Regent Street Motor Show
Modern classics mixed with Veterans on Regent Street
Belgian Peugeot leads veteran first-timers on Brighton Run
As the London to Brighton Run’s centrallondon send-off, the Regent Street Motor Show’s non-veteran content continued to expand with the 2019 edition; special displays commemorated major anniversaries including 60 years of the Mini and 50 of the Ford Capri.
Peugeot 8hp
Said owner Marc Sabbe of his recently restored 1902 Peugeot, ‘It needed absolutely everything doing – it had been a museum exhibit for most of its life. I’ve done most of the work myself and it’s been challenging because no spare parts exist and there are often no surviving examples to compare it with. The low-tension ignition system was the biggest challenge – I had to make new parts for it.
‘I finally got it running in March this year – that was the first time that it had run since at least the Thirties. This isn’t just its first Brighton Run – it’s the first time it’s been to Britain.’
‘French car designer Philippe Charbonneaux found it in the Eighties in a Paris garage where it had been put away in the Thirties and remained there untouched. All of his cars were sold off when he died. A Parisian classic car dealer bought this one then sold it to a 40-car museum, which closed not long afterwards. Then it was sold and went to Belgium. I bought it two years ago.’
Ford Capri RS3100
This unique, wide-bodied RS3100 returned to the road this year after a 30-year slumber and a difficult restoration.
‘I bought it in July 1986, ran it regularly for a few years then took it off the road,’ said owner Chris Griffiths. It just got to the point where it was too rough for me to do the restoration so I took it to Restore A Ford in Newhaven.
‘Mick Hill Racing – best known for competing in Special Saloons in the Seventies – modified it in period. In 1973, Ford had 12 RS3100S with “RPU” registrations that it couldn’t get rid of but needed to sell in order to homologate the Cosworth GAA V6 for Group 1 competition. Unfortunately, the oil crisis struck and the Capri MKII was about to come out, rendering a V6-engined MKI undesirable.
‘Mick Hill, who was running a Boss Mustangengined Capri at the time, bought this car from Ford then sold it to a US Air Force officer, having fitted it with Special Saloon-style arches and wheels. In 1981, its next owner tuned the GAA to full Group 1 specification and used it for sprinting.
‘I got it back from Restore A Ford in May, then had to send it back 12 weeks later when it was involved in a hit-and-run with an uninsured driver who’d just robbed a building site!’
Chevrolet Bel Air
This 1954 Chevrolet is one of just two in the UK. Owner Garry Gore said, ‘I bought it in Florida in 2012. It had been restored in the Nineties having been found in a barn in Oregon in 1993 but the paint and chrome had started pitting and delaminating, so I restored it over the next four years, flying to and fro between the UK and Florida.
‘I was drawn to its rarity. Everyone hears “Chevrolet Bel Air” and thinks of the 1957 car with its V8 but the name was around long before then. The 1954s shared their Blue Flame straight-six with the earliest Corvettes though apparently a few very late ’54 Bel Airs were fitted with the early V8.
‘With the exception of fitting electric windscreen wipers – the vacuum-powered ones were just dangerous – it’s all-original and unmodified right down to the six-volt electrics. They went out of their way to avoid putting strain on the battery – even the dashboard clock needs winding up.’
Cadillac Rear Entrance
Despite being 115 years old and having lived just over the Irish Sea for the past 25 years, 2019 marked this Cadillac Rear Entrance Tonneau’s very first outing on the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run.
Originally delivered to the midwestern US in 1904, it was used on the prairies as new frontier road routes were forged across the country. It passed from private collections in America to Ireland in 1994 before current owner Andrew Bailey acquired it in 2019. It’s in original condition, having always been maintained rather than restored.
Arrows FA1
This 1978 Arrows F1 car – one of the first to feature ground-effect – became the subject of an infamous court case the year it was built. Arrows was formed in 1977 by former Shadow employees including designer Tony Southgate, and Shadow boss Don Nichols felt that the new FA1 was a copy of the DN9 that he had just designed for him.
Riccardo Patrese finished tenth at the Brazilian GP in this car and put another FA1 chassis second on the podium in Sweden before the High Court in London demanded that all FA1S be dismantled and handed over to Nichols for inspection.
The cars were deemed to be DN9 copies and the FIA banned the FA1 from racing again, forcing Southgate to design its A1 replacement from scratch in just 60 days.
Incredibly, Arrows missed no races that season, Patrese finished fourth in the season-ending Canadian Grand Prix and Arrows finished in joint ninth place in the Constructors Championship – one place above Shadow.