Alvis Archive

Our regular monthly lunch meetings have continued throughout the year and July saw “Betsy” make an appearance after media exposure from the NEC Restoration show, looking rather smart on newly painted wheels and new tyres.

Sadly, we had previously missed a visit to the Drivers Club from Lex Westoby who was belatedly celebrating the Alvis Centenary by travelling the world from New Zealand and presenting trophies to various people. He left one with the Drivers Club for the Trust and it is now on display in our archive cabinet.

Lex wrote “I’m still in Europe, and this is the first opportunity I’ve had to explain the trophy I left with you. My original plan was to go to as many Alvis Centenary celebrations as possible. First the Australian event in Albury, Then the New Zealand event in April. then cross over to UK for the International Event, travel on to The Crossing Borders event in The Netherlands and maybe stopping in USA on the way home. Sounds great, almost all was booked and paid for, but then after the Australian event Covid struck. In New Zealand we had a delayed event and I missed the opportunity to come over the Europe for their events.

My own personal effort for the Alvis Centenary was to make 100 Trophies like the one you now have, and to present or gift them to Alvis owners at each event I went to, i.e. one for each group of cars, Vintage, Post vintage and post 60 vintage, and also to the club or organization hosting the event.

I have now presented 100 trophies around the world. 4 in Australia, 4 in UK including the one you have, 4 in Europe at the Crossing Borders event, and the remainder in New Zealand for all the entrants in the event there. I hope you enjoy it, and I enjoy all your articles.”

Thank you Lex, a surprisingly weighty piece!

Buying and selling a car at auction has become a popular activity to watch both on TV and the internet. The fortunes of Alvis participants have been mixed in recent sales – several failing to reach their reserves but others finding new homes. Reports of last weekend’s Bonhams sale at Goodwood, with no Alvis, showed less than a third of the lots sold at or over their estimates and over a third were not sold. The upcoming Bonhams sale at Gstaad includes 57 interesting cars, many from static collections with no reserve https://www.bonhams.com/auction/27530/the-gstaad-sale-collectors-motor-cars/

More digitisation of archive photo collections has been completed this week and can be seen here 1979 – Knebworth

A good number of followers are past owners of Alvis cars. We are always pleased to receive their news and recollections which often shed light on the history of cars, some of them long gone. One such owner also sent us a box of transparencies of the 1961 and 1962 Crystal Palace Alvis Days including this :

A gallery of other pictures is here 1961 – Crystal Palace

Alan Bond, now living in Watchet, Somerset, wrote: An old friend of mine, Mike Pratt, who lived in Hendon and latterly Watford, passed away on 12th June. He owns a speed 20 Charlesworth saloon but hasn’t used it for years. It is safely stored and, hopefully, it will run again one day. He was well known in Alvis circles for many years and I had known him as a close friend for more than sixty years. His funeral is at Garston Crematorium, Watford on 4th July at 10.20 a.m. All welcome to give the old lad a hearty send off. I shall be going. We were close friends for over 60 years so I have to pay my respects in person.

Back in the 1960s I owned a TA21 Alvis EWH 310 (24105) bought off the late Jock Stephen through the good offices of the late Mick O’Callaghan (or it might have been the other way round). I used the car until about three months before I got married in February of 1967 and then it was laid up in the driveway of my family’s house at Colindale for about a year as I had then moved and was living in Bletchley. My late father asked me several times to remove the car but since I was not in a position to do anything with it at the time it was eventually taken away by a scrap dealer who had premises off Colindeep Lane. I did eventually make arrangements to have it transported to Bletchley but it had been broken up before I could put those plans into action. I was very disappointed as it could have lived in my garage in Bletchley while I got it ready to go back on the road. Under Jock Stephen’s ownership, the problem with excessive oil use had been sorted and the car was running beautifully when I took it off the road due to the lack of ‘pfennigs’ because of my impending marriage.

Jock also had a D type Silversone Healey which he had fitted with a 3.8 litre jaguar engine with triple SU carburettors as a commission for a friend. The owner used it a couple of times, frightened himself with it and then sold it to Jock at a price that was a snip. Jock put in a lot of work with that car to make it go and, boy, did it go. Mrs Jock eventually wouldn’t ride in it as it was so hairy.

I was ever grateful to Jock as his Met police connections enabled me to blag my way on to a police ‘Roadcraft’ driving course not long after I passed my car test and that was a revelation. Those police Wolseley 6/110s were no slouches either and that course was the only time I was able to legally break the speed limits, albeit in a limited way. Chiswick training school was a doddle after that.

Keep up the good work – the site holds a great deal if interest for me in my dotage.

TTFN – 007

Wayne Brooks was invited to and attended the Greenwich Concours, 30 miles from the heart of New York City and overlooking the Long Island Sound.

The Concours d’Elegance, held on Sunday 5th June, was the climax of the three days event. Wayne’s full report is here 2022 Greenwich Concours

If you own a TD21, TE or TF there is some useful information in your handbook about oil pressure and some help on what to do if it too low, see Oil pressure

While the boom in newer classic cars continues all the more reason to keep Alvis cars in the public eye to show they remain useable and rewarding cars to drive.

This Speed 20 Charlesworth had a spell in the USA and was last heard of in Australia.

This Silver Eagle was last heard of in Germany a long time ago – does it survive?

With Covid restrictions now eased, we welcome visitors to the archives at Bowcliffe Hall. The third Wednesday is a regular lunch meeting hosted by Chris Taylor. Visits can be made by prior arrangement on any other weekday with the possibility to have lunch in the Drivers Club. Visit the Archives

If you would like to know more about the charity, click Meet the Trustees

To become a member or make a donation to help fund the preservation and storage of the physical archives click Becoming a Friend

While I was filling SHP up with E5 watching the meter racking up more pounds than usual I had failed to notice my shoes were paddling in petrol. After apologies to the lady behind the till for my old lady’s incontinence I drove to the air line and to my relief no more fuel was leaking out. The rest of my journey was uneventful and enjoyable.

This had happened to me before in another TC 21/100 Graber some thirty odd years ago in France – a perished fuel hose – and sure enough there was a tiny hole surrounded by rubber that had seen better days. In France it had meant keeping the tank no more than half full.

I wasn’t sure whether a standard fuel hose was fitted to a Graber but a call to Chris Prince with a photo of the offending article produced a new TA21 fuel hose which was exactly the part needed. Removal and refitting wasn’t too onerous and created a chance to appreciate the quality of underbody restoration completed over forty years ago.

The early cars fed the petrol into the side of the tank. This has the disavantage of a full tank leaving fuel in the feed hose which can find its way out of the filler particularly on right hand bends. This was changed for the TD21 to feed into the top of the tank and explains the intrusion on the left side of the boot space.

The continuing process of digitising archive material has produced some more period photos of the early Three Litres and a detailed article written by Nick Simpson in 1991. These can be seen on the updated page TA21 together with a downloadable register of cars.