|
Post by Alanović on Dec 9, 2016 11:43:54 GMT
Driving to work this morning I started to follow a large, 60's looking burgundy car with fins on the rear wings, which I didn't recognise. Now, this surprised me as when I was a child in the 70s, I was obsessed, and I mean obsessed to the point where I'd probably be given an autism diagnosis these days, with cars. As a toddler in my pushchair I would drive my mother to distraction, reciting the make and model of every. single. car. which passed us by. Incessantly. I knew them all. I was infallible. I even had my mother teach me to recognise letters from the age of two so I could read car badges.
But it seems I wasn't infallible. I could not place this car at all, it looked like some kind of grotesque Vauxhall to my eye, but only when I got close enough in a queue (switch aircon to recirc, those exhaust fumes are a bit of a flavour of past times) could I decipher the upward sloping faded chrome name badge. Borgward. Ah. Yes. I'd heard of these, but I don't think I'd never knowingly seen one. And this set me thinking. Perhaps they were never sold in the UK. But wait. This was a right hand drive car.
I looked the plate up (NNH 400) on the DVLA's MOT check service. Borgward is not listed in the drop down, so it doesn't recognise the car. So, were they ever sold here in the UK? Was this car an import from perhaps Sweden when they changed sides, or Cyprus or somewhere else which drives on the correct side of the road? If they were a UK sold car, I am at a loss as to how the toddler me didn't know this or ever spot one.
Anyone here ever own one, or have anything to do with them?
|
|
|
Post by tyrednexited on Dec 9, 2016 13:20:14 GMT
..a few hits (and pictures) on the web. No revealing details, though it's been in Blighty since at least 2002 (I know one would assume rather longer unless someone is being "naughty" with the plate). Link posted for the piccy: tinyurl.com/borgward2002
|
|
|
Post by Hofmeister on Dec 9, 2016 13:35:41 GMT
My father told me tales of driving a weekly train from Harwich docks in the late 50s flatbed trucks loaded with cars from Germany, new R/H drive Borgward Isabellas. It was scheduled weekly, bit often cancelled at short notice, leaving him at Harwich on a "dead turn"
|
|
|
Post by Alanović on Dec 9, 2016 13:41:53 GMT
That's the stinky old tub all right, t&e. Didn't look quite that shiny this morning.
Union flag sticker on the boot, funny how it's always German cars with these on.
|
|
|
Post by tyrednexited on Dec 9, 2016 13:54:32 GMT
That's the stinky old tub all right, t&e. Didn't look quite that shiny this morning. ...a bit more like this, then....? www.carsreunited.com/nnh400(since the firm went bankrupt in '61, if the original registration date quoted here of '64 is correct, then it may have had a bit of previous history.)
|
|
|
Post by Alanović on Dec 9, 2016 14:03:40 GMT
Less shiny still. Nice Skoda Rapid.
So they did sell them in the UK. Were they any good? How did they compare with other makes? Where did they sit in the pecking order of prestige? What did a Borgward say about a gentleman?
|
|
Avant
Full Member
Posts: 691
|
Post by Avant on Dec 9, 2016 20:17:56 GMT
NNH 400 is Northampton, c. 1961 - it was about then that Borgward went bust. Up to then they'd sold the Isabella in the UK from the late 50s: a two-door saloon and an estate. The one you've pictured is interesting as I never knew they'd done a four-door.
From memory the two-door Isabella was quite graceful in appearance (nice name, too), so maybe this four-door was less popular and contributed to Borgward's demise.
I was only a child in the 50s and early 60s, but like you, Alanovic, I tried to make sure I knew every car by sight from the same early age as you. I seem to remember that Borgwards had quite an up-market image: in those days there was no Audi and BMW were struggling.
|
|
|
Borgward
Dec 9, 2016 22:59:03 GMT
via mobile
Post by dixinormus on Dec 9, 2016 22:59:03 GMT
Didn't I read somewhere recently that Borgward is about to be revived and start production again. An announcement at a motor show... Paris?
|
|
|
Post by Alanović on Dec 13, 2016 10:26:33 GMT
|
|
|
Post by tyrednexited on Dec 13, 2016 10:56:31 GMT
......her conclusion is that it's a silly bloody thing with a stupidly small boot for a family (there are 5 of them). Quite. ....quite. The interior space of the current X1 (largely due to its different underpinnings) is at least on a par with the X3 (my impression is that it is greater).
|
|
|
Post by Alanović on Dec 13, 2016 11:04:30 GMT
I do recall my sister asking my advice a couple of years ago, when these elderly relatives were looking for a new car. She said they fancied an X3 and I said don't bother - an X1 is probably a better proposition if they insist on silly faux-offroad style. It's funny how often I'm asked for car advice, the asker then goes and buys something different, and comes back later moaning that it's not the best. Hey ho. The exception being a couple of folks who I've advised to get a Ford Focus, and they've been delighted with them. Of course, I never recommend other people buy the stupid stuff I get for myself, my own peccadillos and daft fixations are my own problem.
|
|