Good for MG

Sir,

Although it is now a few years since the MG-C died prematurely, killed by those short-sighted people at British Leyland who got cold feet when they read all those illinformed “bad reports” in the motoring Press, I still read magazine articles that knock the old “C” as a disaster or a mongrel and other ill-chosen phrases. It is a pity that all the correspondence about the TR6 in Motor Sport didn’t come out a few years earlier; then British Leyland could have justifiably killed that off and kept the MG-C in production.

It is obvious from this that I am a “C” fan; but I do have plenty of experience of driving two of these cars, and have been entirely satisfied with them both. After the first “C”, I had a new TR6 and . . . well, enough said! Since that time I have been driving my second “C” for 30,000 miles in one year with no problems at all. It is entirely at home on either fast Continental and motorway journeys, town pottering or as a “work horse”. (With the roof down it makes an ideal pick-up truck, with plenty of power for “humping” heavy loads!)

The MG-C, as I know it, certainly is a much better car than the TR6; it is safer, faster, more economical and definitely much more reliable; all this and more I know from experience. Dare I go so far as to say that the “C” is the best MG ever made? And that includes the V8 barge with its cast-off Buick engine that commands a ridiculously high price for very little more (if anything?) and no fresh-air motoring!

As a second-hand buy, I would say that the MG-C offers probably the best possible value for money; with only a £500-odd pricetag on the average example these days, this is surely true. Where else would one find a 130 m.p.h., 30+ m.p.g. sports car with excellent handling qualities and good comfort with a big, unstressed engine that will go over 100.000 miles, and still give over 1,000 m.p.p. of oil, and needs no attention, save the usual servicing, to keep it in perfect running order.

I am sure that there are many other “C” owners who would agree with what I have said. If only British Leyland had shown confidence in a product well worthy of it, we would have had the MG-C with us today, and there would have been no need to invest in useless PI or V8 “Gimmick Wagons”.

Newquay R. S. Fuller