Do you like my new car

Do you like my new car

Of all the cars designed by the British motor industry the Hunter wasn't the ugliest but it was by far the most boring and I'm not sure I could bring myself to describe anything beige as being "cool". But if you love it who am I to argue?

Now-a-days we tend to forget just how bad British cars of the 1960s and 1970s were for rust because those that have survived from that era are either well looked after or completely renovated from scratch - my current (albeit German-built) car is 15 years old and doesn't have a single scrap of rust on it and even my previous British car (MG-TF) was of a similar vintage and completely rust free (in spite of being made of the thinnest steel possible) - this would have been unprecedented in 1966 or 1976.

In retrospect the Imp was an innovative and revolutionary design (more so than the BMC Mini) but sadly not one that the Rootes Group were capable of making well despite building a purposely designed factory in Scotland for it. The Clydeside workforce that had spent a lifetime building massive ships didn't adapt well to making small cars and their understanding of corrosion and anti-corrosion methods based on thick steel plate used to construct ocean-going ships didn't work on the thinner steel sheets used in car construction (which was also the fate of the Hunter whose body panels were fabricated there later, including the parts they sent out to Australia to make the Safari). The Rootes Group were referred to as the Rust Group back then for good reason (even after they were bought-out by Chrysler).