‘The Tatra is the only Uk-registered example’
1989 Citroën 2CV6 Special Dolly Ste Applegate, Northants 1936 Tatra T97 Ian Tisdale, London
Ste: The Citroën has been owned by my godfather and I for about 10 years now, after previously having several different 2CVS and a Lomax. We found this little beauty advertised for sale for about £1000. It has been a long-term, ongoing rolling restoration project for us over the years… in the sense that it keeps breaking and we have to keep adding replacement bits to it. My Citroën is normally the joke at the Hagerty Insurance office where I work, as is my interest in weird and quirky cars that nobody else likes. However, I wouldn’t trade the 2CV for any other car now. Its punchy 602cc engine will zip along the road but it is the timeless look of the plucky French tin snail that I love most. It’s a typical Marmite car, you either love them or hate them… but most people love them. Ian: My 1938 Tatra T97 isn’t quite what most people imagine or expect. It was bought eight years ago with fourteen (yes, fourteen!) more layers of paint than it wears today and was in dire need of a thorough recommissioning. It has an overhead-cam 1.7-litre air-cooled flat-four in the tail rather than the expected V8. Despite decades of misrepresentation it’s no people’s car precursor. Only 510 cars were built, all of them entirely hand-made – the doors are ash-framed with cable and turnbuckle tensioning – and they sold for nearly six times the planned cost of the Volkswagen. It has been campaigned on many German and Dutch events, and now with a fully rebuilt engine, it’s the only Uk-registered example in existence.