with Alcan when developing the Mk 1 A8?

The reason I had attended the event? I was a Rover 75 owner and had booked the hotel etc to go to Pride of Longbridge and the HMC in Gaydon when running that car!

I was allowed to park in a prominent position among the '75 and ZT cars!
 
My pleasure Murdo; my attempts to convince people questioning the appearance of my A2 @ Gaydon that my car was indeed relevant was made easier when I pointed FCV3 to them!
 
Top Gear fellas got their hands on it in 1983

[video]http://youtube.com/watch?v=UQuzHU3JVWU[/video]

Excellent stuff. What forward thinking. In its appearance the ECV3 has hints of the A2 in profile, the Renault Scenic Mk 1, many a Citroën from side on and the rear and the Vauxhall Calibra, from the front if you squint. The Calibra had a very very low Cd figure too I believe.

Interestingly Audi made a similar car we all know and love, but it cost them ~£6k per car to do so. Hardly what BL needed at the time. I believe I'm right in saying the Mini cost BL £1 per car to make too.

Losing money is never clever.
 
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Compared with all the other excesses that lost BL money an aluminium car may not have been so stupid.
During this time period they took the purchasing chiefs of all of the UK Emergency Services on an annual holiday to showcase new (or rather the same cars again!) and then for example make special deals on "cosmetic seconds". I learnt a lot about this in a previous life from the poor boys who ended up driving SD1's with doors that did not match, or fit in the frames, and so on.
A slightly higher production cost without the "cosmetic seconds" and a car that did not need so much remedial work could have been a better option....

John
 
There is a photo I posted somewhere on here a couple of years ago and taken from aronline (I too am a former ZT-T - great car - and 75 Tourer owner and frequent that website/forum) which shows the design studio and on the wall is a sketch of a very A2 looking car. VAG should have recruited ex MGRover chassis engineers to give Audi's a decent chassis set up for the UK roads.....
 
Thankyou very much for posting the video John! Adrian, I'm sure I took a picture of the concept you are talking about; will try and post it... :)
 
I don't think the image I am referring to ever got to concept build however if it did even more frustrating to think what might have been..... MGRover leading the automotive world instead of a name on a Chinese made UK designed 'has been' of a car (MG6).
 
I agree fully. As I walked around the museum, I could not help but wonder how it all went the way it did! I've sent a PM with some pictures as I still have not worked out how to post with my 'phone :)
 
So many Metro's rusted away, could you imagine if they had got to the point where they built Aluminium ones, maybe we would still be seeing them on the road now..
 
BL were a disaster area in the 80's, as far as cars were concerned. One of my first cars was an Austin 1300 which broke down in Richelieu on the Loire. The silly little idler bearing that transmits all the power (same as the Mini) had cut its' way through the clutch housing and oil was dripping out the bottom. Despite having all the relevant numbers, BL had no clue which type of gearbox or gearchange was fitted to my car - there were two options for each. In the end, someone from the local garage took all four options to the Loire - nice jolly! I should have given it up as a bad job, which it was!

RAB
 
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