Diamond from the rough
IF YOU’VE VISITED Bicester Heritage in the past year, you may well have seen this Riley van and been intrigued. We certainly were; so much so that we asked owner John Lomas if we could pop back and take it for a spin.
John was happy to oblige, explaining that one of the main reasons he built it was to promote his business, Blue Diamond Riley Services Ltd.
‘We bought it as a basketcase at an auction in 2017, thinking it might be useful for spares, but once we got it back to the workshop we realised it deserved better than that. The idea was to build something that we could use as pit transport at the Le Mans Classic, and as a showcase for what we do,’ says John.
‘It started life as a Riley Nine Kestrel, but was probably turned into a van in the 1940s. The body it was wearing then was very boxy, so we tasked body craftsman Graham Figg with making a new one that was more streamlined, inspired by the pre-war MG High Speed Service vans.
‘The body panelling was subcontracted to Keith Pointing in Rochford, Essex, whose business was acquired by Blue Diamond three years ago, and Keith also built up the engine. It’s a 12/4 Kestrel fast-road unit to the same spec as the one in the Sprite that I’ve used on the Monte for the last two years, with ported heads, some nice cams and tubular headers. It should give the van a cruising speed of 60mph, although I’ve yet to test it fully.’
Speaking of testing, John points to a very non-period-looking item in the engine bay: ‘That’s an inline electric water pump, which we’re thinking of offering to customers as an accessory. The van is acting as our test-bed first.’
Sliding behind the large four-spoke wheel, you find it is considerably offset to the left, since the cabin tapers inwards quite strongly from the B-pillar and you can almost look ahead through the door glass while cornering – it would be a great way for a dog to travel, sticking its head out of the other side.
On the steering column is a lever quadrant for the Wilson pre-selector gearbox. This device allows you to ‘pre-select’ a gear before you need it, and then you just operate the clutch at the appropriate time; hey presto, a neat automatic change without taking your hands off the wheel. Start the engine, and there’s a puppy-like ‘yip-yip-yip’ noise from the transmission as it waits for your command, followed by a sad-puppy whine as drive takes up. The rasp of the 1500cc engine soon drowns that out, however, revving freely and providing an unusually brisk turn of speed. It’s something of a sleeper, this van.
Those wire wheels are a bit special, too, if only by association. ‘They came off my business partner’s Riley MPH that he bought at Amelia Island in 2016,’ chuckles John. ‘They were fitted with oversized Blockley tyres that didn’t quite suit the svelte lines of the MPH, but they look just right on a commercial. The thought that they used to be on a million-dollar car tickles me!’