Maybe I’m getting old, maybe I’m going mad, but whatever it is I’m currently looking at Rovers with a real longing. I can’t drive past one that’s for sale without taking a much closer look.
The other day it was a 2001 Rover 25 parked in a garden on a main road with the obligatory and explanatory piece of cardboard in the side window. Usually that’s not a particularly good sign especially if the Magic Markings have been smudged by condensation. This one was different, it wasn’t a trader trying to make a few quid, but a genuine private 25 finished in green, plus it looked so damned pretty and clean. No shiny wax, tyre paint, or fresh fragrant trees, just a good honest small hatchback for so much less than £2000.
Not only that, but can Rover 800s be any cheaper? To be honest they should almost be at the giveaway stage by now, but the second generation Sterlings really are rather comprehensively equipped. Driving them is quite an average experience, but they are usefully narrow in these crowded times and provided you don’t plan on doing 30,000 miles a year in one, these are very relaxing models to smoke around in. The trick is to find the one or two owner examples being sold privately and desperately with history and bills and a blanket that goes over the bonnet when it is tucked up in the owner’s garage. Car dealers really don’t want to know about 800s and that is sensational news for us bargain hunters.
However, it is the coupe that gets most of my attention these days. With the right alloys on, Sterling and Turbo models mostly, it is such a handsome beast. Whilst the low mile private ones are still over £2000, this previously £30K new car that never even got the chance to fail in American market, really is a poor bloke’s Lexus Soarer. The traders who have them usually as unwanted part exchanges can’t wait to unload them for £1k or less. I would swap whatever I’m driving right now for one, cash either way, as they say. The leather and wood looks really good in them and I’m a sucker for chrome kick plates.
Of course all Rovers continue to have an image problem and not all of that is deserved. Now I didn’t buy Austin Rovers when they were new because all my relatives did. I drove them of course and they reeked of WD40 that the BL dealer had used to free up all the seized parts. However, I did go and buy British Leyland’s finest when they were very, very used. These sheds weren’t for me of course, but for a mate, who you might assume I didn’t like much. Actually he lived abroad and when back in Blighty needed some cheap wheels, so I obliged. Allegros, Princesses and Itals all went his way because at least they were cheap and easy to fix. The ones I hated I would resell to Billy the Scrapper to banger race them into oblivion. Right now though ’90s Rovers at the bottom of the pile are brilliant.
First generation Rover 200s and 400 saloons of course are magic, especially with the Honda 1.6 engine. They last absolutely forever and they also scrub up very nicely. Compare one to an early ‘90s Ford Escort with faded paint, distressed interior and rackety engine. By contrast a Rover is more like a Roller. Now every day I drive past a used car lot, which has recently gone up market. Instead of selling £200 shockers it is now in the sub £1000 class and leading the marketing push is a couple of 200s with £795 on them. That seemed a bit pricey to me, but there was history and tons of it, which almost made me think that I could run one for year and then find someone like me to buy it off me for £595, possibly.
Getting more contemporary though it is the late ‘90s Rovers and noughties MG-Rovers which are a very different kettle of fishy wonderment. I met someone the other day who was close to tears after selling their 75 and now spends every waking hour regretting their foolishness. Well, built, frugal and comfy, who could ask for more? Well, some sellers are because the word is getting out about how nice, and it must be remembered, how exclusive these are now becoming. BMW diesel engine, mad Ford V8s and elegant Tourers, what’s not to love?
The real trouble is that Rovers are driven almost exclusively by the most infuriating drivers on the planet who maintain an average speed at least 10mph below the legal limit, dawdle at junctions and roundabouts and generally drive without any urgency at all. They also wear trilby hats.
My cunning plan is to do none of the above. And remember, Rover doesn’t have to be the name of a dog.
Love your mad, bad, old Uncle James