Going back a bit to some of the peripheral point raised:
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how many of those 500 were built LHD?
As far as I know, all of them, and basically all sold off in the North American market. I do suspect that a few TR7 Sprints were given away as freebees - you have to read the Guardian reports on BL's expenditure on bribes in 76-78 to see how deep they were into that stuff. And it looks like some may have been made specially for that - given special paint jobs, etc. So it's entirely possible some of the TR8's went that way and were one-off RHD cars.
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I'm also aware that Triumph in particular were in the habit of selling off (usually internally, within the company) fascinating prototypes and development 1 offs rather than scrapping them as most other manufacurers did (and still do) As proof of this, I offer the Herald hatchback (which it was my privilege to own for some 15 years) the similar T2000 hatchback (used as a comp dept hack, then as a development testbed for the Lucas PI then sold off, it still exists) The beautiful Triumph Fury prototype which is still preserved in private hands and the TR7 based Lynx conserved at Gaydon.
I think the situation with odds and sods might have been different, especially with Standard Triumph and Stokes' BLMC rather than BL. As to the Lynx and Broadside, I remember Paul Towel (ex TR8 registrar with the TRDC) told me the story of his involvement in saving them from being scrapped quite a few years ago. Though I don't think I remember it well enough to recount. But on the issue of failed production runs and larger numbers, I'm following what Bill Piggott wrote on that issue of "normal practice might have been to dismantle the cars or convert them to normal TR7 power". And that is clearly supported by what's in Canley Classics webpages on the 25 O-Series TR7s.
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