Month: June 2011

It’s got pulling power… Vauxhall was onto a winner with its Cavalier Mk2, but the switch to FWD was a radical step for the conservative company, and it wasn’t sure […]

Christina Savvas, Birmingham Post, 27 June 2011 Birmingham’s car manufacturing industry received a huge boost when China’s Premier Wen Jiabao visited the MG plant in Longbridge on Sunday. Mr. Wen […]

Keith Adams A look at some of the less likely extinct cars in the UK, according to data supplied by the brilliant How Many Left? website based on DVLA data. […]

The small hatchback Rover commissioned OMNI design to produce a proposal for the company’s upcoming supermini – these were the results. These sketches show two interesting interpretations on the Rover […]

Here’s a lovely advertising video for you – it’s 1981, and you know you want a Capri Injection! Feel the power

The Rancho might be the best known 1100 variant for fashionistas, but the Talbot Wind was an equally faddish flavour – for rather less money. The beach was probably the […]

Various SIMCAs were built in Spain, and the majority of these adhered to their French cousins. However, the Campero was unique to Spain. Graham Arnold tells its interesting story. Spanish […]

MGB for the 21st century? Hinted at for some time in the press, the MG GT Concept marries the well-known capabilities of the MG TF chassis and the KV6 engine, […]

Anglo-French Rover? It wasn’t only Matra’s Renault Espace Gen 3 that MG Rover had been interested in – Longbridge executives could have ended up reviving the MG Midget name with […]

Conceived as an advanced replacement for the Audax range and created with the same set of goals as the Imp, the Swallow could have been the Rootes Group’s swansong… Sadly, […]

The Arrow range was conceived as a smart-suited replacement for the Audax range of Minx/Supermix models and their badge-engineered counterparts. Some have called this the last Rootes car, although the […]

The Aston MGB The 10th September 1979 became known as “Black Monday” among MG enthusiasts around the world, because it was the date that BL finally went public with their […]

The Arrow range was conceived to be a conventional replacement for the Audax Rootes cars – and as such, was designed in Hillman, Humber and Singer versions. The early styling […]

In design Roy Axe’s designs feature heavily on this website, and it was his Sunbeam Rapier that saw him rise to prominence… April 1964 May 1964 Full size clay, January […]

The Rootes Group were a prime proponent of the art of badge engineering; take a basic car and apply several marque names to it in order to cover several market […]

Enduring legend After several unsuccessful attempts to make FIAT automobiles, the most serious step towards production of automobiles was taken by establishment of Iran National Factories (Iran khodro, public joint […]

Active between 1960 and 1964, ADO34 was a project to develop a Mini-based roadster, which would logically have replaced the MG Midget and Austin-Healey Sprite. Different versions were put forward […]

The sporting version of the Imp looks as promising today as it did back during the 1960s. A lack of money would spell its end… Rootes’ engineers knew that the […]

Rootes’ bouncing new baby The Slug The Slug was the brainchild Michael Parkes and Tim Fry, when they were asked to come up with a small car to generate sales […]

XPowered MGF launched at Le Mans 2001, the MG XPower TF500 demonstrated that there was a fighting spirit at MG Rover; one that wanted to show the world that the […]

The Hillman Imp came about as a direct response to the Suez-crisis induced petrol shortages of 1956/57, even though Rootes had started small car investigations long before this. The first […]