TRIUMPH TR7 BODY PANELS DISCONTINUED

Future restorations ‘made impossible’ as interest in the model surges

More than 2000 Triumph TR7 enthusiasts worldwide face a future without new body panels with which to complete restorations.

Clubs have expressed concerns that British Motor Heritage (BMH) is to stop supplying such things as wings, headlamp surrounds and other parts vital to restorations, and believe that it has abandoned the tooling altogether.

Affiliated stockist of BMH panels, Rimmer Brothers, confirmed that it had TR7 sill sections in stock, but did not expect them to last forever, despite being able to quote for complete Mini MkI and MGB body shells from BMH.

The TR7 sections of both the TR Drivers’ Club and the TR Register responded with concern, worried that the price of second-hand and new old stock components would make all but the highest level of restorations impossible.

TR Drivers’ Club official, John Clancy, said: ‘It’s incredibly sad if the press tools have gone. Having been much maligned historically, the profile of the TR7 has risen enormously in recent years; now everyone wants one, it now may well turn out that you can’t get the panels in the future. It will make restorations difficult, if not impossible.’

John added that the TR Drivers’ Club and a conglomerate of TR7 clubs – including The Triumph Wedge Owners’ Association – was working on a contingency to have TR7 panels fabricated in aluminium should their worst fears be realised.

He said: ‘The trouble is, owners will want panels in steel rather than aluminium – and the costs will be high.’

CCW approached BMH for its view on the clubs’ concerns, but it declined to comment before this week’s issue went to press.

TR Register TR7 archivist, Christopher Smith, said: ‘Since the rumours [of displaced tooling] started, people have been running scared. The price of remaining new wings, for example, has doubled.’ Christopher is well invested in the model, owning more than 100 TR7s and TR8s.

Parts were hard to come by before BMH discontinued its TR7 panel range; even Christopher has just a few pairs of spare wings in stock.