French article on Morris Minor

[joeone62]

Hey folks, hope that some of you read some French, however its interesting to see that also some French magazines in France are giving some interest towards our Morrises, take a look at the link and let me know what think
http://gazoline.net/article2.php?id_article=1517

[MarkyB]

Google translate helps a lot!

http://translate.google.co.uk/translate ... cle%3D1517

[irmscher]

good article and downloading google translate helped

[rayofleamington]

I'm impressed with their research!
It's a nice wide approach to an article covering who did what and what else was around that Issi may have taken inspiration from & the parrallels with the rest of Europe...

[MarkyB]

It's interesting how people all over Europe were thinking along similar lines at that time.
Part of the design specification for the 2CV was that it should be capable of driving over a ploughed field with a basket of eggs on the bonnet without them shaking loose.
Also it had to be capable of carrying 4 people and being driven flat out all day (not on a ploughed field!).
The VW Beetle had to do the last two as well.
I guess if this was the brief for Issigonis we'd be tinkering with air cooled engines too.

[morrisminorbzh]

Just been out to the newsagent in my village and bought Gazoline n°177 - this is indeed a very good 6-page article concerning the Morris Minor. The car is registered in Italy and owned by Vittorio Capozzi. The front grill has MMOC badge, so is he a member ? I seem to remember pictures of this Minor on a web site somewhere.

Gazoline is one of the best French magazines concerning classic cars - if you can't read french it's worth buying for the pictures. The current issue has an article on the restauration of a 1959 Triumph TR3A and short articles on cars such as Frazer Nash, a 1971 Futura, a 1967 FWM, and a Gilberns from 1959 -1973.

There are also lots of articles giving advice on restauration work, obviously mostly French classic cars.

As soon as my scanner is repaired will copy the article.

A bientôt

Michael

[LouiseM]

As soon as my scanner is repaired will copy the article.

The article is subject to copyright:

All texts and pictures are the property of the magazine and are covered by a copyright notice. Any reproduction is strictly forbidden.

So no problem with posting a direct link to the article as joeone62 has done but please don't post any scanned articles on the forum. Thank you.

[pingis]

And if the French article wasn't enough for you - here's one in Swedish: http://www.aftonbladet.se/bil/retro/article8061677.ab

[Trabantdave]

Good magazine is Gazoline! I always get the current mag. when doing the 'Supermarket Sweep' through Auchan at Calais or Grande-Synthe prior to boarding the ferry; we travel over to and through France quite often.... So far have not taken the Morris as the Civic has infinitely more wine-carrying capacity, but will take her at least once, but only when I have found a suitable period GB plate (haha).

In three weeks we are off to Krakow in Poland by car, via Amsterdam and East Berlin (Hauptstadt der DDR, to those german-speakers out there ) and returning via Leipzig and Brussels.

This marathon will culminate in the usual four hour orgy of wine and cheese buying.

Classic car wise, there's a few gems in Poland from the communist days; my wife is Polish and we are looking at buying one of the domestic products of her childhood such as the Syrena and Warszawa- Syrena is a 3-cylinder two-stroke that was bult from the early 1960's to the 80's and Warszawa is a locally buit version of the Soviet Pobieda. There's a few Trabant and the occasional Dacia (Renault 12) but most Poles got rid of their PRL built cars in favour of secondhand Opels etc from Germany (sadly). We have a Syrena to look at while we are there which her brother knew of and it is excellent, 1969 and only 37,000 km on the clock!

You do still see a lot of the Fiat 126 which are known as Maluch (baby or 'small one') but far fewer of the Polski-Fiat 125 (Duzy Fiat-Big Fiat) and some of the FSO Polonez and its later variants. There's a couple of Polish classic car magazines too, and the German mags are easily obtained too.

We are planning on moving over to Poland medium-term and will be taking Morris

I have been buying a series of diecast car partworks called Koltowe Auta PRL-u http://www.kultoweauta.pl/opis.php which are excellent-why don't the publishers here do something similar instead of the constant diet of c*ap like Hello etc?

Regards

Dave

[dp]

[EDIT]
Classic car wise, there's a few gems in Poland from the communist days; my wife is Polish and we are looking at buying one of the domestic products of her childhood such as the Syrena and Warszawa- Syrena is a 3-cylinder two-stroke that was bult from the early 1960's to the 80's and Warszawa is a locally buit version of the Soviet Pobieda. There's a few Trabant and the occasional Dacia (Renault 12) but most Poles got rid of their PRL built cars in favour of secondhand Opels etc from Germany (sadly). We have a Syrena to look at while we are there which her brother knew of and it is excellent, 1969 and only 37,000 km on the clock!

You do still see a lot of the Fiat 126 which are known as Maluch (baby or 'small one') but far fewer of the Polski-Fiat 125 (Duzy Fiat-Big Fiat) and some of the FSO Polonez and its later variants. There's a couple of Polish classic car magazines too, and the German mags are easily obtained too.

We are planning on moving over to Poland medium-term and will be taking Morris

Oh, just timed out & now have to type it all again...

Berlin: If you're into East German motorbikes, there'a an under-publicised motorbike museum underneath the arches (who's singing the Flannigan & Allen tune? ) near to Alexanderplatz Station. Also has some Trabants

Berlin now has an environmental central zone. Only cars that have a green sticker are allowed in. And 'classics', 30 years' old or more. Locals say the police wouldn't know what to do about a foreign non-stickered car but officially foreign cars are supposed to have nonetheless.

Info:

https://www.berlin.de/sen/umwelt/luftqu ... ere_en.pdf
http://www.berlin.de/sen/umwelt/luftqua ... ines.shtml

Actually, I'll be over there from 8th - 11th July if you're about and want to talk Eastern Europe.

Poland. I was there in the '80s in communist times and remember seeing Syrenias. I remember thinking it was a bit like a Minor. Nice clean lines. Back then I was a petrol-head but recognised almost nothing as E.European cars didn't really feature in the UK press at the time and the Internet wasn't invented; no googling. I asked the family I was with what it was and they said it was "rubbish"! I guessed '50s from the styling but certain features that would have been chrome were plastic Eg the indicator holders.

Most of the cars I saw were Małuchs, and they really seemed to be used hard and to take it. I had a 126 bis as my daily in England & it was interesting that the Poles didn't switch away from air-cooled technology for the home market when they were exporting water-cooled Bis's.

Going back a few years ago, it's amazing how there are so few of the old cars and how the place has improved.