The Camaro Club (UK)

Hi Guys,

Although i have been in and out of LHD cars since i was very young my first ever drive was in a Plymouth Barracuda that belonged to a friends dad although that drive was little more than around the block. A few years later early 80's when i was working for Vauxhall Motors Luton we started building a lot of LHD Cavalier's (i can't remember the reason now, maybe europe was on strike ??) and we would have to drive them all over the plant, sometimes over to Toddington, Millbrook or Dunstable, the manual's were definately harder to drive than the auto's until you got the hang of it, i remember on quite a few occasions making a grab for the window winder to change gear rather than the gearstick. After a while it became second nature although in an emergency situation where instinctive reactions tend to be quicker than actually thinking you could come a bit unstuck.

Like a few others have already owned up to, i have gone to the wrong side of the car on more than one occasion.

Cheers.

Russ.

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http://ukrusshotrodforum.proboards.com/index.cgi

Glad it's not just me then!

The weirdest lhd car i've driven was a '71 AMC Javelin i had back in the 90's with six banger and a 3 speed box. Reverse was where first should be, and first to second was a dogleg. There were 4 pedals on the floor with the parking brake as well as a dimmer switch for the headlight's main beam. At times my feet were going like Sammy Davis jnr on acid. You had to reach through the steering wheel to operate the wipers and screen wash which was interesting too. I think AMC just opened the door, threw everything inside and bolted it in where it landed.

I remember once going to pick it up after a MOT. The mechanic said;
"I'll have to fail it, the horn doesn't work."
"Yes it does." Says i.
"No it doesn't." He says, pushing the end of the indicator stalk.
"That's not the horn." i said.
"So where is it then?"
"It's that button on the side of the gearbox tunnel."
"Oh, of course." He says, "Why the F*** didn't i think of looking there..."

Oh yeah, when i got home i noticed he'd written 'Austin Motor Company' on the test certificate! I always wondered what 'AMC' stood for...

My first drive of a left hand drive care came when I went to buy my '69 Firebird. It was for sale about 80 mile from me & after a lot of aggro trying to tie the seller down to a time that I could go & see it, I set off with my mate John, who had previously owned a few Yank cars. By the time we got to the car it had started snowing, but hey, I fell in love with this brush painted red Firebird. Could the owner find the keys?? could he hell as like. He ended up dismantling the steering column to rig it to start. By this time it was getting dark & cold, with it snowing quite heavily. Undetered, having paid the princely sum of £550 I set off in this strange car, with the steering wheel on the wrong side,...in the dark, in the snow!

It all seemed very exciting at the time, I suppose being in my early 20's didn't help any though.. I soon realised that I didn't know where any of the switches were that worked the wipers, heater or the headlight main beam, which was on & I couldn't turn it off. Having travelled down narrow country lanes with the snow getting heavier I finally made it to the M4 motorway. At this point there were very few cars out & just a faint line of tyre tracks visible in the snow. I was slowly starting to worry as I still had about an hours journey in front of me to get anywhere near home. Going up some of the hills on the motorway was interesting to say the least. As I put my foot down a little , the car started to skid & slide across the road & no matter how gentle I was with the throttle it just seemed to have a mind of its own. Eventually after what seemed like an eternity, I got the car back to my workshop, where I just parked it up outside & went home feeling rather pleased with myself.

The next day the snow was so deep I couldn't get my daily out of the street to go to work, so I did the only sensible thing & that was walked the few miles, just to see my new car . When i got to the workshops I couldn't even see my car as it was totally covered with a snow drift. I was able to scrape some of the snow off to get a look, but ended up giving up & walked all the way home again. Her indoors thought I was mental, but you know how it is.............?


cheers...Nige

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Too much power...not enough hands!!

A '69 Firebird for £550! That must have been a while ago...

Seems like yesterday, but was actually 1979 To think that that car was only 10 years old & someone had brush painted it red with Indian murals on it Aaaargh!!

cheers...Nige

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Too much power...not enough hands!!

Sounds like the day i bought mine It was mid Feb, we didn't get there till about 6pm by which time it was dark and cold, snow everywhere. Being a divroce, it all had to go so the car came with many extra's - filled up the camaro and my mates car with everything from a spare fender to car polish! There was an original steel hood that we couldn't put anywhere so were told it was headed to the scrappy the next day Was about 8pm when we left, up in Leicester area, followed my mate's car as he has the sat nav. pitch black down country lanes, snow on the sides. Didn't know where any of the switches were. Didn't know how the heater worked! The dash had some dodgy wiring so the lights kept going out. Speedo wasn't working. Stopped at a petrol station to fill up. Embarssingly asked my mate to help me get in the car as i couldn't figure out which key was for what, tried them all, turned out the lock was dodgy. Got home evenutally at about 10:30pm, realising that the adrenaline was pumping so much that i had the window completely open the whole way! The next day i started taking it apart and well, it's not been driveable since. That was Feb 2010!!!

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This was on the hood of my Challenger;



I thought it was a bit naff and i intended painting over it before i got lynched by the feminists but Women loved it and God knows i needed all the help i could get!

I quite like that mural, was the whole car done or just the bonnet? Any more pictures?

cheers...Nige

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Too much power...not enough hands!!

Love to learn more about the sort of girls who liked this!
we have Viking throwback women whom you can't fail to see in IOM- they are HUGE with masses of blonde hair and often undershot jaws- think they would appreciate this

They clearly descended from the Vikings who invaded 10th and 11th centuries

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Kind Regards
TopCat
Secretary
Classic Camaro Club
Member of The Association of American Car Clubs UK
Email :tboles@strathnoon.co.uk Websites: http://www.classiccamaroclubuk.com and:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IdhLJtR_ZY4

That's what i hoped to do but they liked the mural more than they liked me.

Nige, i haven't got a lot of pix and i don't want to hijack the thread but here's one;



I recently found out it was one of 200 built in the Simca plant in France (sent almost complete from the States to avoid import duties!) and had a warmed up 318, auto box with a Slapstick shifter, headers and straight through exhaust with a pair of Cherry Bombs.

The reg at the time was Q158HVF and i stupidly sold it to a bloke in Manchester and never saw it again...