Ok so I am trying to come up with a list of British and French old odd ball cars that might be available for cheap in crap condition.
Rules: Nothing "common" so no Brit sports cars (aka MGB, Spridget, or TRs) or Minis.
Must have been sold in the US
Or it can be British based like the Plymouth Cricket
Also not microcars.
Examples: MG 1300, Standard 10, MG Magnette/
And go!
Edit: Also Eastern Bloc cars would be awesome.
Renault Dauphine
Peugeot 504
Austin Marina
Triumph 20000 sedan
Sunbeam Arrow
Rover SD1
the trick is finding one
Singer Gazelle...................there's one for sale on the Detroit Craigslist.
Just saw a 504 yesterday, but for my money I'd take a 505 turbo diesel.
LeCar?
I doubt there are any fuegos left.. the europa guys like them for the engines
Renault 8
Renault 10
Basket case 4CV's pop up from time to time
A Sunbeam Arrow would be an awesome find
I will take mine in wagon guise
the french definatly make some fugly cars... but I would take a 4cv
The reasoning behind is I want a old odd British or French car to do the trifeca of crap in and if I have a long list and plenty of time to look for the car (I am trying to find it by the end of this year), I can probably find something I like.
I would love to have a Matra Murino in the 2.2 version. Very good looking, about 2200 lbs., mid engine, 3 seater,
galvanized chassis, very affordable. How cool is that?
Would hate to see somebody trash it, though.
depends on what you want to drop.... Old Morgans might be cheap depending on condition... and a Morgan trike is one of the oddest
Hal
Dork
1/19/12 9:52 p.m.
ditchdigger wrote:
Basket case 4CV's pop up from time to time
Would love to have one of those again. My parents bought me on for my first car in 1959
Speaking of crap British cars...you MUST include the Marina. (I can't remember which brand it was sold under in the U.S. Austin or MG). Tho, I guess it's not really odd, per se, just one of the few cars sold in the '70s with lever shocks. They weren't all that popular in the U.K. and are even harder to find (much less in running condition) in the U.S.
The Eagle Premier is sort of oddball. It was a French car sold by Renault, Eagle, and Dodge.
Renault Alliance / Encore "twins". One of these usually winds up on E-bay every now and again and while the Alliance isn't all that odd, the hatchback Encore is so oddball even the French weren't all that crazy about them when they were new.
Finally, as you can sometimes see in the $200X Classifieds section: any old Vauxhall(sp?). Tiny engines, and styling that mimics '50s Chevys...what's not to like?
The Marina was sold as an Austin in North America. They are quite like a re-bodied Morris Minor with (mostly) a MG B B-series engine (there are some 1275 A-series powered ones but never seen one in North America). This one was around locally a while back. Would you believe almost 300K miles on it? Note the Icelert sensor.
ArthurDent wrote:
The Marina was sold as an Austin in North America. They are quite like a re-bodied Morris Minor with (mostly) a MG B B-series engine (there are some 1275 A-series powered ones but never seen one in North America). This one was around locally a while back. Would you believe almost 300K miles on it? Note the Icelert sensor.
Funny, I was just going to mention the Marina. By the way, our friend Skip knows everything about them: http://www.austinmarina.com/
Need rear chunk brought to Rolex