I was bored one evening last week so i thought I’d quickly hop on the old facebook, see what my friends were saying. Sadly this is becoming an all to common occurrence for me in my spare time days!
I remember one time I vowed never to have a facebook but here we are, and I do quite enjoy it if im honest and it more often than not leads to things like this occurring!
So I saw one of my friends joined a group called “classic, retro and vintage car meeting”, sounds cool, right? As i was reading through it I saw it was happening in wroughton, which is not at all far from Swindon at all! Nothing like this ever seems to happen around Swindon, or if it does its usually rare at best!
I thought I’d invite myself to the group, as you do, especially since it was an open invite. Turned out to be a rather good idea!
I’ve got to be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect or whether many people would turn up, but it turned out to be a pretty spot on meeting, definitely with an emphasis on Americana! I didn’t think there was much in the way of serious American vehicles around Swindon, that said some of the ones I saw that day must be very well hidden. They were all loud, brash and stunning to look at.
There was already a nice collection of cars there when we turned up, the ones that caught my attention first thing were a couple of old skool granadas and a bright yellow chevy pickup which was in no way subtle! To see granadas of that age in this good a condition is incredibly rare. The reason the saloon looked so sharp though was it recently had a respray. I really checked out the sills and arches. Amazingly no rust there either! This was certainly a very tidy 2.8 When it pulled away it sounded ultra smooth aswell.
The other Granada was a hearse! Not something I’d drive everyday but there was no denying it had a presence on the road! A nice little touch was a load of speakers sat where the coffin would usually go…this was truly waking the dead stuff. Hearse/coffin/ death aspect aside, it was certainly very tidy! The interior looked rather luxurious aswell. Definitely a motorway cruiser.
I would be lying if I didn’t say the Chevy pickup was definitely high on my favourite car list that afternoon, under the bonnet sat a big 7.2 v8 putting out around 900bhp at the flywheel and 720 odd to the wheels. I imagine the torque figures wouldn’t be far off or just over the 1000lb-ft of torque. Even with the fat tyres on the back this would still spinup at the blip of a throttle.
When this started up it reminded me of when I was in the paddock at donington park a few years back on a Ferrari day. One of the old le mans cars was fired up and you could feel the vibration through the ground. The sound of it idling kind of resonated with anything thing within about 10-20 meters of it. You could feel it in your stomach and through any object you touched in that kind of area of the car.
This wasn’t quite to that level but it was very loud and bassy just sat still. The finish on it was second to none with a brilliant blue interior to compliment the bright yellow exterior.
Back to planet earth and realistic cars we can all afford and enjoy, top of the list had to be this 2.8 capri. This was superbly cared for and had clearly had alot of time and effort invested to keep it in this condition. It was done nicely. Choice modifications all round the car. Nothing to detract from the originality and charm of the Capri and everything to compliment it, the best area demonstrating this was the engine bay where alot of the piping and wiring was swapped for red or it was chromed up nicely. Also the engine bay was so clean! It really looked immaculate and added to the special feeling you got from seeing it.
Probabally the secret to the super cleanliness though was the usage of the car. The owner didn’t take it out often except for shows and special occasions like this and kept it garaged all the time. Fairplay to him! I’d want to be driving this all the time!
If its Character your after in a car though, this is perfect! An MG Magnette, these were produced between the 50’s and 60’s and judging by the colour and condition of this car it was more or less the same one that rolled off the factory line way back then. This was very well kept and incredibly clean. I struggled to find rust on it and the underside and arches were very tidy too.
The owner clearly loved it immensely. I was loving all the badges on the front bumper aswell. It’s about as british as a car could get, Id have this one over most MGBs I’ve seen. It didn’t stop on the body though. The engine was lovely to look at aswell. I especially loved the SU carbs with the MG badges on them. You see MG’s like this and you can’t help but wonder…Why did it all go so wrong?
MG is back now as far as im aware, lets hope they stay and maybe go back to their roots on some of the future models.
Something a bit different now, considering this is a car blog this might seem a little unusual, but i definitely had to share it with you, it had some very strong, and moving air brushed graphics on it, commemorating war veterans and prisoners of war.
The best way to describe this bike is by letting you have a look at the pictures yourself. Awesome.
For a small local meet it was a brilliant day with a nice collection of cars turning up, hopefully there will be another one soon!
Before the first session I had a wonderful nervousness and feeling of butterflies in my stomach, I knew it was going to be epic but still wasn’t expecting quite what was to come!
Recent Comments