The Family Car

[teamsaint]

If anyone owns a Volvo, please don't post a photo of it.

I lease one . They threw in a free harp on the deal. Can I post a piccie of either or both?

Carist.

[Bryn]

Over the year my father had a few somewhat unusual cars. One I have particularly fond memories of was of this type:



Note the little knob in the middle, behind the rear seat. The Goggomobile had no fuel guage. When the engine showed signs of fuel starvation, you turned the know to access the 0.7 gallon reserve tank.

[Beef Oven!]

I lease one . They threw in a free harp on the deal. Can I post a piccie of either or both?

Carist.

I guess you have a good practical reason for the Volvo. Post away!

P.S. didn't she sell it?

[teamsaint]

I guess you have a good practical reason for the Volvo. Post away!

P.S. didn't she sell it?

I lied. Sorry.

My old man had an armstrong siddley. Also a Fiat 500 van. Eclectic tastes, and we lived near a car auction place. Disastrous combination.

[french frank]

Still seems to be going - on current DVLA as 'Morris 918cc'. A Morris 8, n'est pas?

Yes, a Morris 8, I think Aggie was about 1935 vintage. I do remember that it had a starting handle (not that it was always needed), it had to be 'decoked' every so often, and double declutching was necessary. It was the car mother learned to drive on.

[Nick Armstrong]

an armstrong siddley

A Hamstrung Sidney! magic!

[mangerton]

Not my picture either. Father's first car was a Riley RMA 1952 vintage, complete with trafficators and a starting handle. I was nine when we got it, and soon learned how to crank it. It eased starting on cold winter mornings. We quickly discovered that owners of Riley RM series waved to each other as they passed on the road.

[mangerton]

A Hamstrung Sidney! magic!

I haven't heard that version of the name before. You may be interested to know that that Armstrong had fingers in all sorts of engineering pies, including Vickers-A and A-Whitworth. His house in Northumberland (Cragside, now a NT property) was the first to be lit by hydro electricity.

[gurnemanz]

Not my photo (I only have black and white 'snaps', and they're up in the roof space). It was my mother's car and we went on holiday to Devon (Shaldon, Dawlish and Dartmoor). If we came to a steepish hill the passengers often had to get out and push or it just gradually came to a halt. What do I mean "It"? Her name was Aggie.

We had one of them early 50s. There were six of us! Was there a four door version? I remember loving the running board. Aged four, I actually fell out of the moving car on Crystal Palace High Street - no child locks or seat belts. Not going too fast luckily. My father just stopped the car and picked me up.

[amateur51]

I was correct: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austin_A40_Farina

An A40 Farina Mark I, to be absolutely precise.

Farina? We'll have no floury language here I tell you,

[Serial_Apologist]

We had one of them early 50s. There were six of us! Was there a four door version? I remember loving the running board. Aged four, I actually fell out of the moving car on Crystal Palace High Street - no child locks or seat belts. Not going too fast luckily. My father just stopped the car and picked me up.

The Morris 10 was the 4-door, iirc.

[Stillhomewardbound]

... and then, in the McKenna household, came the Cortina years. The car seemed super modern and sportys at the time but to see it now I'm surprised how boxy it looks at the back. Bottom shot is your truly clearly impatient to get going.

This was a very nippy car and when Dad was home on one of his rare visits from London he would pile all his boys into the car and then drive us onto Sandymount Strand where the sea would recede for miles. Well, he'd put the pedal to the floor and have us splash through the shallows and for the piece de resistance he perform fantastic handbrake turns. We would be hysterical with laughter in the back of that car, but afterwards he always made sure to stop at a nearby and hose down the wheel arches, etc, to clean off the salt water and sand.

[Mary Chambers]

I'm afraid I can't show the photo, but this thread's an excuse to repeat one of my favourite family jokes. In the mid-1950s we had a Standard 10, which we took to France on the ferry. My father took a photo of it being hauled on board by a crane, and captioned it 'L'étandard sanglant est levé'.

In the 1940s we had a Ford 10. I can still remember the registration number.

[french frank]

I'm afraid I can't show the photo, but this thread's an excuse to repeat one of my favourite family jokes. In the mid-1950s we had a Standard 10, which we took to France on the ferry. My father took a photo of it being hauled on board by a crane, and captioned it 'L'étandard sanglant est levé'.

In the 1940s we had a Ford 10. I can still remember the registration number.

The Morris 8 was DPE 572 and father had a small Austin - JHY 825. These are the earliest family cars of my lifetime. I can't remember all the later ones (or even what they were) though I can remember some.

[anotherbob]

Over the year my father had a few somewhat unusual cars. One I have particularly fond memories of was of this type:



Not the little knob in the middle, behind the rear seat. The Goggomobile had no fuel guage. When the engine showed signs of fuel starvation, you turned the know to access the 0.7 gallon reserve tank.

Another Goggomobil owner. An owners club of two.
My Goggo was not strictly a "family" car since I owned it in the days before I had a family. The one in the picture isn't mine, I didn't take any pix of it since I wasn't all that keen at the time to be associated with a two-stroke micro-car. Mine was a 1958 Mayfair TS400 Coupe like the one in the picture except mine wasn't two-tone.



I took it in part exchange for the car in the next picture which I was only too happy to be associated with. An Abarth 750 GT Zagato which I had to sell to finance other things.



The sums of money involved will give a clue to how long ago the deal was done. The price of the Abarth was £275 and I allowed the buyer £15 on the Goggomobil.