Although currently not owning any MG-Rover car, Dylan does not want to miss the experience with his former Rovers. He tells the story in his own words...
SD1 3500- LYL671X
This was an ex-Police car used at Heathrow airport and has been mentioned in the "My Baby & I"-section elsewhere on this site.
It was a basic model as all police cars were then, with no electric windows or central locking, or any of the kit you might expect to find on a 3500SE of the time. There were holes in the tailgate, roof and bonnet where the police signs had been, and we had a different speedometer to the standard car. Apparently the suspension and brakes were upgraded to cope with the demands of the police, although quite how fast you would have to go patrolling Heathrow I'm not sure. The best bit was when we pulled over to let a police car follow, we would bew the first to pull back out and everybody thought we were another patrol car so would let us go through! Brilliant!
We owned it for about 3 years until a Series 2 Vanden Plas EFi came up for sale. This unfortunately got stolen the day before we were due to collect it so we moved on to a Rover 820E, D186RWL.
416GTi- H376AMT
This was a replacement for D186RWL and was the most reliable car we had owned. The previous owner had been very meticulous and if something needed doing, it was done. It had all round electric windows, electric sunroof and superb Honda DOHC engine.
It was 6 years old when we came to own it, and it really felt like you were driving something special, especially with the privacy glass which had been installed from new. The combination of cherry red, cream leather and an automatic box was just right for me. Shame it wasn't my car!! When it was polished and looking its best I could see no other car I would want to own at the time, although the multi-spoke alloys tested my patience every now and again when they needed cleaning!
When dad bought his 75 at the end of 2005, I took over H376AMT with the intention of doing a rolling restoration as it was starting to look a little tired in places. When the news of our impending parenthood came, I decided I wouldn't have the time to do any work on it and didn't want it sat on the drive doing nothing but rotting away, so it was sold to Keith Adams at the beginning of 2006.
214 SLi- J108XEV
Because I liked the 416 so much that we had owned for a year or so, my Fiesta 1.6D had become the sort of car that I didn't want to own any more, so I set about looking for a replacement. An Orion 1.8 Ghia came up and I was about to go for that when somebody else beat me to it. A white 214 SLi then came up, the only issue being it was in the process of a head gasket replacement so I couldn't test drive it at the time. As it was a through a family friend's mechanic business, he knew the previous history of the car and had serviced it once the manufacturers warranty had run out so I was happy with that. I decided to take the plunge and bought the car at 6 years old for £2700- book value at the time was about £3800 but I had to pay for the repairs. With one or two other things that need doing, I still paid less than book. I used to go to the garage every evening for a couple of weeks and work on each panel, cleaning and really polishing it while it was still being worked on- once I got it home it was gleaming and stayed that way until I sold it on.
It was torquey, smooth, comfortable and spacious and everything I wanted out of a car. It got a bit battered through 2 no fault accidents- somebody reversed out of a parking space on a service road, hit the left front wing, and pushed the car sideways so the right wing also got hit by a wall. The two front wings and bumper were replaced (great as the bumper was looking a little faded by now).
A few months later I was stopped in traffic on a very wet M25 early evening, and a Cavalier obviously not checking the road ahead ploughed straight into me. Luckily he had attempted to slow down so it wasn't quite as bad as it could have been. Because I had seen it coming in my mirror and I had left plenty of space between my and the car in front, I simply released the handbrake, got hit and then put the footbrake on before I hot the car in front. When I got out, there was no visible damage to the car at all which I couldn't understand. I opened the tailgate and all became clear, when I tried to close it again, the lockplate was about 3 inches further forward. I had to really force the tailgate closed, but again, a new bumper and tailgate were the order of the day so the car looked great.
I opted to go for the chrome look on the front and rear bumpers, but couldn't do the doors very easily so they were left.
When I got married, I wanted to treat myself to a new car, so I bought a SEAT Leon from the continent and saved a packet, as personal importing was all the rage then due to the exchange rates. J108XEV now serves sterling service in North Yorkshire and has done so since 2002. We had to cut our honeymoon short due to problems with the accommodation, so we used the second week to go to the Lake District. A friend who we popped in to see while we were there was having some work done, and one of the builders bought it there and then. I took it back to him the following weekend and it has been there ever since.
