I thought that was an interesting discussion got underway by Rich (Erik the Viking) in the Welcome category.
Many of you may know that neither of my P6's are very standard! One is a 4.6 with ZF 4Spd Auto built with many quirks from a NADA shell. The other is an S1, again with the 4Spd ZF.
So how do I sleep at night knowing I've ruined the originality of my cars?
I think there are a few categories of non originality!
The first relates to things that Rover definitely got wrong and need putting right to make the car properly usable. In this category I'd include things like needing an electric fuel pump to cope with fuel starvation/vapourisation; needing the high capacity oil pump and duplex primary drive; needing the later lip type crankshaft seals; needing a somewhat pokier alternator. Also, if I was looking at a car to buy I'd expect to find a reasonably recent inner sill/rear wheelarch etc rebuild. Arguably you could include a much higher quality paint job than Rover provided!
Any car that didn't have these non original features I would either not buy or mark down heavily on price!!!
Then there is the category of upspeccing an otherwise original car - like Dave Pilkington describes for his. The car finishes up in a condition where it could have left the factory like that.
Fianally there is the category of true variations from original spec. My cars definitely fall into this one!
You must remember that development of the car was pretty well complete by 1967. All subsequent upgrades were already engineered and ready to go by this point (with the sole exception of the 2.2 engine and the S2 bonnet), albeit many not yet launched. Even the NADA 3500S aka prototype S2 was ready in the wings to be launched a year later.
An awful lot of water has gone under the bridge since then and a lot of it relates to the normal driving environment. For instance, motorways were pretty rare then and the normal driving environment was A roads where high speeds were only breifly attained. So today we really notice how undergeared the cars are and how much front end lift they generate at speed where these problems weren't too evident at the time. So today it is entirely sensible to want to fit a 5 speed SD1 or 4 speed ZF gearbox to get an overdrive top. Likewise the Police undertray spoilers become a must have accessory. And continuous high speed use exposes the inadeqauacy of the standard radiator and lack of a sepaprate reservoir.
There are other issues that are more cosmetic. Rear seat belts and side impact bars (available on the NADA's) are a must for passive safety. I personally think it is folly to drive on a UK motorway without a 3rd high level stop lamp and fog warning lamp. I get very nervous in towns that the P6's front and rear lamp clusters don't give the level of side visibility to the turn indicators that is normal today. So I want side repeators as well.
More technically, tyre design has moved on since '67 an radials are available in lower profiles and with stiffer side walls. So the suspension geometry is no longer as suited to the tyres as it was then. Cue a few roll bars and a bit of negative camber.
Nobody had vented discs in '67, but its easy to achieve now and fits the Rover ethos of massive competence in braking.
Rover were never very good at carburettors/inlet manifolds/camshaft profiles/valving and porting. It seems entierly reasonable to me to 2nd guess where Rover might have gone if development had continued.
The key criteria I apply in this stimulating and expensive area is that the final result should bear scrutiny as what Rover would have done had they had 20/20 hindsight. I'm pretty comfortable with my cars in that respect. If you aren't an expert in the breed I reckon you'd be pretty hard put to it to identify what is Rover and what is my subsequent mods.
So where does that leave value?
For me a truly original car gets heavily marked down on value. An intelligently repaired car with the main gremlins sorted gets marked up on value. A sensibly upspecced car is neutral. One like mine that has had a bit more development - well it depends on your personal taste!
I reckon that assessment is significantly at odds with the normal way classic cars are valued - with originality prized above everything else. And I think that is quite clearly the wrong approach!
Of course the real problem with P6's is that they are far too cheap, so this is largely an academic discussion until more people start to realise what fabulous cars they are!!
Chris
Many of you may know that neither of my P6's are very standard! One is a 4.6 with ZF 4Spd Auto built with many quirks from a NADA shell. The other is an S1, again with the 4Spd ZF.
So how do I sleep at night knowing I've ruined the originality of my cars?
I think there are a few categories of non originality!
The first relates to things that Rover definitely got wrong and need putting right to make the car properly usable. In this category I'd include things like needing an electric fuel pump to cope with fuel starvation/vapourisation; needing the high capacity oil pump and duplex primary drive; needing the later lip type crankshaft seals; needing a somewhat pokier alternator. Also, if I was looking at a car to buy I'd expect to find a reasonably recent inner sill/rear wheelarch etc rebuild. Arguably you could include a much higher quality paint job than Rover provided!
Any car that didn't have these non original features I would either not buy or mark down heavily on price!!!
Then there is the category of upspeccing an otherwise original car - like Dave Pilkington describes for his. The car finishes up in a condition where it could have left the factory like that.
Fianally there is the category of true variations from original spec. My cars definitely fall into this one!
You must remember that development of the car was pretty well complete by 1967. All subsequent upgrades were already engineered and ready to go by this point (with the sole exception of the 2.2 engine and the S2 bonnet), albeit many not yet launched. Even the NADA 3500S aka prototype S2 was ready in the wings to be launched a year later.
An awful lot of water has gone under the bridge since then and a lot of it relates to the normal driving environment. For instance, motorways were pretty rare then and the normal driving environment was A roads where high speeds were only breifly attained. So today we really notice how undergeared the cars are and how much front end lift they generate at speed where these problems weren't too evident at the time. So today it is entirely sensible to want to fit a 5 speed SD1 or 4 speed ZF gearbox to get an overdrive top. Likewise the Police undertray spoilers become a must have accessory. And continuous high speed use exposes the inadeqauacy of the standard radiator and lack of a sepaprate reservoir.
There are other issues that are more cosmetic. Rear seat belts and side impact bars (available on the NADA's) are a must for passive safety. I personally think it is folly to drive on a UK motorway without a 3rd high level stop lamp and fog warning lamp. I get very nervous in towns that the P6's front and rear lamp clusters don't give the level of side visibility to the turn indicators that is normal today. So I want side repeators as well.
More technically, tyre design has moved on since '67 an radials are available in lower profiles and with stiffer side walls. So the suspension geometry is no longer as suited to the tyres as it was then. Cue a few roll bars and a bit of negative camber.
Nobody had vented discs in '67, but its easy to achieve now and fits the Rover ethos of massive competence in braking.
Rover were never very good at carburettors/inlet manifolds/camshaft profiles/valving and porting. It seems entierly reasonable to me to 2nd guess where Rover might have gone if development had continued.
The key criteria I apply in this stimulating and expensive area is that the final result should bear scrutiny as what Rover would have done had they had 20/20 hindsight. I'm pretty comfortable with my cars in that respect. If you aren't an expert in the breed I reckon you'd be pretty hard put to it to identify what is Rover and what is my subsequent mods.
So where does that leave value?
For me a truly original car gets heavily marked down on value. An intelligently repaired car with the main gremlins sorted gets marked up on value. A sensibly upspecced car is neutral. One like mine that has had a bit more development - well it depends on your personal taste!
I reckon that assessment is significantly at odds with the normal way classic cars are valued - with originality prized above everything else. And I think that is quite clearly the wrong approach!
Of course the real problem with P6's is that they are far too cheap, so this is largely an academic discussion until more people start to realise what fabulous cars they are!!
Chris
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