AUSTIN-ROVER’S MAESTRO
The Maestro had great potential, and could so easily have been turned into a winner.
As you read this, it’ll be a whopping 40 years since Austin-Rover were building the first Austin Maestros in readiness for the triumphant March 1983 launch. The Cowley production lines had been cleared of all traces of the Maxi, built there since 1969. Cowley had been extensively revamped with new production lines, but whilst there were Maxis stockpiled, there was still a yawning 18 month gap between the final Maxi and first Maestro.
On the face of it, the Maestro should have been the same runaway success that the 1980 Mini Metro had been. Patriotism was running high, the economy was picking up nicely and the product itself was pretty good.
By the time the Maestro was being planned, the influence of Alec Issigonis had near enough gone. The only reason the Metro retained the Mini’s gearbox-insump layout is because BL didn’t have the money to develop a new engine and end-on gearbox. That would come back to haunt them in the form of lost sales and warranty claims, but the Maestro would not have this problem because it was designed to be simple and effective, retaining the usual Austin Morris features of a good ride and excellent space utilisation, but getting rid of anything that might cause a problem later. No more Hydragas pitching or inevitable leaning to one side when the unit either sprang a leak, burst a pipe or just needed pumping up, rare though these problems were to be fair. The Maestro leap-frogged all of this by basically copying the suspension from the Mk1 Volkswagen Golf, a car that VW were about to replace anyway. Rumour has it that following a deal between BL and VW on component sharing they look identical: a rear twist beam axle with coilover damper rear suspension struts plus MacPherson front struts (an Austin Morris first) and pressed steel wishbones. Simple, light, effective and cheap. You only needed to compare the original Golf to the Hydragas-suspended Allegro to realise that the BL Moulton suspension system was heading down a technical dead end. The Alfasud ran rings around both of them and still gave an excellent ride – coil springs were the future I’m afraid.
BL needed to retain the existing engines, the 1275 A-series successfully revamped into the A Plus and the okayish but hardly brilliant Maxi E-series. The 1500 was slow, the 1750 too harsh, too big and thirsty and BL needed a 1600. No problem: by combining the existing Maxi type block with the crankshaft from the forthcoming 1984 1600 S-series, BL were able to knock out the R-series 1600 engine on the cheap.
As launched, the Maestro certainly seemed like another winner for BL. With neat styling, a huge glass area and body colour plastic bumpers it looked distinctly BL, but in a good way, even if the front end styling had Allegro overtones. It looked good inside too, had plenty of interior space and what’s more it drove well with a very good ride and excellent handling.
But was this enough? In a word, no. In 1983 Ford were using a peppy if slightly harsh CVH that outdid the A Plus and R-series, whilst the Vauxhall Astra’s 1300 and 1600 OHC duo wiped the floor with both. That car had a sporty, rorty feel to it, would cruise along at 90+ all day without complaint and in its looks and road manners was what young family people and company car user choosers wanted. It was as close as anyone ever got to the Alfasud, a car that was still being built and had yet to be beaten, ridiculous for a car launched in 1971.
The Maestro however still showed promise and could have come good if it were not for some unwise decisions by a cash-strapped BL. The problems of the Maestro are well known of course. The plastic bumpers were prone to cracks, the dash could creak like me first thing in the morning and the computercontrolled SU carburettor made the Ford VV carb look like a paragon of reliability. BL linkages popped off the VW gearbox, crankshaft rear oil seals leaked oil onto the clutch (worse on the later S-series) and it didn’t take many years for rust to peep through the sill to rear wing seam. As for the 1600 MG Maestro, that was a car that even BL admitted in private they shouldn’t have built. Bolting a pair of Weber twin chokes to an R-series may have seemed a good idea, but not with a massive steel air cleaner on top. The heat build up caused the fuel to boil, resulting in hot start nightmares and BL sold a small electric fan kit to blow cold air in, but it was too late by then. If they’d only waited a year and launched the MG as the (excellent) O-series 2.0i and paid more heed to curing the original build quality issues.
I like the early Maestro. It has a refreshing originality and tidiness of design about it. Today more than ever, its small footprint, superb vision, compliant ride and squashy seats make it a great town car. Drop a modern Honda motor in there and you’d have the car BL should have been building in 1993 just as production was winding down after selling two million examples.
The Maestro however still showed promise and could have come good if it were not for some unwise decisions by a cash-strapped BL