Bonus Episode - Trade Talks: The Sequel!

This is The Tiger Kickers, Classic Car Chat with Max and Matt. Hello and welcome to this latest

Tiger Kickers episode. This time, it's a trade talk special, as we talk to the people selling

classic cars. Now I'm here at the classic motor hub in Bibery, I came here in January,

so time to make a return trip to talk about the market, and kick the tyres on a few cars they've

got in stock. Plus, it's also near my house, and serves good coffee. So lots of reasons for a

Tiger Kickers, trade talks, special autumn bonus episode, Bonanza. The classic motor hub is just

outside Bibery in Gloucestershire. Now, one of the big draws here is they do lots of classic

car events and meets at the weekends. It's also got some great driving roads nearby,

plus this is the big thing, two massive barns, full of mouthwatering cars for sale,

including four I really want to look at in more detail. The first is a 2007 Aston Martin V8

Vantage, which I think are both beautiful drivers cars, and probably about as cheap as they're

going to get. Secondly, an Aston Hilly 3000 Mark II, not as pretty as a Hilly 100 maybe,

but possibly a bit more usable. Then there's a Lotus Elan sprint. Sometimes I think Lotus is

get forgotten about, but the Elan is both genuinely fast, as well as a brilliant drive.

And then there's a great big Bentley Continental T. Now, is this the last proper Bentley? I mean,

we could discuss that for hours, but probably the most sinister Bentley ever made, especially in black

on black, like this one, will look at in a minute. Now, we were hoping for a drive, but Storm Amy has

other ideas, and it's absolutely pouring with rain. Two of my picks are convertibles, sensible,

and the other two are impossibly shiny, so sadly it's a no-go on getting them out.

Now, we'll talk about all those cars in a minute, but first let's hear from George McGregor,

from the MotorHub sales team about the market and his classic car season.

Well, it's been a fantastic year for sales and weather as well, which has meant that the whole

community has been able to get out there. It's one of my favourite things when I'm not even driving

an old car just in every day car, and you on the road see so many other beautiful old classic cars out,

and it's just lovely. I feel almost quite a British thing to be proud of seeing all these old cars

driving around, and people smiling, and probably my favourite memories this year revolve around

a DB4 that I sold, and the owner is very trusting, and it's good fun, and he's all up for driving

the car. I sold it, and he immediately put I think three and a half thousand miles on it,

which is just brilliant. It's what you need, and we love selling cars to people who are going to

use them and crack on and enjoy them. The DB4 did take a few months to sell as they all do,

especially when they're that expensive, and when it was in the show, it was often troublesome

with starting, because we would go off in a month without starting it, but in the new owner's ownership,

you get in that car now, it's out back in our storage, turn the key and it goes fine, because

it's been used, everything's cleared through, and nothing's been sat in it for ages.

So what are your most memorable drives that you've had this summer then? What's the best car you've

been out in? Whether it's something you've sold, or whether it's just something you've borrowed?

I took with a friend of mine to Germany a four and a half liter Bentley, so 1920, something I can't

remember, and we trailed it the UK leg just to prevent breaking down as much as we can, but we'd

needn't have done that. We'd then drove it to Holland to Germany and no problems whatsoever,

and then we drove it back. That was fantastic for me because I've driven pre-war cars, and they are

very difficult to drive, but I learned everything on that trip, and now I can get in one of those

confidently fire it up and just crack on to go down the road, which before I lacked that experience,

so it's been a lot of learning this year for me driving different kinds of cars.

Can you detect any trends then this year? Have you seen any particular trends you've noticed

and thought people are going for certain cars or certain types of cars? Yes, I think Jaguars,

we've sold a lot of Jaguars this year, we've sold a lot of Astans, but they've always been quite,

the market's always been pretty point, prices obviously come up and down, they do with everything.

But the general prices they have come down, but cars are still selling. The appetite is

absolutely still there, which is so nice. We're all worried, I think that the appetite might

disappear, but it hasn't. Well, I think if anything, falling prices make things

a lot more affordable, then people are more interested, aren't they? Because as soon as the

prices go up, you think that's out of my price range, I'm not interested anymore.

Yeah, then they come into your price range, and you're on it straight away. It's like with the

e-types and XKs, as they've come down in price, I've seen the average age of buyers also coming down.

They see the good deals, the beautiful cars, the great to drive, and they're pretty simple to

maintain as well. Particularly when you're looking at the more modern cars with all the electronics,

you know, something that that a land which is sitting in front of, that's a very, very simple car

to keep going, isn't it? Really simple, and I find often as a little healy, frog-eye sprite,

spit fires as well, they're so brilliant, because they're very affordable, and they're really

easy to maintain, and you can actually drive them on their limits, not your limits. Something like

this 150 race car, we've got here, XK 150 race car. If you're alive driving that on our limit,

we'd probably be in a hedge, but it's with the land and the Sprite and a Spitfire and MGB,

you can drive them how you want to, and you'll never feel like you're going to

quick with anything. Okay, I've poked my head outside and it's still raining, so let's head over

to the car barns. Now, I've put pictures up on Instagram, have a look at the tire kickers UK,

to see them, and then drop me a comment about what you think. Plus, here are all the ways to get in

touch with us, here at the tire kickers. You can get in touch with Max and Matt via our socials.

We're at the tire kickers UK on Instagram, and the tire kickers on Facebook.

So George, first up, what I think is a bargain of the Aston Martin range at the moment,

a V8 vantage, a 2007 4.3, just talked me through this car. It's tremendous value for money,

I think we both agree that. This car, I think we were originally asking £34,000 for it,

which is sort of middle of the range for one of these, but it's relatively low mileage at 36,000

miles. It's got a full dealer and specialist service history. Almost every single year without

fail, it's had an oil change, and it's in a very, very classy spec of silver with a blue leather.

It's a beautiful car. Now, you've got a few Aston Martin's here in six figures, a DB24, a DB6,

I've seen in the showroom, and yet these Aston still V8, still hand-built, still British Aston

Martin, but remarkably cheap for what they are. They are, you know, when you look at even the

more expensive models, the DBS, and then the newer cars, and even some DB7 Zigatos, they're

fundamentally pretty bad cars, and you can go and buy this car, which is so much better for a

fraction of the price. Now, this is a 4.3. There is a raging 4.3 versus 4.7 debate on the internet.

Now, I've driven a 4.3 a few years ago, not particularly quick compared to what it was

up against at the time, but still a very nice, rev-y engine, and it's a V8, so it sounds great.

Yeah, that's the thing with it, you know, it'll never be as quick as it's Ferrari competitors,

or even Porsche's, the turbos, and things like that, but it's what it does have, I think it's class,

you know, and it sounds good, it looks great, and it is still a quick car, you've just got to be

on it a bit more, and revving that naturally aspirated engine.

So, inside of the V8 Vantage, there's a lovely Alcantara roof, you really feel sat low down,

tucked away behind the dashboard. It's a great feeling car, this is a manual one as well,

so the best spec. Yeah, it's, you know, you're wrapped in luxury, essentially, but you're still in

a sports car, so I think that's, you know, if you get in a Ferrari of the same age,

they are very luxurious, you know, full of leather, but they're very hard, they're very aggressive,

these are so much more relaxing, more comfortable, and just fun, and as you said, the manual gearbox is

essential. If you look past the electric window switches and the remote mirrors from Volvo V70,

which is a fair bit of part sharing at the time, oh, and the key, yeah, the room has it, sorry,

if you take the leather off the back of the key here, there is a Volvo logo on the back.

If we skip over that, actually, the feeling inside here is fantastic, it feels so expensive,

it's all leather, it's got a beautiful seat to it, they're very comfortable, and actually the

interior, I know it's a bit old now, especially when the sat nav screen pops up, but it's still a great

looking interior. It is, and you know, it feels expensive because they, they were expensive cars,

it's sort of a shame that people have lost so much money over the years on these cars, but now,

for the average punter, you and I, we can go and get a really luxurious car, for not a lot of money

in the scheme of things. This car's just sold, actually, I think the customer's coming to pick it up

today, so we're better not put fingerprints all over it, but what's the story with these,

then a pretty good secondhand buy? Whenever we get one of these in for sale, we only get the manual

examples in for sale because they're the most desirable. Whenever we get one in for sale,

they fly out the door, usually, within a week, which is pretty crazy for us, because we're used to

selling, you know, the more classic stuff, which usually tends to, it tends to sit for a bit longer,

we love selling them. There's the classic Aston fault code problem, if you leave them standing too

long on their own. When the batteries get low, the car throws up some warning lights, and they need

to be kept on charge, but most importantly, like all cars, they really need to be driven.

Everything needs to get hot, and a lot of people make the mistake of putting them away for

six months, often longer, thinking, oh, it'll be fine, it's a modern car, but it still needs using.

Next up, a 1961 Aston Heli 3000 Mark II, this is the BT7, so it's the 2 plus 2 with very small

seats in the back, but you do get as a driver a bit more space. You do, yeah, and I think it's a real

sweet spot for the Heli Range, the 106 being a very, very pretty car, and the four lacking a

little bit of power, but still a great engine. When they went to the 3000s, they got slightly bigger,

but still the Mark II is the much prettier car with the sort of flat sloping back. When they went

to the Mark III, obviously they have bigger roofs that are much more practical to put up and down,

but they sit up really high, and I don't think they're quite as good looking, but more practical.

So what's the story on this car? It's a kind of ice-blue metallic over old English white factory

overdrive, factory wire wheels. It was restored in the early 90s, and then when it was sold

to the current owner in 2020 as part of the dealership at the time, agreed to repaint the car.

So the paint you see here is really fresh, really nice. They also added these side vents here,

which is a really cool modification. The engine has been rebuilt by a company called

Rules Motorsport, who are very well known for their Heli Racing. This is a good driver's car.

I wouldn't call you the fast road spec because it's missing a roll cage and

brakes and all of that. It's just a really, it was built for sort of fun classic driving.

So the front bumpers have been removed. It's got a pair of classic spotlights, which makes it look

really, really aggressive. It's a great looking car these Helis, and again it's one of those cars

with generational change that are coming down in price. Yes, and as the prices are coming down,

the generation with the money are looking to buy cars in the 80s, but they're not stupid. They're

seeing these cars coming down and they're going, well, that's a beautiful car for the money.

And I find the average age of a Heli owner and an E-type owner is coming down at the moment.

Well, there's still iconic cars, aren't they? They're still great poster cars. It doesn't matter

if you grew up with them or not. You know, everybody who's got petrol running through their vanes

would like a Heli and would like an E-type. Exactly. And they're so unoffensive as well.

It's not like buying a yellow Lamborghini where you're going to get certain gestures as you drive

down the road. Everyone loves a Heli. Everyone loves an E-type. It's such a wonderful

experience to drive a known one of these cars. Let's get in and have a quick look at the interior,

shall we? If you go around the driver's side, I'll come in the passenger side.

Surprising amounts of space and quite comfortable actually as a passenger. I mean,

the steering wheel is quite close to you, isn't it? But you do have to get a grip on it.

Yeah, but it's brilliant because it's right there, but it's not so close you're uncomfortable,

but you really get a sense of feel for a proper old driving experience. You know,

having a bit of a razz driving quite quickly, that it's so much fun and very involving.

The gear lever comes out of you. The most bizarre angle, if you've got the clutch down on that,

I see if I can get it to move. I can't hold there yet. So actually, second is right flat on the floor.

And it makes for fun driving because you've really got to move the gears around and it sort of reminds

me a little bit of like an old Bentley or something like that. It's good fun. It's good fun.

This is a mark two. So the windows aren't wind up. How do you do that? You strap them on.

As you can see here, there's a bolt that you undo. It slots in there, and then on the top of

the outside of the door there, there's a pin that slots in. And they're good windows. They actually

seal surprisingly well. I mean, you don't want to get caught in the rain. You will get wet,

but it's handy on a chilly day when you want to have the roof down. Pop the windows on,

just gives you a bit more shelter. And then it's the mark three that have the wind up windows?

Yes, and great cars. Very, very practical. And I grew up with a mark three, so I don't feel I'm

being harsh by saying this, but I think the mark twos are the prettier cars.

So, bright, bright yellow. 1972 Lotus, a land sprint drophead coupé. This is gorgeous.

It stands out in a sea of other cars just with that super bright yellow paint.

I'm not a fan of yellow cars, maybe less than a Ferrari, but I think if you're going to have

an land, it's got to be yellow or blue. Now, I was looking at this last night and the spec of it,

the sprint is a really, really quick car. In period, it was not to 60 seconds, around six seconds,

so that was quicker than a Lamborghini Mure, I think. I'd forgotten how quick these were.

Yeah, it's faster than my modern BMW diesel. It's absolutely mad. And they are brilliant,

but when they're in their element, I think, is on roads like around the classic motor,

you know, type whiny B roads, you can really throw them around the corners and get the most out of

them. On a big open A roads, like the Fossway or something like that, you're sort of going

to be revving the nuts off the car to keep up with anything else going quickly, but they are

brilliant. They are quick, but it's the handling. It's just epic. So, tell me a bit about this one,

because we were talking about this and it kind of looks like original paint, because you've

got some cracking in the fiberglass, but it doesn't look like it's actually being restored.

No, it looks really, really nice in my opinion. And the cracking is quite, it's characterful.

It shows you the cars had a life and it's not a car you need to be worried about using. You get

on, drive it and have fun. And this car has a very nice, freshly reable engine that's a little

bit hotter than the standard sprint engine, but it's also got a roll cage fitted to it. So,

it was built for proper fast road use. Right, let's try and get in this one, because it looks so

small. It looks even smaller than the Heli, but actually when you get inside the lands,

they do have a remarkable amount of space. This is more spacious than the Heli, isn't it? This

is a bigger car on the inside. It's weird, isn't it? The dash is quite far away from you,

which it sort of gives you a real sense of size. It makes you feel like it's a lot bigger than

it actually is. Now, in the Aston Martin Vantage, we pointed out the Volvo electric window switches.

It would be remiss not to point out that these door handles were also in the marina at the time.

Yes, yeah, exactly. But it's such a cute interior, isn't it? It's very small, the steering wheel

is tiny, it's like a 10-P piece, and all the switches have that slight kit feel to them,

but they do look good. It looks really great, and I can imagine when the car came out,

getting in one of these would have been quite something. Just describe what this is like to drive.

Very engaging, you've got a very short throw on the gear change, which everyone loves, and nippy,

really, really nippy. You know, you can really feel the power that they've got, and I think with

the gearbox being so low down, it creates a wonderful driving experience. 700 kilograms

this, so it's about the same weight as a 2CV, and with that engine, which is quite a quick engine,

it's a seriously fast car, and I think people forget that about a lands when they're comparing them

with other cars from the 60s and 70s, is that how quick and how surprisingly quick these can be.

Yeah, when they came out, I can imagine they were people thrashing the nuts off the

round central London, and all over the countryside, and people would be overtaking by them and go,

wow, I want one of those. It is a bit of a kit car, isn't it, because the

block came from a Ford, a Ford Kent block with a Lotus head. The front suspension came from a

trim, Harold, I think, and then Colin Chapman did the suspension at the back. So there's a hint

of kit about it, but actually it does feel like a very resolved sports car sitting inside.

Absolutely, and some of the best cars ever made have come, bits and bobs of the car have come from

different marks and people over the years. How popular are they? They're very popular,

I think, only when they're priced correctly. Let's go down to this, pull the marina door handles.

It's haunted, they were in a maxi as well or something like that. I think so. It's a whole BL,

and this is a classic generic BL door handle. Now, I think going from the tinier land to this next

car is sublime to the ridiculous. If you're in a state agent and you were pricing cars on square

footage, the land is overpriced, but this next car is massively underpriced. It's a 2002 Bentley

Continental T. Now, these are huge when you stand next to them. Absolutely massive. I mean,

they are ridiculous, really. When you look at them and you drive them, this car is really,

it stands out from the normal ones you see on the market because it's lived in a fabulous collection

of Bentley's of the era, quite a lot of them. The chap who owns it has genuinely treated it

with a no expense spare attitude. It's had an engine rebuild. It's actually been mostly restored

over the years. It's really hard to find another one that's had the level of money spent on it,

but this one has. This is a black-on-black car. It's so menacing. If this was in a pub,

you just walk out of the pub as quick as possible. If it started looking at you, it's an amazing

looking car. Imagine seeing this thing coming up in your rearview mirror at 100 miles an hour.

You think it's some old drug dealer coming up behind you. Very stylish drug dealer, though. Now,

the Continental T's are different because there's only 300 of these made, 300-ish. I think only

100 in right-hand drive. As opposed to the Continental R, they shorten the wheelbase by four inches

and then flare the arches and just the look of them. The paint works in really good condition.

It's been repainted in its life, which is difficult to find. Another one that has the whole car

has been repainted. It's just been really, really well looked after. I don't think we're asking

crazy money for it. I think it's actually quite a good buy. What is the price on the windscreen?

I can see the car park pass from Polo, from the Cartier International Polo. That gives you a hint of

what this car's been doing, but how much is it? It's £90,000, which you can buy cars for less,

but they won't have had the care and detail put into them that this car has had.

Right, let's get inside. I do love these Continental T's. They're just such a threatening car.

When you walk down the side of it, the rear wheel arch is stick out by about five or six inches.

Huge chrome buttons to get in and then it's launched itself into the passenger seat.

This dashboard reminds me of an organ in a church because it's right up staring flat at you.

It's a huge slab of, and this is turned aluminium. It reminds me of

being in the cockpit of an aircraft with all these dials. This is the red starter button in the

middle of the dash, which is just absolutely epic. I mean, you feel like you're going to take off

when you drive this thing down the road. Now, I'm going to do that thing you did when you're a child

and sitting in car showrooms, is play with the switches. They're all incredibly solid, aren't they?

It's a real feel of the organ pull vents for the air. Yeah, that's amazing.

Even the noise of the starter button, it's just brilliant. Everything is built really well.

Everything you touch feels pretty expensive, but that's what you expect from a car that cost,

must have cost an absolute fortune when it was new. I think they were the most expensive car

on sale for a while, weren't they? It's the world's most expensive car and it does feel like it.

I'm just going to describe the dashboard because we've got water temperature, turbo boost,

petrol. You'll need that a lot outside temperature gauge, clock, oil temperature and batteries.

You've got this array of gauges staring you in the face and then you've got the speedo and the

rev counter. It doesn't rev a huge amount of this car, does it? Because it's a really torque car.

Very torquey, big V8, they never tend to rev that high, but you can feel it when you drive it,

you just know. You never need to rev this car high and actually when you do floor them,

I find being an auto unless you force it to be in the lowest gear possible. They'll change gear

quite early because they must know it's got all the torque in the world and it just doesn't need

to rev to the red line. What do these like to drive? They are a little bit dated, they are a little

bit wafty, they don't handle that great, but you know people used to use these to smoke around

London and then blitz on the motorway at 100 miles an hour. So it was never supposed to be fantastic

handling cars, but they do, they're all right, they handle okay. It's surprising coming from

the Elan because the Elan is a small car that felt big inside. This is a massive car that feels

quite small inside and actually where you've got your seat, the back seats, you don't really have

any leg room and for a car this big, it's a very small cockpit. It is actually and I think when

they made the new shape continental, what I call the VW continental, things got a little bit more

spacious in the inside. You can actually fit quite tall people in the back comfortably,

because of these, they were still, the back seats are pretty useless in most cases. Black

headlining, black leather everywhere, big black steering wheel, it just makes you feel sinister,

this is a Bond villain car. It is, it just makes you want to light up a massive cigar.

Right, lifting the bonnet to have a look at this absolutely massive engine. Now this is the very

traditional kind of like Rolls Royce 6 and 3 quarter liter engine, wasn't it, but with a great

big turbo on it and it's vast. The engine was used up until the Mulsan, which I think ceased

production in 2020. So they used this engine for a long time and it originated I think someone

might correct me, you are a silver shadow nut. But it's the same sort of basic engine that came

from that. The sound of that bonnet, it's like a door, exactly. Yeah, a barn door on a

Georgian house is just slammed, isn't it? It's perfect, absolutely lovely. All the cars we've

talked about today are for sale, they're on the website, if you want to go and do a bit of

window shopping, particularly look at the Bentley Continental T, which is tremendous and that lovely

little Lotus Alana, I was really taken by that. So that's it for this episode, thank you very much for

listening, see you next time on the tire kickers, goodbye.

Bonus Episode - Trade Talks: The Sequel!

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Aston Martin Healey 3000 Mark II

Aston Martin DB4

Austin Healey Sprite

4.3 vs 4.7 debate

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