Were these 1970s and 1980s cars really so bad?

I have a friend called Richard Bremner. You may know the name because he was a long-time staffer and former editor of Car magazine and is a current contributor to Autocar and others. When I say he is a man with a car collection like no other, I say so in complete confidence of not being contradicted. And not because they’re the most expensive, rare or fastest cars on earth. But, as a private collection of road-legal production cars, none could be more eclectic.

“I could scarcely believe how much fun the Austin 1300 GT was”

Who else other than Richard would have an Austin 1300 GT and a C3 Corvette living under the same roof? A Rover 75 and a Chevrolet Corvair? An Alpine A110 and a talking-dash Maestro? A BMW 650i and Rover 75 Connoisseur? No one.

When I get to drive them, I’m always surprised by how good they are. I really shouldn’t be surprised at all because when it comes to cars his knowledge and understanding of certain kinds of cars – curios from America, Great Britain and Italy in particular – is on a level unapproached by any other I know. And the cars that interest him most tend to be those who talents went most unappreciated at the time. Which is one more reason I enjoy visiting him so much.

This time around I drove only five, which I doubt is a third of the collection but it was fascinating as ever. The Austin 1300 GT, for instance, a car I’d hitherto considered with either a touch of derision, or not at all. I could scarcely believe how much fun it was, how fast and how well it handled. When I got back I said to Richard that it felt like a five-door Mini Cooper S which didn’t surprise him at all, because that’s essentially what it is.

Next up came the Maestro – all 1.6 litres of it. It was spacious, quiet, conspicuously comfortable and if you just lifted the handbrake a notch or two while driving you would indeed be gently chided by an electronic voice emanating from somewhere behind the dash. It was lovely.

Then came the Rover 75 and because this is actually my era I knew already what a criminally underrated car it was. But its case was forever undermined by BMW boss Bernd Pischetsrieder using the occasion of its global unveiling to launch a blistering attack on Rover and its many and various shortcomings. And it does have a very old man interior. But the 2.5-litre KV6 engine is strong, sharp and smooth, the ride quality exceptional, the handling a delight and the interior a well-appointed, nicely constructed place in which to while away the time. It’s a tragedy it was never allowed to perform the transformative role for Rover of which it was clearly capable.

After that I was into his ‘XJ40’ Jaguar XJ6 dating from, I think, 1989. Richard is the first to point out it’s the wrong car, saddled with the gutless 2.9-litre, single-cam version of the AJ6 engine and I must admit I was astonished by how slow it was, but the comfort levels are staggering and remind you how much has been lost in these days of stiff springing and liquorice-thin sidewalls. I reckon you’d need to buy a Rolls-Royce Phantom before you found a new car that rode materially better than this one.

And so to the ’Vette. The C3 is longest lived of all Corvettes, staying in production fully 15 years from 1967-82. It’s another car I’ve looked at slightly askance but Richard’s is no normal C3, but the much sought-after tiny numbers LT-1, which came with a high compression engine with a hot cam, solid lifters, forged crank and rods, while the car also gained a Muncie rock-crusher manual gearbox and a limited slip differential. It was claimed to have 370bhp, but as this was a gross figure, it was probably less than 300bhp in real terms. But in a car weighing around a tonne and a half, the thing flies, borne along on a deep rolling wave of torque, sounding as incredible as it looks and urging you ever onward. Steering aside, it even handled a bit too.

So thank you Richard, for trusting me with all your toys. Just need to see the Corvair next time and I shall consider my motoring education complete.

I had hoped in this issue to bring you a review of the RML GT Hypercar (or GTH), a massively modified Porsche 911 Turbo S with 920bhp, all new suspension, a gorgeous carbon-fibre body reminiscent of those fitted to the Porsche GT1 Le Mans cars of the late 1990s complete with deployable aero upgrades developing nearly a tonne of downforce. The idea behind it is to create a beautiful car that’s even more comfortable than a Turbo S, yet which will lap any given circuit as fast as, if not faster, than any other road car.

Sadly the weather had other ideas, not helped by the car being on Michelin Cup 2 tyres designed for warm, dry tracks, not wet, cold roads. All I managed to achieve in the end was to scare the poor engineer who’d been unlucky enough to accompany me on my drive after which I gave it up as a bad job. From what I can tell the car has enormous potential and knowing RML’s Michael Mallock and his dad Ray who founded the company (and still racing at 74), I have every confidence it will hit its marks, but without any form of proper assessment being possible, I cannot report for sure. But, as someone once says, them’s the breaks. Another time, I hope.

Don’t spare the horses
Audi’s quick, 2.5-litre RS 3 sounds glorious
It’s been years since I last enjoyed driving a five-cylinder Audi as much as this RS 3. You know what we always say about fast Audis? How they’re rapid but uninvolving. This one isn’t. With almost 400bhp it’s quick. The problem? It costs more than £60,000. But if that doesn’t scare you off…
Verdict: Poised, balanced and responsive.

All change at BMW
It’s a whole new era for the company
I’d not normally be drawing your attention to a mid-sized electric SUV, but this BMW is different. What’s important is not so much the car, but what it represents. This is the next chapter: new architecture and new design language (thank goodness). I like the look of it.

Longbow to hit the target 
Why we should take the Brit maker seriously
A new British EV sports car is arriving in ’26. The Longbow Speedster, above, will hit 62mph in 3.5sec and cost £84,995. It will be followed by the Roadster, 0-62mph in 3.8sec and cost £64,995. Ex-McLaren Automotive CEO Mike Flewitt, ex-Alpine CEO Michael van der Sande and ex-Lotus CEO Dan Balmer sit on the advisory board.