Back in 1977 the price list for Triumph car

[Richard the old one]

1977 price list.rtf

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The car that I have just purchased came with the attached August 1977 price list. In general the prices are not that far from today's prices for a good condition model.

My attempt to attach an electronic copy seems to have failed so I will provide some of the detail:

Dolomite 1300 £2772, 1500 £2983, 1500HL £3382, 1850HL, £3772. Sprint £4642

[AndyJ]

The attachment works fine actually Richard! And the prices aren't that far off as you say, but a brand new Sprint would be more than tempting.

[Jon Tilson]

Makes you wonder why so many bought 1500HL's when you could get the proper one for less than 400 quid more.

Jonners

[gmsclassics]

I suppose it depends on what proportion were bought by companies, as was the new 1500 I had in 1978. RHM had a very structured list of what car you were entitiled to depending on the grade of your job. I suspect cars got on that list depending on the net price after discount and there were only four or five in each grade. I had gone from an orange Ford Escort 1.3 Popular to a pageant blue Dolomite 1500 and I was well pleased with that. Of course I would have prefered a Sprint, but even the 1500 was perhaps enough to spark an obsession.............

Geoff

[Pippin]

The car that I have just purchased came with the attached August 1997 price list.

I think that should be 1977. I guess the £400 difference would have been a lot more significant almost 40 years ago.

[RobSun]

This post has brought back memories from this very year and the non purchase of a 1500 hl.

My then wife had a beetle and I had a tweeked imp tuned to the same spec as my rally cars and I had just changed my job which required a 70 mile commute each way so a more comfortable refined car was required. Wife's uncle was on his second 1500 hl and I liked it and yes the 1850/sprint was more appealing but the extra price in those days was a lump. Triumphs were expensive upmarket cars. To put the prices into perspective in 1972 at 20 years old I purchased my first brand new car, an imp for £720. 1973 my second a superb fiat 850 sport coupe £975. That was swopped for a mk2 hatchback 1.6l Capri in 1974 £1300. It was the time of high inflation but you get the idea. Wife and a mortgage came along in 75 so the Capri went for a new imp, think it was about £900 before tweeks.

I wanted an mg midget but swmbo said no so decided to go for the 1500hl. All went well wife happy with the car, deal ready to sign. Then the salesman started going for the extras, the main one was the extended warantee. He was pushing this big time and said that I would need it doing 140 miles a day to cover the breakdowns I will have. Well I looked at the wife and then turned to him and said so these cars are no good then and not reliable. That's no good to me I want reliability, got up and walked out. We went next door and purchased an ex demo hunter 1500 for around half the price of the triumph and they wanted my imp which I wasn't trading for the Triumph.

Never mind I eventually joined the clan.

[Jon Tilson]

Great story...

A dolly 1500HL when new would have been quite capable of a 140 mile a day commute until it had done about 50k miles.
Then it would probably have needed a reshell and done another 50k or so. They were certainly as robust as anything made at Ryton.

In fact the ohv can do pretty decent mileages as long as oil is changed regularly and sustained use above 4000 rpm is avoided.
What kills them usually is clutch riding in town traffic as the thrust washers are weak.

I prefer the 1850 somehow in spite of the stretching chains, stupid angled studs, head corrosion, head gasket failures and leaking water pumps. I think the extra poke and refinement were worth the 400 quid.

Jonners

[RobSun]

I would now agree whole heartedly Jon but the salesman was so motivated in selling the BL extended three year warantee for his commission by telling me the wheel bearings, clutch, waterpump , and bottom end will all need replacing within the three years that nobody in their right mind would buy one. The extended warrantee was a factor in going for the triumph and I had already decided on getting one before he started his selling pitch and effectively running the car down.

The Hunter did a first class job never let me down and became the wife's car a year later when I got my first company car, a marina. Now I had two of these and did they need the warantee. They were both off the road for repairs every two weeks. The company purchased 160 every two years. My first one was so bad BL took it back to the factory to repair and returned it in December with no antifreeze in it hense the replacement new one. After the two years my employers broke off the deal due to the unreliability and for 1980 we got cortinas or caveliers.

In 1982 I was called in to H.O and presented with a Cavalier. It had come from Belgium was badged as an L but had recarro seats fitted. My boss, the MD, Sales Director, and Transport Manager, together with someone from Vauxhall were also there. I was told nothing about the car just that I had to keep a log of all faults and comments, and to take it to one specific dealer for servicing. As I was about to drive off in it the chap from Vauxhall said be very careful its very quick and a handful.

It was magnificent. The suspension was rock hard, you felt a matchstick. Torque steer in the wet was massive and wheel spin was vertually impossible not to get. In the dry the acceleration was astounding, it would out drag anything, and overtaking was brilliant. The speedo read 130 and I tried to see what it would do. The needle went passed it and was still accelerating and I gave up as the car started to become unstable. Tyres didn't last long, the brakes were fantastic but required frequent pad and disc changes, and half shafts didn't last either. I had this car for two and a half years and then Vauxhall came and took it back. They never said what it was, and the standard Cavalier that replaced it was dead and boring by comparison, but a short time after the Cavalier 130 came out with the same seats in. This wasn't the beast that I had but I think it was what came from it.

I asked the transport manager to give me the lowdown on it but he said he couldn't. All he could say was that Vauxhall approached them because of the numbers they purchased to run it for a long term evaluation for them, and I was selected to have it because of my driving background and the way I looked after my cars.

I remember that car with fondness and sadness because it probably ended up being pulled apart in some development shed back in Belgium.

[Edin Dundee]

That's a great Cavalier story Rob, brilliant. Any pics of 'the beast'?

[trackerjack]

Possibly a red top Cavalier like the one my daughter had and loved, hers was 150 bhp SRI and my memory of it was as a passenger at Castle Combe flying into Quarry bend (which has the reputation of most accidents on any in the land!) and she lifted the throttle at speed and the car oversteered at an alarming angle and I thought we were about to crash when she nailed the throttle and shot round like a missile in Syria, I should have had more faith

I then bought a Vectra 1800, yuk a slow barge and happily gone to a scrap yard.

[RobSun]

Sorry Bill no pics, well yes I do have pics but on slides and its in the background at camp sites and with the kids playing etc. I did use it to tow a caravan and it did a good job of that to. It was nothing special to look at, it was just a standard mk1 front wheel drive l badged Cavalier except for the seats and everything under the bonnet was in German.

It may have been a red top but it didn't have the red cam cover, there was nothing under the bonnet externally that looked different to a standard engine.

Any work that was done to it had to be approved first by Vauxhall, from an oil change to a tyre. I would take it in and say what was wrong or needed, the dealers did an investigation and made a report to Vauxhall and they authorised and directed them in what to do. Once I took it in for a mid term oil change as required by them and got it back with a different exhaust on it. Another time I took it in for a major service and brakes. They didn't authorise the brakes said there was life left in them. Two weeks later the front pads were metal on metal and I was mighty P**sed off. It was trailered in to the dealers and they let me see the report they had made stating pads were worn out and the refusal by Vauxhall to repair. No idea what they were up to but the dealer gave me the number of the person they reported to and we had a very heated discussion centred around him trying to kill me. The result was a complete new set of brakes, everything replaced and after discs and pads were replaced automatically every 6 months.

It was a real Q car and I loved ruining boy racers days with it. Many a modified escort driver after being left behind would ask what it was and I just said a standard 1.6 Cavalier. There faces were a picture. I was on one occasion running late for a meeting with a client, the general engineering manager of a national garage and transport company. I came up behind a nice Ford 2.8 Capri who was motoring, and at the first safe place shot past him. When I got to the garage the client was not in but left a message saying he was on his way and for me to wait. After a few minutes his secretary came out and said that he had arrived but he was outside in the car park looking at a car. You guessed it, it was him. I went out to see him and he wanted to know what it was. He said he had never had a car overtake him so quickly, I was shifting, I recognised you in my mirrors, and then you were passed and gone, what is it? A long discussion on it and after he went all over it with one of his colleagues, he decided it was a development vehicle. I didn't tell Vauxhall that a main Ford dealer had had a butchers at it in my comments section of my reports.

[MIG Wielder]

Just to put those new Dolomite prices in context, in 1977 we scraped up enough money for a mortgage deposit on our first flat in that year. Two brand new Sprints plus a bit would have bought the place outright. We did have a 1973 1850 which was just 4 years old and we bought for £700. So they did depreciate quite a bit. We owned MPD 155 L for near on 10 years.
Tony.

[Jon Tilson]

True Tony but I think your 73 dolly new would have been about 1300 quid so 700 at 4 years old is pretty good...

I remember dollies making 1100 quid at a year old and more in auctions. I REALLY wanted one but was too poor....

I think this cav must have been an SRI 130 development vehicle. The red top was 150 bhp and quite a bit later....

Mk2 Cav was a great car.....sadly quite rare now but one those "move the game on" for the common man cars that are now
taken for granted. It may not have been the best in any single department but was pretty damn good in all of them.

Jonners