Another COTY winner

COTY jurors aren’t voting for Car of the Year. They are voting to look Green. Why else would they have elected the Ampera in 2012? They surely can’t have expected it to sell more than a handful. They’re not that stupid. No, they are spooked, along with governments round the world, by what WS Gilbert called greenery yallery Grosvenor Gallery foot-in-the-grave young men. Or women.

Opel and Vauxhall dealers, who hadn’t a lot of choice perhaps, accounted for the first year’s 5,000 or so Amperas. That sank to 3,184 last year and collapsed to 332 in the first five months of this, of which only 46 were in its German home market. GM Vice Chairman Steve Girsky vented frustration at Geneva: “All the governments in Europe said, ‘We want EVs, we want EVs.’ We show up with one, and where is everybody?” The answer is that they were off buying something else, real cars mostly.

COTY jurors are like governments appeasing Green voters with inglorious wind farms and wasteful subsidies. By any standards the Ampera was a disaster. Production is stopping and although GM will redesign the broadly similar Volt next year it won’t come to Europe.

There wasn’t much wrong with the Ampera. It was sensibly-sized and quite handsome, drove smoothly and quietly and as a hybrid didn’t have the range anxieties of milk-floaty plug-in electric cars, attracting complaints now about how costly they are to top-up. Apparently charging stations take money by the hour, without knowing how much electricity is actually being used. The cost can be just as much for a battery flat or near full.

I have said before that there is a FIFA flavour about Car of the Year. In 50 years COTY has never elected a Jaguar, Range Rover or Land Rover. It can’t be anti-British-ness. Munich doesn’t come off well either. There has been no BMW; a range that goes from Rolls-Royce to Mini has never made the grade except for second last year for the i3. It elected an electric Nissan yet COTY doesn’t do safety. Volvo and Saab never featured. Engineering excellence? Bentley has never made it. Production quality? There have been no Hondas. Value for money? No Skodas, no Seats but 9 Fiats, 6 Renaults and 5 Fords. I can’t understand why manufacturers get so excited by it.

Vauxhall Wensum

The Wensum was a Vauxhall 30-98 OE-type made between 1923 and 1927. As with most up-market cars bodies were made to order, mostly the elegant 4-seat open 3-door Velox tourer. Handsome and well-proportioned, although more dramatic the nautical-looking boat-tailed Wensum had no doors, no hood, flared wings, polished wood panelling and V windscreen. It cost £150 more than the plain Velox. Coachbuilders Mulliner and Grosvenor also catalogued 2-seaters. Designer Laurence Pomeroy’s departure from Vauxhall had been a profound loss not only to Luton but also the entire British motor industry. He had been figuring out an overhead camshaft 30-98 since 1919 with all the flair and inventiveness of a British Ferdinand Porsche. Pomeroy’s prescient approach to engineering led him to America in 1919 where he did pioneering work on developing aluminium applications in cars. His successor at Vauxhall C E King developed Pomoroy’s work with a pushrod engine for the D-type 25HP and the E-type 30-98 in 1923 making it the fastest catalogued car in Britain. Almost all were sold as fast tourers.

The new engine had much the same lower half as before, with a redesigned block and overhead valves so large they needed rockers on offset pedestals. Their seats extended to the edge of the combustion spaces. Double valve springs and substantial four-bolt Duralumin connecting rods were necessary for an engine that revved freely to 3400rpm – almost unheard of. The result was greater refinement but not, at first, a great deal more speed although in racing trim and with a high axle ratio 30-98s were guaranteed for 100mph. Later cars had a balanced crank and good hydraulic brakes. Wensum pictured at Windsor last year had a slightly taller windscreen than early ones and a whimsical Vauxhall bonnet mascot. Instruments were laid out flat and the colour scheme original-looking with black flowing wings which, according to a sales catalogue (when a Wensum was £1300 “complete”) reproduced in Nick Portway’s splendid Vauxhall The Finest of Sporting Cars 30-98, “offer little resistance to the wind and are fully effective in keeping the body clean.” Portway’s books are exemplars; essential for any student of the Vintage era. See www.newwensum.co.uk/‎ .

BODY: Velox fast tourer 1423kg (3136lb). Wensum sports 4 seater, complete car 1473kg (3248lb) chassis 1245kg (2744lb)
ENGINE 4 cylinders, in-line, front, 98mm x 140mm; 4224cc; compr: 5.2:1; 83.5kW (112bhp) @ 3400rpm; 19.8kW (26.5bhp)/l; rated horse power 23.8. Later cars 89.5kW (120bhp) @ 3500rpm
ENGINE STRUCTURE pushrod overhead valves; chain driven camshaft; detachable cast iron cylinder head; cast iron block; 5-bearing crankshaft; Zenith 48RA carburettor, pressurised fuel feed until 1923 then Autovac; Watford magneto ignition; water-cooled, honeycomb radiator, cast alloy fan.
TRANSMISSION rear wheel drive; Vauxhall multi-plate clutch; 4-speed gearbox; ENV spiral bevel final drive; ratio 3.3:1.
CHASSIS DETAILS pressed steel chassis, engine sub-frame channel pressed steel section; half-elliptic suspension all round; Hartford friction dampers; 4 wheel brakes from 1923, hydraulic in front from 1926; worm and wheel steering; 54.5l(12gal) fuel tank; 820x120 beaded edge tyres, centre-lock Rudge wheels to 1925 then 32x4.5SS rims.
PERFORMANCE maximum speed 144.5kph (90mph), 160kph (100mph) guaranteed when stripped for racing; 44.9kph (28mph) @ 1000rpm; acceleration 0-60mph, 17 secs; 19kg/kW (14kg/bhp); fuel consumption 15.7l/100km (18mpg).
PRODUCTION 312.
PRICE chassis 1923 £1020, later £950
The 1930-1932 T and T80 was a derivative of the 1928-1929 R-type with taller radiator, and chrome flutes. The sole Vauxhall at the beginning of 1930 the stylish Hurlingham echoing the Wensum was also a rakish 2-seater with a V-shaped windscreen and small dickey seat. It was capable of 70mph but Motor Sport was uncertain. “Third gear enables an excellent average to be put up as it gives excellent acceleration and one gets into the habit of spending a good deal of time in this gear on anything like a twisty road.” But 55mph remained about the maximum and the steering was too low geared. Testers contrasted the Hurlingham’s gentlemanly behaviour with what it called the roughness of this old school Vauxhall. Production of the 20/60 T-type probably did not continue much after 1930 but the expensive (£750 for a 1931 saloon) Silent 80 (T80) sold for a further season.

Vauxhall Victor

Negative legacy. Vauxhall Victor. Pity really, for although the first FA of 1957-1961 was a styling disaster on the level of the Edsel, there was a Series 2 by 1959 that tidied it up. This took what looked like an accident out of the rear door and the exhaust no longer emerged from a jet-like bit of the bulbous bumper. Unburnt gases left rainbow colours on the chrome in weeks. The Victor was still too narrow and too tall but some of the worst excesses of the Detroite couture were erased. The proportions never suited a narrow car with 13in wheels, there was a lot of overhang, and the pillars of the wrap-around windscreen had a bruising dogleg. There may have been a certain logic in transplanting features popular in America but the two year face-lift was deeply necessary. Detroit never understood the British. There was a Victor estate car and in 1958 the option of the mercifully short-lived Newton two-pedal transmission.
(right)Knee-cracking entry – the wrap-round windscreen pillar.
The 1961-1964 Victor FB was not at all bad. It laid the foundations of a model range that took Vauxhall through to the second half of the 1970s with a lively turn of speed, quite a roomy body and a useful boot, in an era bored with Austin Cambridge, Hillman Minx, Standard 10 and Morris Oxford. The Victor was never going to match the Ford Consul for style but it had a hydraulic clutch and synchromesh on first gear. (below) Vauxhall classic with bonnet flutes, the Wensum.
FB second thoughts exorcised the dogleg A-pillar, and improved the proportions. It also finally banished the trade-mark flutes, which had been on every Vauxhall since Edwardian times. Crisp and even rather than beautiful, the changes put the Victor firmly into the well-respected family category. Wheelbase, track, length, and width were all increased. Only the height was reduced – by 3.8cm (1.5in) and the spare wheel was mounted upright at the side to increase luggage room. Vauxhall had been something of a pioneer of unitary structures and now it managed to reduce the weight by nearly 77kg (170lb). A 3-speed gearbox was standard but customers preferred the optional 4-speed all-synchromesh box, although it was criticised at first for being noisy, with a spongy long-travel remote control shift. Bench seats were standard; discerning customers could have comfortable bucket seats. Steering swivels were re-designed so that grease gun applications were now 12,000 miles apart.
Specification FA:
BODY saloon, 4 seats, 4 doors, weight 1016kg (2240lb); estate 1066kg (2352lb).
ENGINE 4 cylinders, in-line, front, 79.37mm x 76.2mm; 1508cc; compr: 7.8:1; 41kW (55bhp) gross @ 4200rpm, 28kW (36.5bhp)/l; 113 Nm (84lb/ft) @ 2400rpm.
ENGINE STRUCTURE overhead valves; chain-driven camshaft; cast iron cylinder head and block; 4-bearing crankshaft; Zenith VN434 carburettor; centrifugal and vacuum coil ignition; water-cooled.
TRANSMISSION rear wheel drive; Borg & Beck 7.25in sdp clutch; 3-speed gearbox; all synchromesh; hypoid bevel final drive; ratio 4.125:1 saloon, 4.625 estate; optional Newton clutch 1958 engaged at 800rpm.
CHASSIS DETAILS integral steel structure; independent coil spring and wishbone front suspension; anti-roll bar; live axle half-elliptic springs at rear (25% stiffer for estate); telescopic hydraulic dampers; hydraulic composite steel and cast-iron drum brakes; Burman recirculating ball steering; 36.4l (8gal) fuel tank; 5.60-13 (5.90 estate) tyres.
DIMENSIONS wheelbase 249cm (98in); track 127cm (50in) front and rear; ground clearance 16.5cm (6.5in); turning circle 10.5m (34.5ft); length 424cm (167in); width 158cm (62.25in); height 148cm (58.25in); estate permissible load 386kg (850lb), 1275l (45cu ft).
PERFORMANCE maximum speed 120.4kph (75mph); 26.5kph (16.5mph) @ 1000rpm (23.6kph, 14.7mph estate); 25kg/kW (18.5kg/bhp); acceleration 0-60mph 28.1sec (30.9sec estate); fuel consumption 9.1l/100km (31mpg).
PRODUCTION 390,747 all F-type.
PRICE FA £505 + PT £253 17s 0d, £758 17s 0d 1957 Super saloon. £637 + PT £319 17s 0d, £956.17s.0d 1958 estate car with Newton 2-pedal control, £931 7s 0d with manual transmission. £565 + PT £283 17s 0d, £848 17s 0d 1959 series II Super saloon.
PRICE FB with 4-speed gearbox £547, £781 8s 11d.
Unitary structure in 1937, the H-type.


Classic book

Guild of Motoring Writers on a front line? A handful of founders in 1944 maybe but not many. Road tests can be written under fire from unhappy PRs, readers throw brickbats, but it’s a relatively safe business so long as you choose carefully who to drive with on press launches. Yet Mike Brewer was actually shot at doing an illuminating series on army vehicles in Afghanistan. Bouncy and enthusiastic, his publicist describes Brewer as TVs best-known car dealing expert, and now he has produced a book on buying and selling modern classic cars.

Brewer presents Discovery channel’s Wheeler Dealer series, which has been running for nine years and is shown all over the world. It illustrates what interest there is in classic cars and Brewer’s book is a useful primer. It covers buying, owning, selling, auctions and basics like giving a car a deep clean. “It never ceases to amaze me how little effort people make when it comes to tidying up their cars,” Brewer says. Quite right. I learned it long ago during a brief spell in the rough and tumble of the Glasgow motor trade. “If it’s looking a bit grimy get the engine steam cleaned, and don’t forget the painted areas like the inner wings.” Every motoring writer should have a spell selling cars. What makes people buy can be revealing, and it’s hardly ever understeer or oversteer or how many seconds it takes to 60.

Brewer’s experience in the trade was more successful than mine. See his Tales from the Trade. There is cogent advice on starter classics. He recommends Mark 1 Ford Escort and Vauxhall Viva HB - plenty of variants and spares are cheap. I was less convinced about his advocacy of the Triumph Spitfire although he does recommend later ones after 1974.

Sporting classics? MGA yes, Delorean definitely not – terrible car – a dishonest pastiche. Favourite modern classics? VW Beetle – OK. Ford Capri ? Maybe. Lotus Elan? Yes. Jaguar E-type, yes certainly although not the lugubrious V12. And Morgan? OK but probably not the Plus 8, which I always thought over-powered for the frail frame. As for the Citroën DS; well to say the complicated suspension and hydraulics aren’t for the faint-hearted is an understatement. I’d go for something more bullet-proof - an MGB maybe with a Heritage bodyshell – to fend off the Taliban.

Mike Brewer’s The Wheeler Dealer Know How! £16.99 ISBN 978-1-845844-89-9 everything you need to know about buying, preparing and selling collectable cars. www.veloce.co.uk.
Top: Jaguar E-type. Ford Capri II. My sturdy MGB. Bottom - I tested military vehicles in my Gunner days. 8 (Alma) Field Battery Royal Artillery Daimler Ferret armoured car, like they used to build in what became the Jaguar factory in Browns Lane. That’s me in the turret.

Electrickery: It isn't working


If there was a way of storing enough electricity to drive a car it would have been discovered by now. In the 200 or so years since Michael Faraday (1791-1867), we have split the atom, been to the moon and back, invented aviation, television, computers and the world wide web. Yet it still needs a 4 ton battery the size of a 550 gallon petrol tank, to provide a family car with 500 miles’ range and 100 mph performance. Electricity is a means of transmitting power, not a source of power, and the electric car has not come far since 1899 when Camille Jenatzy did his 65mph flying kilometre.
He had to charge the batteries before he could do the return kilometre. Last week Auto Express admitted its Nissan Leaf on the RAC Future Car Challenge was charged up overnight at Brighton to ensure it would get back to London. Driver Sam Hardy slipstreamed a lorry for 25 miles and avoided using heater or demister. Some cars were so slow they caused traffic tailbacks.

Even electrophiles on Autocar revealed that UK electric car sales have hardly passed 1,000 and only the Chevrolet Volt (top and bottom) and Vauxhall Ampera, with on-board generators, stand any chance. More Ferraris were sold last year. The Nissan Leaf has not come near its wildly optimistic sales target. Car of the Year 2011 – what a joke; Chevrolet thought it might manage 10,000 Volts but sold 7700.

To appease greenery-yallery foot-in-the-grave lobbyists the government set aside £300million to subsidise electric cars. Yet hardly anybody’s tempted; throwing money at them hasn’t worked. Milk floats, fine – cars, not a chance. It might be all right for hybrids like the Toyota Prius (below). I tested one in 2004 and over 1,300miles it did 45mpg – about what I might have managed with a real car just driving slowly.


In America the National Highway Traffic Safety Adminstration (NHTSA) has been before a Senate sub-committee. Administrator David Strickland was asked why it kept quiet about lithium-ion battery fires following crash tests of the plug-in Volt. The wrecks ignited three weeks after the tests, but the NHTSA waited five months before owning up and only when a news reporter exposed it.

The Islay distillery of Bruichladdich would be fine for a Leaf. You could drive the 30 miles all round the island without running out of juice. Strickland claimed the NHTSA had not worked out why the Volt caught fire, only to be told nobody believed him. He was accused of keeping quiet in view of his taxpayer subsidy and his relationship with General Motors. The implication was that he had become so influenced by lobbying on electric cars he felt obliged to conceal bad news.

Some politicians will do anything ... Strickland was rather like climate change theorists suppressing anything that contradicts their dogma. Inability to distinguish matters of opinion from matters of fact is the last refuge of the dirigist. Everybody thinks they ought to believe electric cars work. It is politically incorrect to say they don’t. Let’s get real.

Unintended consequencies

Not before time, there's proposed safety legislation not obsessed with speeding. Proposals for new powers so police can issue tickets for bad driving are all very well, but begs the question of how you catch the miscreants. One sees drivers weaving in and out of motorway traffic, risking theirs and everybody else's necks, and just wish there was a patrol car there to scoop them up. There never is. And with the passing of a regime that thought it could enforce safety by speed cameras while reducing traffic police, maybe we are on the threshold of a new era.

We need more patrol cars like this Vauxhall Insignia
Unfortunately making new regulations does not follow logical processes. This 1993 Sunday Times column was concerned about unintended consequences. The original copy for "proposed law..." is attached.


The AA has just taken delivery of a fleet of new Ford Transits.
Sunday Times: Motoring 02 May 1993
DEATH BY DANGEROUS DRIVING

The creation of a new offence of causing death by driving is to be looked at by the AA as soon as the proposals are drawn up for a new criminal justice bill in the autumn. It is barely a year since the Road Traffic Act introduced two offences, causing death by dangerous driving and causing death by careless driving while over the prescribed blood-alcohol limit. Instead there will be a new single offence with double the existing maximum jail term of five years.

Courts will need to take account of the circumstances of accidents to make a distinction between misdemeanours with unexpectedly tragic consequences and minor shunts. 'We need to make sure that motoring offences do not get out of proportion,' an AA spokesman said. 'Causing death while at the wheel of a car must relate to similar offences in other areas, although we acknowledge public concern over the powers judges have for dealing with the lunatic fringe who drive without concern for life.'

A driver who runs into a car stationary at traffic lights is clearly culpable. But the difference between the consequences may be no more than a matter of chance. The driver of the stationary car may get a stiff neck when his headrest cushions the blow, step from his damaged vehicle and exchange names and addresses before driving off, aggrieved but alive.

Another stationary car might have no head restraints. They are a relatively recent safety feature. In an identical accident with the same degree of carelessness by the offending driver, whiplash could break the driver's neck and kill him.

Consequences in traffic accidents can often be a matter of luck - running into a car with safety features against running into one without. Driver B could face a custodial sentence of up to ten years against driver A getting a caution, a fine, and a few points on his driving licence for essentially the same misdeed, running into the back of a stationary car.

Drink-driving is a different issue. Impairment through drinking is a serious business, the courts take it seriously, and the distinction of a separate offence of causing death while unfit to drive through drink should remain.

But there is a distinction between the driver who crashes carelessly or recklessly into a bus shelter when it is empty, and the one who kills all the occupants. The difference rests only on whether anyone was in the shelter at the time. In one case it might mean a wigging by the bench, in the other a long term of imprisonment.

The logic of increasing penalties according to the consequences of transgressions, would imply decreasing them where the risks are small. Speeding at 3am on an empty motorway in clear weather would become less serious than recklessly flouting the law on a busy afternoon.

Reckless, careless, driving without due care and attention, or whatever it may be called under various road traffic acts, now generally comes to light when there has been an accident. Yet it is the bad driving that is the offence, not whether the driver knocks down a tree or kills a sheep.

In the last four years nearly 100 cases of apparently lenient sentences on drivers involved in accidents have been referred by the Attorney General to the Court of Appeal. Fourteen involved fatalities. The protests the Home Office receives over sentences on killer-drivers are overwhelming.

It is difficult not to take account of fatalities in assessing culpability, but leaving aside the drink-driving issue, not many drivers set out to kill, and pressing for fierce penalties on those who do will not do much for deterrence and could look like a cry for vengeance.