Cars will literally drive themselves, leaving you to be able to eat and sleep whilst a computer does all the hard work, at a fraction of the cost! Don’t worry about having to wait for your car to charge either because robots will be doing your job for you, so you can chill out at home with your nearest and dearest. Even food will be a thing of the past, no more microwaving your machine excreted pies. Once meat has been deemed toxic or something, food powders, pastes and tablets will be delivered to your door via a drone which will conveniently scan your vital signs and never pass this kind of information onto global authorities. Plastic and other waste will be gone to and all the money you save on buying your groceries with no need for packaging like that, will mean you can go on holiday three times a year.

But until the high times of Star Trek like living there are a few teething problems. Like the cost of making the future happen. For the cost of one battery for a Tesla I could have purchased ten Audi 80’s and still have change to buy a pair Nike Mags. But I only needed one car and one that isn’t a silent Jaguar lookalike.

The Audi 80 was introduced in the 60’s as a compact executive car. Audi were fast growing in popularity, more so since their name change from Auto Union, an amalgamation of four automobile manufactures during the great depression in the 1930’s. Conveniently the world found enough money for yet another war and this gave an opportunity for Auto Union to have a go at armored cars and trucks. The U.S remodeled the landscape and turned over most of what was left to the Russians. The Germans, now pushed over into the East, started to rebuild and no one would know just how successful Audi would become.

I wasn’t drinking officer

The Audi 80 shared it platform with the Volkswagen Passat, a coupe, convertible and the Avant (Audi’s name for an estate car or station wagon). Again, the ever efficient Germans had a logical alphanumerical range of vehicles. The B1 Audi 80 had a face lift in the 70’s, the full range with two door, four and the Avant, they were built to last at the cost of fairly underwhelming performance. The B2 launched in the late 70’s and had the hand of god, or Giorgetto Giugiaro, design the body for the refreshed look. In the 80’s, Audi unveiled their turbocharged rally machine, the Audi Quattro, or Ur-Quattro, the “Ur” German for “primordial”, “original”, or “first of its kind” although some would dispute that back in the 1960’s, Jensen the British car manufacture had a system developed for their awesomely regal Interceptor.

Zero to the shops in 6 seconds

Finally the penultimate B series aptly named the “B3” appeared in ’86, it was finally not having to donor from the VW Passat, this was the all new body with an extensive range of specifications. More aerodynamic and a quattro 20V option was enough to make this a very popular car across Europe and further afield.

Mine in particular is a 1.8 litre 80 E in a rather fetching champagne colour.

Or is it gold?

If you’re thinking about starting a journey with a classic, I would highly recommend the Audi range from this era. They are built well, with parts still in abundance. The mechanical layout is straightforward and would only require a fairly standard set of tools to start pulling things apart. It’s a no frills experience with the Audi gadgets wise, but then again I needed a solid reliable car for my commute and this thing has just survived one of the harshest winters I’ve experienced, putting into perspective the sticker in the rear window which reads “Ten year anti corrosion guarantee”. I was surprised however by the quality of the sound system, the acoustics alone are pretty cool but the speakers sound like something decent from the late nineties. In the back parcel shelf is a small black box with two headphone jacks, I later discovered this is for the option for the front and rear occupants to listen to different soundtracks, in case your passengers listen to pop music.

Punch the four rings for horn

You’ll probably notice the wheels are very much not of the Audi range and you’d be correct. It’s currently sat on some Calibre alloys, similar to something from BBS although probably for around half the price. I recently performed an oil change on the car and didn’t expect it to be difficult and indeed it wasn’t, the only reason I needed a jack was because my oil collection tub was too tall to fit under the car. I could reach the sump bolt with ease and the oil filter is placed in the upright position, on the side of the engine, meaning that I could actually unscrew it and not cause death in the environment, unlike some engines where the filter is often positioned I presume, for a joke.

Four cylinders missing but it’ll do

I admit, mine does hold the road a little better than stock thanks to lowered springs and so far the engine gives out enough poke to keep up with modern traffic. In short this is a very usable and cheap classic and with a few upgrades it can bring life back into an old tank, I mean a saloon, like this.

The wet look

This is, however, the reason we produce some of the greatest racing drivers in the world, cars produced on this island of rural race tracks required pin sharp handling, just enough speed to keep things interesting, looks were optional.

An Austin Maestro and an oil rig. Two things near extinction.

I’ve recently purchased a 1989 Audi 80 for less than a pair of trainers from Kanye West with a colour scheme that would make a five year old puke. I’m a fan of German and Japanese cars as you can probably tell but this is mostly down to the fact I’m not much of a gambling man, so I avoid French and British cars. I’m not saying they’re all bad but whilst thousands of workers in the UK cried into their cups of tea when British car manufacturers started to close down, I didn’t lose much sleep over it.

There are however some cars that became legend in my eyes and I’m sure for many of you overseas NRW fans, you wouldn’t have seen many.

GTE “Get there evenfaster”

The last time I saw a Vauxhall Astra GTE was around six years ago. I was on my Kawasaki Ninja at the time and waiting to pull away from some lights. As I pulled away and onto a dual carriageway an AC Cobra (another British sports car) filtered in front of me. I could hear the low rumble of the V8 through my helmet and I accelerated to get a closer look. As I did so a rather tatty, brown/red Astra GTE came in on the slip road and in-between me and the Cobra. At first I raised an eyebrow, staggered that one had actually survived 90’s but on further inspection I realised this was no regular GTE. The guy driving was wearing a hi-viz vest and ear defenders, sat in what appeared to be a bucket seat…surrounded by a roll cage.

With the Ninja poised and ready, the Cobra approached the part of the road that split into two lanes, I was hoping he’d put on a show. The driver of the AC laid down the power but it was too late, the Astra’s front end lifted, a pop, a bang and he dropped into third, I think, and we watched the GTE leave us like the Starship Enterprise leaves orbit.

The weapon

If you ever saw Police Camera Action here in the UK during the 90’s you’d always watch intently if the narrator mentioned a high speed chase with a GTE. Wildly underdeveloped handling, front wheel drive with around 150BHP made police chases with this thing more exciting than The Fast and Furious if everyone was on PCP. You were never in front of a GTE which is why myself and friends named it “The fastest car in the world”.

If you had the money and wanted Mustang speed, the Ford Sierra Cosworth was the one to get. In the 90’s my home town here in England was host to an unofficial Sunday night cruise, where young men and women came to show off their motors with widened body kits and ear bleeding sound systems in what is now probably considered the golden era of car modification.

Note the picnic table on the back

Much to the dismay of local authorities, proud owners of modified cars would lay down rubber in various car parks on the outskirts of the town, blasting bass heavy electronic music, whilst crowds gathered resulting in near misses and discarded fast food packaging.

Just like when a fight breaks out at school and a ring of onlookers gather to see who loses the first shoe, if you saw a large ring of people in a car park it may be surrounding the infamous Sierra RS Cosworth.

With its bad boy looks, ironing board size wing on the back and obnoxious exhaust as standard, this thing would eat more donuts than a New York cop. Although a fairly large car by UK standards the Cosworth was rebuilt and tuned to compete globally and finished off competition in Europe, Australia’s Bathurst and Japan’s raceways.

In rally the old girl was not quite as agile as the rest of the pack, up against the mighty Lancia and Toyota’s finest in the group A class but spectators fell for the brutish style it would blast around a track, spitting flame and shards of exhaust matter into the air.

The Ford production line probably made more cups of coffee in a day than TVR made cars in the 1980s but the TVR Tasmin for me beat them all in looks. I’m a fan of most wedge shaped cars of the era but TVR decided to provide drivers with a choice of wedges, complete with either V6’s or V8’s. Speaking of Ford, TVR actually poached many parts for the Tasmin from some of the most common Fords on the UK market and for some reason, like early limb transplants, TVRs did reject things in its body from time to time. I’ve looked at servicing costs and intervals, TVR owners would suggest you DON’T miss them and as you can expect from a company that’s been up and down like an ageing 80s A-lister, it’s not going to be cheap.

But just look at it!

The one thing I’ve heard from anyone who owns a TVR at various meets, is that if you have a million pennies to spend on a car, the TVR will reward you in many ways. You’re going to enjoy driving every minute it’s actually running, purely for the sound it makes. But i’m not here to review the running costs of a TVR, if you’re enthusiastic about this stuff, you WILL keep it going and survive on noodles for the month.

I could fill this article up with the most popular retro cars in the UK and this would most likely be a long list of Fords, but this wouldn’t be a run down of some of the British greats without mentioning a Bond car. I’m firmly in the Aston camp when it comes to choosing which car was the best. If i had the funds, it would the be the V8 Vantage.

Over 6 litres of carburettor fed V8, around 450BHP giving it enough welly to take it up to 170mph. Aston Martin weren’t kidding around but when you are tasked with building a car to outrun tanks in the snow, who else would you turn to?

I remember seeing a guy refuelling one of these at a petrol station, when i arrived he had been filling up before me. As i started refueling my motor, he closed that cap and walked around the other side to fill another tank! A car best remembered for cutting a Lada in half with a lazer beam, destroying a police roadblock with missiles, spiked tyres and skis…it even transformed into a shed at one point! (See the film)

Here are a couple more motors worth the mention;

The Rover SD1. A British muscle car with as much class as a kebab but for some reason I love it’s presence on the road and the distinct sound of the beautiful Rover V8. The choice of vehicles for both cops and robbers of the 80’s. Gorgeously quirky, an acquired taste.

The Jensen Interceptor had a huge Chrysler V8. I know this because a man in his 50’s used to thunder past me everyday whilst i waited for a bus for school back in the day. I never knew until sometime later what it actually was. You only had to describe the looks to a car nut and they would know instantly the long bonnet to sleek body and then finished off with a huge pane of glass at the rear, it had to be the Interceptor. Developed as a GT car, if you fed it enough fossil fuel, it would happily get you from England to Monaco and back again in one big powerful wafting motion.

Well there you have some of my favourite British retro motors but what are yours?

Comment below and happy driving retro fans!