THE POST WAR BRITISH CLASSICS - Individual Vintage Trading Card from the set issued by A&P PUBLICATIONS in 1992.
A classic car is typically an automobile 25 years or older, though definitions vary. A common theme is of an older car of historical interest to be collectible and tend to be restored rather than scrapped, though sometimes age is not a factor. Classic cars are often considered a subset of a broader category of "collector cars," including restored classic cars and newer exotic vehicles. A subset of classic cars are known as antique cars, manufactured before 1980, or vintage cars, manufactured before World War II.
Organizations such as the Classic Car Club of America (CCCA)
maintain lists of eligible unmodified cars that are called "classic."
These are described as "fine" or "distinctive" automobiles,
either American or foreign-built, produced between 1915 and 1948.
The United Kingdom has no fixed definition of a classic car.
However, Two taxation issues affect them, leading to some people using them as
cutoff dates. All cars built over 40 years ago are exempt from paying the
annual road tax vehicle excise duty. Also, exempt from the annual UK safety
test known as the MOT test on the condition that no substantial changes have
been made to the vehicle, however the vehicle can still be presented for test
voluntarily. This is known as "Historic vehicle tax exemption”. HM Revenue
and Customs define a classic car for company taxation purposes as being over 15
years old and having a value over £15,000.
Additionally, popular acclaim through classic car magazines
can play an important role in whether a car comes to be regarded as a classic.
Still, the definition remains subjective and a matter of opinion. The
elimination of depreciation can be a reason for buying a classic car, and
picking 'future classics' that are current 'bangers' can result in a profit for
the buyer and provide transport. An immaculate, well-cared-for prestige model
with high running costs that affect its value, but is not yet old enough to be
regarded as a classic, could be a good buy, for example.
The automotive industry in the United Kingdom is now best
known for premium and sports car marques including Aston Martin, Bentley, Caterham
Cars, Daimler, Jaguar, Lagonda, Land Rover, Lister Cars, Lotus, McLaren, Mini,
MOKE, Morgan and Rolls-Royce. Volume car manufacturers with a major presence in
the UK include Nissan, Toyota, BMW (under the Mini marque), and Vauxhall Motors
(a subsidiary of Opel, itself a subsidiary of Stellantis). Commercial vehicle
manufacturers active in the UK include Alexander Dennis, Dennis Eagle, IBC
Vehicles (owned by Stellantis), Leyland Trucks (owned by Paccar), TEVVA and
London Electric Vehicle Company (owned by Geely).
The origins of the UK automotive industry date back to the
final years of the 19th century. By the 1950s, the UK was the second-largest
manufacturer of cars in the world (after the United States), and the largest
exporter. However, in subsequent decades the industry experienced considerably
lower growth than competitor nations such as France, Germany and Japan, and by
2008 the UK was the 12th-largest producer of cars measured by volume. Since the
early 1990s, many British car marques have been acquired by foreign companies
including BMW (Mini and Rolls-Royce), SAIC (MG), Tata (Jaguar and Land Rover)
and Volkswagen Group (Bentley). Rights to many currently dormant marques,
including Austin, Riley, Rover and Triumph, are also owned by foreign companies.
Famous and iconic British cars include the Aston Martin DB5,
Aston Martin V8 Vantage, Bentley 4½ Litre, Jaguar E-Type, Land Rover Defender,
Lotus Esprit, McLaren F1, MGB, original two-door Mini, Range Rover, Rolls-Royce
Phantom III and Rover P5. Notable British car designers include David Bache,
Dick Burzi, Laurence Pomeroy, John Polwhele Blatchley, Ian Callum, Colin
Chapman, Alec Issigonis, Charles Spencer King and Gordon Murray.
History
1896 to 1900
Motorcars came into use on British roads during the early
1890s, but initially relied entirely on imported vehicles. The inception of the
British motor industry can be traced back to the late 1880s, when Frederick
Simms, a London-based consulting engineer, became friends with Gottlieb
Daimler, who had, in 1885, patented a successful design for a high-speed petrol
engine. Simms acquired the British rights to Daimler's engine and associated
patents and from 1891 successfully sold launches using these Cannstatt-made
motors from Eel Pie Island in the Thames. In 1893 he formed The Daimler Motor
Syndicate Limited for his various Daimler-related enterprises.
In June 1895, Simms and his friend Evelyn Ellis promoted
motor cars in the United Kingdom by bringing a Daimler-engined Panhard &
Levassor to England and in July it completed, without police intervention, the
first British long-distance motorcar journey from Southampton to Malvern.
Simms' documented plans to manufacture Daimler motors and
Daimler Motor Carriages (in Cheltenham) were taken over, together with his
company and its Daimler licences, by London company-promoter H J Lawson. Lawson
contracted to buy The Daimler Motor Syndicate Limited and all its rights and on
14 January 1896 formed and in February successfully floated in London The
Daimler Motor Company Limited. It then purchased from a friend of Lawson a
disused cotton mill in Coventry for car engine and chassis manufacture where,
it is claimed, the UK's first serial production car was made.
The claim for the first all-British motor car is contested,
but George Lanchester's first cars of 1895 and 1896 did include French and
German components. In 1891 Richard Stephens, a mining engineer from South
Wales, returned from a commission in Michigan to establish a bicycle works in
Clevedon, Somerset. Whilst in the United States, he had seen the developments
in motive power and by 1897 he had produced his first car. This was entirely of
his own design and manufacture, including the two-cylinder engine, apart from
the wheels which he bought from Starley in Coventry. This was probably the
first all-British car and Stephens set up a production line, manufacturing in
all, twelve vehicles, including four- and six-seater cars and hackneys, and
nine-seater buses.
Early motor vehicle development in the UK had been effectively
stopped by a series of Locomotive Acts introduced during the 19th century which
severely restricted the use of mechanically propelled vehicles on the public
highways. Following intense advocacy by motor vehicle enthusiasts, including
Harry J. Lawson of Daimler, the worst restrictions of these acts, (the need for
each vehicle to be accompanied by a crew of three, and a 2 mph (3.2 km/h) speed
limit in towns), was lifted by the Locomotives on Highways Act 1896. Under this
regulation, light locomotives (those vehicles under 3 tons unladen weight) were
exempt from the previous restrictions, and a higher speed limit – 14 mph (23
km/h) was set for them. To celebrate the new freedoms Lawson organised the
Emancipation Run held on 14 November 1896, the day the new Act came into force.
This occasion has been commemorated since 1927 by the annual London to Brighton
Veteran Car Run.
1900 to 1939
The Rolls-Royce 10 hp, which was the first car to be
produced as a result of the agreement between Charles Rolls and Henry Royce.
The early British vehicles of the late-nineteenth century
relied mainly upon developments from Germany and France. By 1900 however, the
first all-British 4-wheel car had been designed and built by Herbert Austin as
manager of The Wolseley Sheep Shearing Machine Company. In 1901, backed by
(Vickers Limited) brothers 'Colonel Tom' and Albert Vickers, Austin started
what became Wolseley Motors in Birmingham and was the UK's largest car
manufacturer until Ford overtook them in 1913.
The great bulk of the pioneering car producers, many of them
from the bicycle industry, got off to a shaky start. Of the 200 British makes
of car that had been launched up until 1913, only about 100 of the firms were
still in existence. In 1910, UK vehicle production was 14,000 units. By 1913,
Henry Ford had built a new factory in Manchester and was the leading UK
carmaker, building 7,310 cars that year, followed by Wolseley at 3,000, Humber
(making cars since 1898 in Coventry) at 2,500, Rover (Coventry car maker since
1904) at 1,800 and Sunbeam (producing cars since 1901) at 1,700, with the
plethora of smaller producers bringing the 1913 total up to about 16,000
vehicles. Car production virtually came to an end during the war years
1914–1918, although the requirements of war production led to the development
of new mass-production techniques in the motor industry.
By 1922, there were 183 motor companies in the UK, and by
1929, following the slump years, there were 58 companies remaining. In 1929,
production was dominated by Morris (founded by William Morris in 1910 in
Oxford) and Austin (founded by Herbert Austin in Birmingham in 1905 after he
left Wolseley) which between them produced around 60% of total UK output.
Singer (Coventry motorcycle manufacturer started building cars in 1905)
followed in third place that year with 15% of production.
In 1932, the UK overtook France to become Europe's largest
car producer (a position which it retained until 1955). In 1937, the UK
produced 379,310 passenger cars and 113,946 commercial vehicles. To celebrate
the granting of his peerage, William Morris upon becoming Viscount Nuffield,
reorganised his motor vehicle companies in 1938, which by then included not
only Morris Motors and MG, but also Wolseley and Riley (bicycle company founded
in Coventry in 1890 and making cars since 1913), into the Nuffield
Organization. In 1939, the top producers were Morris: 27%, Austin: 24%, Ford:
15%, Standard (founded in Coventry in 1903): 13%, Rootes (which had acquired
Humber and Sunbeam): 11%, Vauxhall (building cars since 1903, acquired by GM in
1925): 10%.
1939 to 1955
During the Second World War, car production in the UK gave
way to commercial and military vehicle production, and many motor vehicle
plants were converted to aircraft and aero engine production. Following the
war, the UK Government had nationalised the steel industry; where priority was
given to supplying foreign-revenue-raising export businesses. In 1947, steel
was available only to businesses which exported at least 75% of their production.
This, coupled with the inevitably limited competition from continental Europe,
and with demand for new vehicles in America and in Australia being greater than
the American industry alone could supply, resulted in British vehicle exports
reaching record levels and the UK became the world's largest motor vehicle
exporter. In 1937, the UK provided 15% of world vehicle exports. By 1950, a
year in which 75% of British car production and 60% of its commercial vehicle
production was exported, the UK provided 52% of the world's exported vehicles.
This situation remained until the mid-1950s, by which time
the American industry production had caught up with American demand, and
European production was recovering. By 1952, the American-owned producers in
the UK (Ford and GM's Vauxhall) had between them a 29% share of the British
market, which exceeded the share of either of the UK's two top domestically
owned manufacturers. It was in that context that Viscount Nuffield agreed to
the merger of his company, the Nuffield Organization, with Austin, to form the
British Motor Corporation (BMC). Thus BMC, comprising Austin, Morris, MG, Riley
and Wolseley was formed in 1952 and commanded a 40% share of the British
market. German production was increasing yearly, and by 1953 it had exceeded
that of France, and by 1956 it had overtaken that of the UK.
1955 to 1968
By 1955 five companies produced 90% of the UK's motor
vehicle output: BMC, Ford, Rootes, Standard-Triumph and Vauxhall. Of the dozen
or so smaller producers Rover and Jaguar were strong niche producers. By 1960
the UK had dropped from being the world's second largest motor vehicle producer
into third place. Labour-intensive methods, and wide model ranges hindered
opportunities to reduce manufacturing costs – the UK's unit costs were higher
than those of their major Japanese, European and American competitors. Although
rationalisation of motor vehicle companies had started, full integration did
not occur. BMC continued to produce vehicles under the marque names of its incorporated
companies, many of which competed with each other. Standard-Triumph's attempts
to reduce costs by embracing a modern volume production strategy almost led to
their bankruptcy in 1960, the result was that they were purchased by the
commercial vehicle manufacturing company Leyland Motors. In 1966, BMC and
Jaguar came together, to form British Motor Holdings (BMH). Leyland had
achieved some sales success with Leyland-Triumph and in 1967 it acquired Rover.
By 1966 the UK had slipped to become the world's fourth largest motor vehicle
producer. Following a gradual process which had begun in 1964, Chrysler UK
(CUK) had fully acquired Rootes by 1967.
In the context of BMC's wide, complex, and
expensive-to-produce model range, Ford's conventionally designed Cortina
challenging for the number one spot in the domestic market, and the heavy
reliance of the British economy on motor vehicle production, in 1968 the
Government brokered the merger of the successful Leyland-Triumph-Rover and the
struggling BMH, to form Europe's fourth-largest car maker, the British Leyland
Motor Corporation (BLMC). The new company announced its intention to invest in
a new volume car range, and to equip its factories with the latest
capital-intensive production methods.
BMC's Mini, designed by Alec Issigonis, had revolutionized
the small car market in 1959, and the car remained among the UK's best selling
cars for more than 20 years after its launch, the last version finally rolling
off the production line on 4 October 2000 after a run of 41 years. The Rootes
Group launched the similar-sized Hillman Imp four years later, but by the end
of the 1960s Ford and Vauxhall had yet to launch a comparable product, and even
with foreign imports slowly starting to gain ground on the British market,
Italy's Fiat 500 was one of the few comparable alternatives to the virtual
monopoly of the Mini and Hillman Imp in this sector of the market.
Also designed by Alec Issigonis was the Morris Minor, which
was heavily updated in 1956 having originally gone into production in 1948. It
earned a reputation for low running costs, good reliability and competitive
pricing, and continued to sell well throughout the 1960s in spite of the
popularity of BMC's 1100/1300 range which was launched in 1962, The Morris
Minor was also the first British car to reach one million in production in 1961
with this record number reached a special model of the Morris Minor was created
and sent to all of the main dealerships under the name "Morris
Million".
Ford's competitor in this sector was the Anglia, which
featured unconventional styling but was still one of the country's most
successful cars from its launch in 1959 up to the end of production in 1967,
after which it was replaced by the Escort. Other British competitors in this
sector were the Vauxhall Viva and Hillman Minx.
Larger family cars enjoyed strong sales in the 1960s, namely
the Ford Cortina (launched in 1962), Austin/Morris 1800 (1964) and Vauxhall
Victor (1957). Later in the 1960s, the Rootes Group launched a new competitor
in this growing sector of the market - the Hillman Hunter.
The Rover P6, launched in 1963 and the first winner of the
European Car of the Year award, was arguably the most popular luxury model in
the UK during the 1960s.
The iconic Jaguar E-Type sports car, designed by Malcolm
Sayer, with a top speed of 145 miles per hour (233 km/h) and the choice of a
coupe or roadster bodystyle, was launched in 1961 and would remain in
production until 1975. Cheaper sports cars also enjoyed strong sales during the
1960s, including the MG B and Triumph Spitfire which were launched in the early
part of the decade, and the Ford Capri which was launched just before the
decade's end.
The 1960s saw a slow but sure increase in the popularity of
foreign cars on the British market. Volkswagen of West Germany had imported the
iconic Beetle to Britain since 1953; this car was first launched in 1937 as a
"people's car" for the German market under the Nazi regime. Its
arrival on the UK market less than a decade after the end of World War II was
met with hostility, with many examples being vandalised soon after being
distributed, but it quickly became popular, with nearly 10,000 being sold in
1959. Volkswagen also began importing examples of its people carrier and van models,
and by 1963 had sold 100,000 cars in Britain. Renault of France had actually
built UK market versions of its cars at a site in Acton, West London, from 1902
until 1962, but its popularity actually increased after the end of UK
production, helped by the arrival of the Renault 4 minicar in 1961 and the
world's first production hatchback model, the Renault 16, in 1965. By the end
of the decade, it had launched a smaller hatchback model, the Renault 6, and a
mid-range saloon, the Renault 12, and was continuing to grow in popularity.
Renault's French rival Peugeot also enjoyed success in the 1960s with its 404
saloon and even more so with its successor, the 504, which was launched in
1968. This set the scene for even more sales for foreign carmakers on the UK
market during the next two decades, as their market share continued to grow.
Japanese cars also started to appear on the UK market during the 1960s, although they were a rare on British roads until exploding in popularity during the early 1970s. The Daihatsu Compagno was the first Japanese car to be sold in Britain when imports began during 1964. This car was not popular with British buyers and was withdrawn from sale within a few years, although Daihatsu would return to the UK market in the early 1980s. A year later, Toyota became the second Japanese carmaker to import cars to Britain. It was followed shortly afterwards by Nissan (which used the Datsun brand for the UK market) and Mazda. Honda was also enjoying great success on the motorcycle market by this stage, although it didn't start importing passenger cars to the UK until 1972.
1968 to 1987
By 1968, UK motor vehicle production was dominated by four
companies: BLMC, Chrysler (UK), Ford, and Vauxhall (GM). The Rootes Group had
taken on the name Chrysler UK after its takeover by the American car giant
Chrysler, which had also taken over French carmaker Simca.
The national champion, BLMC (British Leyland from 1968), was
handicapped in its attempts to modernise by internal rivalries. Unattractive
new products (particularly the Austin Allegro and Morris Marina) which were
widely criticised by the motoring press, retention of legacy marques and
models, labour disputes, quality issues, supplier problems and inefficient use
of new equipment thwarted the dream of efficient high volume production.
Increased overseas competition and high unit costs led to lowered profits,
which in turn jeopardised investment plans. Although the cars continued to sell
well in Britain, they were less popular on overseas markets. As well as that,
the company often produced several cars to compete in the same market sector.
For instance, it produced four competitors for the Ford Cortina at the same
time - the Morris Marina, Austin Maxi, Triumph Dolomite and the Princess.
Japanese cars, particularly the Datsun badged cars built by
Nissan enjoyed a strong surge in popularity during the first half of the 1970s,
while French carmaker Renault and West German carmaker Volkswagen also enjoyed
an upturn on the British market, helped by the arrival of well-received new
cars, particularly the Renault 5 in 1972 and the Volkswagen Golf in 1974.
The fortunes of foreign carmakers on the British market were
also assisted by the fact that most British manufacturers adopted the hatchback
bodystyle, mostly featuring front-wheel drive, considerably later than their
continental rivals. For instance, the arrival of the front-wheel drive
Volkswagen Golf hatchback in 1974 came four years before any of the four
British-based carmakers had launched an equivalent car. By the time the first
small British-built hatchback, the Vauxhall Chevette, was launched in 1975, the
French Renault 5 had already been in production for three years. However,
British Leyland's larger Austin Maxi had been sold with a hatchback and front-wheel
drive since its 1969 launch, although it sold similar-sized cars like the
Morris Marina and Triumph Dolomite alongside it as a rear-wheel drive saloon
alternative, with the Dolomite being sold further upmarket than the Marina. For
buyers wanting six-cylinder and larger four-cylinder engines, the Princess was
launched in 1975. Chrysler launched the Alpine for this market sector in 1975,
featuring front wheel drive and a hatchback, but kept the Hunter in production
alongside it until 1979 for buyers who still preferred rear-wheel drive and a
saloon or estate bodystyle.
At the luxury end of the market, British Leyland was
actually one of the first manufacturers in the world to put a hatchback on an
upmarket car when it launched the Rover SD1 in 1976. This car signalled the
beginning of rationalisation at British Leyland, with the SD1 replacing two
model ranges - the Rover P6 and Triumph 2000/2500.
The popularity of Nissan's range of Datsun-badged cars in
the 1970s was largely down to their low prices, cheap running costs, good
equipment levels and a reputation for better reliability than most British
cars, although these cars also went on to gain a reputation for being prone to
rust.
BLMC's share of the UK market dropped from 40% to 32%
between 1971 and 1973, with its new Morris Marina and Austin Allegro family
cars selling well on the British market but not proving popular on many export
markets, with the motoring media being critical of the styling of these new
models as well as questions regarding the level of quality.
By 1974, the UK's position as a world motor vehicle
manufacturer had dropped to sixth place. In 1974, both BLMC and Chrysler UK
appealed to the UK Government for financial help. The Government rejected the
idea of a merger between the two companies, and instead Chrysler UK received a
loan and BLMC was subjected to a series of studies to determine its future. The
Government's official BLMC enquiry, led by Lord Ryder, suggested that BLMC's
strategy was sound, but required huge state investment to improve productivity
by providing mechanisation and improving labour relations.
Despite the effective nationalisation of BLMC as British
Leyland (BL) in 1975, the recovery never happened. Chrysler sold its European
interests (including those in the UK) to Peugeot in 1978, to allow it to
concentrate on its own difficulties in the United States. The UK interests were
renamed Peugeot-Talbot, with production of the Chrysler-developed cars
continuing, with the last Rootes-developed car, the Avenger, being discontinued
in 1981. Peugeot also developed a saloon version of the Alpine called the
Solara, and also launched the larger Tagora, which had been in development by
Chrysler when it sold its European operations. It also replaced the entry-level
Sunbeam with the Peugeot based Samba in 1981.
As in most other developed countries, the 1970s saw major
changes to the cars produced in the UK. Front-wheel drive, which had been
pioneered by BMC on several new models between 1959 and 1965, now became a
common feature on family cars after decades of producing only rear-wheel drive
models. The hatchback bodystyle, which had debuted in Europe on the French
Renault 16 in 1965, became more popular, with many of Britain's best-selling
cars being available with a hatchback by the early-1980s.
Many Ford and Vauxhall models were also being produced at
their parent company's continental factories by 1980. Ford had switched Capri
and Granada production to Germany by this stage, while production of its new
Fiesta supermini was divided between Britain, West Germany and a new plant in
Spain from its 1976 launch. General Motors had not only decided to make its
Vauxhall and Opel badged cars mechanically identical during the 1970s, but it
had also imported some of its Vauxhall-badged cars from Opel factories in West
Germany and Belgium, and its Corsa supermini (Vauxhall Nova in the UK) was
solely assembled at a factory in Zaragoza, Spain, which opened in 1982. British
Leyland's overseas outposts in countries like Italy (where cars were produced
under the Innocenti brand) were gradually closed down or sold to other
carmakers, so by the 1980s; it was entirely a British-based operation.
By the end of the 1970s, Ford, Peugeot-Talbot and Vauxhall
(GM) were well-integrated with their parent companies' other European
operations. BL stood alone in the UK as an increasingly junior player. As part
of the drive for increased productivity in the late-1970s, BL reduced its
workforce and number of plants, and strived to centralise its management activities.
The city of Coventry suffered particularly badly, with many thousands becoming
unemployed after the closure of the Triumph car factory in the city in 1980.
In 1979, BL struck a collaboration deal with Honda to share
the development and production of a new mid-sized car (Triumph Acclaim/Honda
Ballade), which was launched in 1981. The new car combined Honda engine and
transmission designs with a BL body, as did its successor model - the Rover 200
Series - in 1984. The next plan was to work on a new luxury car together, the
end product being the Rover 800 Series, which arrived in 1986.
Although UK politics changed in 1979 with the election of
the Conservative Party, the UK Government continued to support BL with funds
for the development of a new mass-market model range (Mini Metro, Maestro,
Montego and another Honda collaboration the Rover 800), which were all launched
between 1980 and 1986. The Metro was the most successful of these cars.
By the mid-1980s, front-wheel drive was now the standard on
mass market cars, with most new models having a hatchback bodystyle as at least
an option. Although Ford had adopted front-wheel drive for its new Spanish
built Fiesta supermini in 1976 and the third generation Escort in 1980, it had
curiously retained rear-wheel drive for its larger Sierra (the Cortina
replacement) in 1982, although the Sierra did feature a hatchback bodystyle and
was not available as a saloon until 1987. In 1983, it recognised the continuing
demand for smaller and medium-sized family saloons by introducing the Orion,
which was based on the Escort floorpan.
The supermini sector had expanded rapidly since the
early-1970s. BMC's Mini had remained popular beyond its twentieth anniversary,
but successor organisation British Leyland had started work on a more modern
and practical alternative by the mid-1970s, the final result being the Austin
Metro in 1980 - the new car featured more modern styling and a hatchback
bodystyle. Chrysler Europe had axed the long-running Hillman Imp (launched by
the Rootes Group in 1963) in 1976 and replaced it with the Chrysler Sunbeam
hatchback a year later. General Motors had already adopted this bodystyle with
the Vauxhall Chevette (which was also available as a saloon or estate) and Ford
with the Fiesta. Comparable foreign products like the Fiat 127, Renault 5 and
Volkswagen Polo were also proving popular in the UK.
Ford had now divided its European operations between its
British factories and other European plants in Spain, Belgium and West Germany.
General Motors had started importing some of its West German and Belgian built
Opel products to the UK to be badged as Vauxhalls, and by 1983 its Nova
supermini (badged as the Opel Corsa on the continent) was built solely in its
Spanish factory. Peugeot was dividing production of most of the Talbot badged
vehicles between the Ryton plant near Coventry (the Linwood plant in Scotland
closed in 1981) and its French factories by the early-1980s, and started
producing its own models at Coventry in 1985 after deciding to axe the Talbot
marque due to falling sales.
Foreign carmakers continued to gain ground on the British
market during the 1980s, with the likes of Renault, Peugeot, Citroen (France),
Volvo (Sweden), Volkswagen (West Germany) and Fiat (Italy) proving particularly
popular.
The Russian-built Lada, first sold in the UK in 1974, also
sold well, despite its outdated Fiat-sourced design; with buyers mostly being
attracted by its low price. By the late-1980s, with the four-wheel drive Niva
and a front-wheel drive hatchback, the Samara, complementing the long-running
Riva, Lada sales in Britain had amounted to more than 30,000 a year (some 1.5%
of the new car market), but tailed off after 1990 as a result of growing
competition and a lack of new model launches. Imports to Britain finally ceased
in 1997 due to Lada's difficulties in meeting emissions requirements. Skoda
also enjoyed similarly decent sales of its well-priced rear-engined saloon cars
during the 1970s and 1980s, going from strength to strength in the 1990s
following its takeover by Volkswagen and the launch of new model ranges with
modern technology and styling. Zastava's Yugo-badged cars, based on Fiat
designs from the 1970s, also sold reasonably well in Britain during the 1980s,
but the carmaker was forced to halt imports in 1992 due to sanctions imposed on
Yugoslavia as a result of the civil war there. Polish carmaker FSO imported its
version of the Fiat 125 to Britain from 1975, later launching a hatchback model
(the Polonez) alongside it. However, by 1998, Skoda was the only Eastern
European carmaker still exporting cars to Britain, now competing with
budget-priced Asian cars from the likes of Daewoo, Kia, Hyundai and Proton.
Nissan had axed the Datsun brand by 1984 and used its own
name on all cars, and in 1986 opened a factory in Britain near Sunderland,
which produced the mid-range Bluebird hatchbacks and saloons, although it was
the Japanese-built Micra which was the company's best-selling car in Britain
during the 1980s.
The decade also saw the arrival of purpose-built people
carriers on the British market, starting with the Japanese Mitsubishi Space
Wagon in 1984, and then the market-leading Renault Espace in 1985, but by the
end of the decade this type of vehicle still had only a very small share of the
British market and there were still no British-built people carriers available,
although a few seven-seater estate models including Austin Rover's Montego were
being produced.
The decade also saw a fall in demand for sports cars,
perhaps due to the rising popularity of "hot hatchbacks" (high
performance versions of hatchback cars), and so a number of manufacturers
pulled out of the sports car market. British Leyland finished production of its
MG and Triumph sports cars early in the decade, with no replacement. General
Motors had launched coupe versions of its Cavalier mid-range model in the
1970s, but did not produce any equivalent models of the MK2 Cavalier which
arrived in 1981. It did, however, continue to offer the German-built Opel Manta
to British buyers until the end of production in 1988, replacing it with the
Calibra (also built in Germany) a year later. Ford had enjoyed success in the
1970s with its Capri coupe, but this declined in popularity after 1980 and when
production ended in 1986, there was no direct replacement.
As well as the rebranding of the former Rootes Group and its
eventual integration into Peugeot, the 1980s also saw the disappearance of
several long-established car brands. Production of MG sports cars finished when
the Abingdon factory closed in 1980, although the brand was quickly revived on
higher performance versions of the Metro, Maestro and Montego. 1980 also saw
the closure of the Triumph factory at Canley, Coventry, although the marque
survived until 1984 - the same year that the Morris marque was discontinued
after more than seventy years. The Morris Ital's successor, the Montego, was
sold under the Austin and MG brands, while the Triumph Acclaim's successor was
sold as the Rover 200 Series. By 1988, however, the Austin marque had also been
phased out, with the former Austin-badged products now being incorporated into
the Rover brand.
General Motors enjoyed an upturn in Britain during the
1980s, as its Vauxhall-badged cars increased their market share and the
company's image also improved. At the beginning of 1980, it replaced the Viva
with a new front-wheel drive range of hatchback and estates - the Astra, which
was built in Britain and also in Opel factories on the continent. The MK2
Cavalier was launched in 1981, and became the company's best-selling car of the
decade. Its replacement for the Chevette was the Nova, a rebadged version of
the Spanish built Opel Corsa, which was launched in 1983. The MK2 Astra was
voted European Car of the Year shortly after its launch in 1984, as was the
flagship MK2 Carlton (Opel Omega on the continent) two years later.