The SD1 of motoring journalist Keith Adams My very first memory, earlier even than family events such as holidays and birthdays, is of my father's old SD1 Vanden Plas. A V8 automatic Series 2 in Moonraker metallic, it imprinted itself firmly upon first my young retinas and later my developing mind. I am sure that this car is responsible for my love not only of British Leyland, but of cars in general. Since these memories, maybe from the age of four, I have longed to drive an SD1 V8. And I didn't think my chance would come until I was at an age when I could insure one.
I tried doing so. On the Skelton 'Cars I talked of Buying' list there is an SD1. A Vanden Plas EFi that was being sold locally by a friend. I was close to enquiring before I got an insurance quotation. Suffice it to say I was quoted miserable. So I thought that losing my SD1 virginity would have to wait - that or I'd have to start with a little engined car. However, I'd reckoned without Keith Adams.
Keith is, as I'm sure readers of the site know, a huge British Leyland fan, who has recently had his V8 Series 1 restored in Poland. He's also a generous and big hearted chap, who knew of my reasons for loving SD1s. I was discussing SD1s with him last year, and he commented "Play your cards right, and you can have a go in mine when it comes back." And so it was that on the 17th of April 2010 I found myself behind the wheel of a V8 Rover, about to realise the ambition of some thirteen and a half years.
The first thing to strike me as I entered was that it's a wide car. A very wide car. My mother had commented that upon passing her test and getting straight into an SD1 2300, it felt like an airliner - such was the feeling of width in the cabin. I mocked her when she first told me, but she wasn't far off the mark - the handbrake was a fair way over to my left, as was the gearstick. I turned the key, and felt a slight shiver down my spine as the big Buick V8 burbled into life. In gear, and off we went.
So what's it like? I'd append 'on the road' but I was in a field. Well, first impressions were favourable. Looking down the creased and sculptured bonnet, which I had long admired from all angles but this, I felt that the SD1 disproved the old adage that one should never meet one's heroes - very much my kind of car. Big, quite lazy, yet with the feeling that had I put my foot down it would have gone like a scalded cat. The steering was assisted to the point of feeling easy, yet retaining plenty of feel - and I also relished my first go with a quartic wheel. There was only really one fly in the ointment - Keith mentioned that there was a screeching fan bearing, which seemed at it's worst when letting in the clutch. Having not driven a manual any great distance since passing my driving test (I'm a convert to the lazy life), there was the constant nagging question in the back of my head - was the noise my lack of competence or the bearing?
Pulling back up beside Keith, I switched off the rumbling V8, and emerged from the Pendelican powerhouse a far happier man. As I shook his hand, I thanked him for helping me realise an almost lifelong dream. Would I have one? As a hobby car, of course I would. Like a shot. But as a daily, I don't think I could. I'd forever be hoping that tomorrow wasn't to be the day that the V8 rumble became somehow ordinary, or the day upon which I stopped feeling childishly thrilled at the thought I had my own SD1. Given the fond memories I associate with them, I'd rather the magic remained.
But don't let that stop you.
No comments:
Post a Comment