La Mini è un'automobile prodotta dal 1959 al 2000, con vari marchi e da vari costruttori, seguendo tutte le vicissitudini della Casa automobilistica britannica che la produceva in origine: la British Motor Corporation (abbreviata BMC).
Indice[nascondi]
1 La nascita
2 L'evoluzione negli anni sessanta
3 Seconda serie
4 Gli anni settanta: la Mini classica e la Clubman
5 Gli anni ottanta: la rivincita della Mini classica
6 La Mini classica negli anni novanta
7 Sostituzione
8 Versioni derivate
8.1 Innocenti Mini
9 Elaboratori anni sessanta
10 Note
11 Voci correlate
12 Altri progetti
13 Collegamenti esterni
La nascita [modifica]
Indice[nascondi]
1 La nascita
2 L'evoluzione negli anni sessanta
3 Seconda serie
4 Gli anni settanta: la Mini classica e la Clubman
5 Gli anni ottanta: la rivincita della Mini classica
6 La Mini classica negli anni novanta
7 Sostituzione
8 Versioni derivate
8.1 Innocenti Mini
9 Elaboratori anni sessanta
10 Note
11 Voci correlate
12 Altri progetti
13 Collegamenti esterni
La nascita [modifica]
A metà degli anni cinquanta la neonata BMC aveva l'esigenza, alla luce della Crisi del Canale di Suez del 1956 che aveva portato aumenti sensibili nei prezzi dei carburanti, di realizzare una vettura da città, piccola ed economica, ma in grado di trasportare almeno 4 persone. Leonard Lord, timoniere della BMC, affidò il compito all'ingegnere d'origine greca Alec Issigonis. Issigonis fece un capolavoro: grazie alla disposizione anteriore trasversale del motore, al cambio montato sotto il motore (con coppa dell'olio unica) e alla trazione anteriore, la vettura, lunga appena 303 centimetri, poteva ospitare (con discreto spazio) 4 persone. La carrozzeria era a 2 volumi con 2 porte.
Altri elementi di modernità erano forniti dalle sospensioni a ruote indipendenti con elementi elastici in gomma (al posto delle molle), dalle ruote da 10 pollici (per limitare l'invasività nell'abitacolo dei parafanghi) e dallo sportello del vano bagagli (in sé angusto e occupato, per 1/4, dal serbatoio del carburante) ribaltabile verso il basso (come anche la targa, che era sempre visibile) per trasportare colli ingombranti.
Il motore era un classico A-Series (dotato di un albero a camme laterale), con cilindrata ridotta a 848cc, alimentazione a carburatore e potenza di 34 cv. Per farlo entrare nel piccolo vano, Issigonis aveva dovuto spostare il radiatore sul lato sinistro del motore.
Per contenere i costi di produzione le cerniere delle porte e le saldature (mascherate dai gocciolatoi) erano a vista.
La vetturetta debuttò il 26 agosto del 1959, con marchi Austin e Morris. Sia l'Austin Seven che la Morris Mini Minor (questi i nomi commerciali) erano disponibili negli allestimenti standard e De Luxe.
La Mini s'affermò piuttosto lentamente, per via dell'originalità estetica e di qualche problema qualitativo iniziale. Pian piano divenne però uno straordinario successo e il pubblico ne apprezzò anche altre doti sorprendenti: la straordinaria agilità (sembrava un kart) e l'eccezionale tenuta di strada.
L'evoluzione negli anni sessanta [modifica]
Altri elementi di modernità erano forniti dalle sospensioni a ruote indipendenti con elementi elastici in gomma (al posto delle molle), dalle ruote da 10 pollici (per limitare l'invasività nell'abitacolo dei parafanghi) e dallo sportello del vano bagagli (in sé angusto e occupato, per 1/4, dal serbatoio del carburante) ribaltabile verso il basso (come anche la targa, che era sempre visibile) per trasportare colli ingombranti.
Il motore era un classico A-Series (dotato di un albero a camme laterale), con cilindrata ridotta a 848cc, alimentazione a carburatore e potenza di 34 cv. Per farlo entrare nel piccolo vano, Issigonis aveva dovuto spostare il radiatore sul lato sinistro del motore.
Per contenere i costi di produzione le cerniere delle porte e le saldature (mascherate dai gocciolatoi) erano a vista.
La vetturetta debuttò il 26 agosto del 1959, con marchi Austin e Morris. Sia l'Austin Seven che la Morris Mini Minor (questi i nomi commerciali) erano disponibili negli allestimenti standard e De Luxe.
La Mini s'affermò piuttosto lentamente, per via dell'originalità estetica e di qualche problema qualitativo iniziale. Pian piano divenne però uno straordinario successo e il pubblico ne apprezzò anche altre doti sorprendenti: la straordinaria agilità (sembrava un kart) e l'eccezionale tenuta di strada.
L'evoluzione negli anni sessanta [modifica]
Nel 1960 venne lanciata la versione station wagon della Mini, con passo allungato, portellone a doppio battente e listelli in legno. La nuova versione, dotata dello stesso motore della berlina, era disponibile nella versione Austin (denominata Seven Countryman) e Morris (Mini Minor Traveller), negli allestimenti standard e De Luxe. Nel 1961 la versione con listelli in legno venne affiancata da quella con carrozzeria interamente metallica. Sempre nel 1961, per offrire un modello dotato di un bagagliaio più capiente, venne presentata una versione a 3 volumi (con coda dotata anche di "pinne") della Mini. La linea, discutibile, presentava anche un frontale ridisegnato, con una calandra a sviluppo verticale. La nuova variante della Mini venne commercializzata in due versioni: Wolseley Hornet (più economica) e Riley Riley Elf (più lussuosa, con plancia in legno). Ma il 1961 fu un anno importante per la Mini soprattutto per il lancio della Mini Cooper, ovvero la versione sportiva elaborata da John Cooper (titolare dell'omonimo team di Formula 1). L'elaborazione consisteva, essenzialmente, nell'incremento di cilindrata da 848 a 997cc, nell'adozione di 2 carburatori tipo SU da 1.25, di freni anteriori a disco e di un assetto rivisto. La potenza di 55cv (non molti in assoluto) era sufficiente, abbinata alle straordinarie doti stradali della Mini, a garantire ottime prestazioni.
La Mini Cooper, opportunamente elaborata, s'aggiudicò la vittoria di classe del rally di Montecarlo del 1963, con alla sua guida il pilota Timo Mäkinen. Alla fine dello stesso anno le Wolseley Hornet e le Riley Elf adottarono un motore di cilindrata maggiorata a 998cc e potenza di 38cv. Sul finire del 1964 tutte le Mini berlina (incluse le Cooper, le Cooper S e le varianti Wolseley e Riley) adottarono le sospensioni Hydrolastic, già montate dal 1962 sulle Austin e Morris 1100. Le versioni station wagon mantennero, invece, le sospensioni d'origine. Con l'occasione la Cooper venne affiancata dalla Cooper S, con motore di 1071cc da 70cv. La Cooper S (1071cc) con potenza portata a circa 85Cv s'aggiudicò il rally di Montecarlo edizione del '64. Nel 1964 la gamma Cooper e Cooper S cambiò ancora, con l'introduzione di una nuova versione per la Cooper "normale" con motore portato a 998cc (55CV) e la produzione di due nuovi modelli Cooper S 1.0 (970cc, 65cv) e la Cooper S 1.275 (1275cc, 76cv) che si andarono ad affiancare alla oramai famosa versione da 1071cc (70cv)che vinse il Monte Carlo del '64. La Cooper S 1.275 s'aggiudicò inoltre nuovamente il rally di Montecarlo nel 1965, 1966 (fu tuttavia squalificata per fanali irregolari) e nel 1967, nonché il rally dell'Acropoli del 1967.
Austin/Morris Mini 850
Austin/Morris Mini 850 De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini 1000 Super De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper 997 (54Cv, prodotta dal 1961-1964)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper 998 (55Cv, prodotta dal 1964-1967)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper S 1070 (71Cv, prodotta dal 1963-1964)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper S 970 (65Cv, prodotta dal 1964-1965)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper S 1275 (76Cv, prodotta dal 1964-1967)
Wolseley Hornet 1000
Riley Elf 1000
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 850
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 850 De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 1000 Super De Luxe
Bisogna premettere che inizialmente lo stesso Issigonis all'idea di elaborare la "sua" Mini non era particolarmente entusiasta ma fu lo stesso Cooper all'inizio degli anni '60 a farlo ricredere anche grazie ad una dimostrazione pratica delle potenzialità della piccola vettura. La risposta alla domanda del titolo è facile: "se si vuole vincere il più possibile bisogna portare macchine in più categorie". La "S" da 1071cc non poteva competere nelle classi sotto i 1000cc e inoltre aveva molte difficoltà a competere con certi giganti, sia di mole che di cilindrata e potenza, nella categoria assoluta dei rally (la vittoria assoluta al rally di Monte Carlo del '64 era stata ottenuta grazie alla correzione del tempo finale come previsto dal regolamento dell'epoca in base alla cilindrata). Per questi motivi fu messa a punto la Cooper S 1000 (prodotta in poco più di 900 esemplari) per gareggiare nelle categorie riservate alle piccole cilindrate mentre la 1275cc fu pensata per competere nella classe assoluta aperta anche a vetture di oltre 2000cc.
Seconda serie [modifica]
Una Morris Cooper seconda serie del 1969
Retro di una Austin Mini Cooper seconda serie del 1968
Nel 1967 fu introdotta la Mini seconda serie, che venne prodotta fino al 1969. In verità le modifiche furono modeste e diversificate a seconda delle versioni. Le Mini berlina di Austin e Morris (incluse le Cooper) adottarono una nuova calandra (ampliata), un lunotto leggermente ampliato e luci posteriori rettangolari (senza la luce della retromarcia) e interni monocolore neri (Cooper e Cooper S). Le station wagon Traveller e Countryman (sempre disponibili nelle varianti con o senza inserti esterni in legno) adottarono la nuova calandra delle berline. Le versioni Austin e Morris, berlina o station wagon, erano inoltre disponibili in versione Super De Luxe, equipaggiate col motore di 998cc da 38cv. Più consistenti gli aggiornamenti alle Wolseley Hornet e Riley Elf: vetri discendenti, cerniere delle porte nascoste, impianto di ventilazione migliorato, trasmissione manuale migliorata e disponibilità, a richiesta, di un cambio automatico a 4 rapporti.
La gamma della seconda serie comprendeva:
Austin/Morris Mini 850
Austin/Morris Mini 850 De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini 1000 Super De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper 1000 (998cc)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper S 1275
Wolseley Hornet 1000
Riley Elf 1000
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 850
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 850 De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 1000 Super De Luxe
La gamma fu completata nel 1968 con l'introduzione della Mini Matic, con motore 1000 da 38cv e cambio automatico a 4 rapporti della Automotive Products. La parte interessante della nuova trasmissione automatica era la logica di funzionamento. La selezione dei rapporti avveniva in base a quanto si premeva l'acceleratore: premendolo poco i cambi di marcia avvenivano a basso numero di giri, premendolo a fondo le marce venivano tirate il più possibile, era inoltre dotato del sistema "kick down" per la fase di ripresa.
Nel 1969 iniziò la produzione della terza serie (MK3) che terminò sul finire del 1971.
Gli anni settanta: la Mini classica e la Clubman [modifica]
Austin/Morris Mini 850
Austin/Morris Mini 850 De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini 1000 Super De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper 997 (54Cv, prodotta dal 1961-1964)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper 998 (55Cv, prodotta dal 1964-1967)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper S 1070 (71Cv, prodotta dal 1963-1964)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper S 970 (65Cv, prodotta dal 1964-1965)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper S 1275 (76Cv, prodotta dal 1964-1967)
Wolseley Hornet 1000
Riley Elf 1000
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 850
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 850 De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 1000 Super De Luxe
Bisogna premettere che inizialmente lo stesso Issigonis all'idea di elaborare la "sua" Mini non era particolarmente entusiasta ma fu lo stesso Cooper all'inizio degli anni '60 a farlo ricredere anche grazie ad una dimostrazione pratica delle potenzialità della piccola vettura. La risposta alla domanda del titolo è facile: "se si vuole vincere il più possibile bisogna portare macchine in più categorie". La "S" da 1071cc non poteva competere nelle classi sotto i 1000cc e inoltre aveva molte difficoltà a competere con certi giganti, sia di mole che di cilindrata e potenza, nella categoria assoluta dei rally (la vittoria assoluta al rally di Monte Carlo del '64 era stata ottenuta grazie alla correzione del tempo finale come previsto dal regolamento dell'epoca in base alla cilindrata). Per questi motivi fu messa a punto la Cooper S 1000 (prodotta in poco più di 900 esemplari) per gareggiare nelle categorie riservate alle piccole cilindrate mentre la 1275cc fu pensata per competere nella classe assoluta aperta anche a vetture di oltre 2000cc.
Seconda serie [modifica]
Una Morris Cooper seconda serie del 1969
Retro di una Austin Mini Cooper seconda serie del 1968
Nel 1967 fu introdotta la Mini seconda serie, che venne prodotta fino al 1969. In verità le modifiche furono modeste e diversificate a seconda delle versioni. Le Mini berlina di Austin e Morris (incluse le Cooper) adottarono una nuova calandra (ampliata), un lunotto leggermente ampliato e luci posteriori rettangolari (senza la luce della retromarcia) e interni monocolore neri (Cooper e Cooper S). Le station wagon Traveller e Countryman (sempre disponibili nelle varianti con o senza inserti esterni in legno) adottarono la nuova calandra delle berline. Le versioni Austin e Morris, berlina o station wagon, erano inoltre disponibili in versione Super De Luxe, equipaggiate col motore di 998cc da 38cv. Più consistenti gli aggiornamenti alle Wolseley Hornet e Riley Elf: vetri discendenti, cerniere delle porte nascoste, impianto di ventilazione migliorato, trasmissione manuale migliorata e disponibilità, a richiesta, di un cambio automatico a 4 rapporti.
La gamma della seconda serie comprendeva:
Austin/Morris Mini 850
Austin/Morris Mini 850 De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini 1000 Super De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper 1000 (998cc)
Austin/Morris Mini Cooper S 1275
Wolseley Hornet 1000
Riley Elf 1000
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 850
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 850 De Luxe
Austin/Morris Mini Traveller/Countryman 1000 Super De Luxe
La gamma fu completata nel 1968 con l'introduzione della Mini Matic, con motore 1000 da 38cv e cambio automatico a 4 rapporti della Automotive Products. La parte interessante della nuova trasmissione automatica era la logica di funzionamento. La selezione dei rapporti avveniva in base a quanto si premeva l'acceleratore: premendolo poco i cambi di marcia avvenivano a basso numero di giri, premendolo a fondo le marce venivano tirate il più possibile, era inoltre dotato del sistema "kick down" per la fase di ripresa.
Nel 1969 iniziò la produzione della terza serie (MK3) che terminò sul finire del 1971.
Gli anni settanta: la Mini classica e la Clubman [modifica]
Nel 1969, tolte di produzione le poco gradite Wolseley Hornet e Riley Elf, la British Leyland (nuova denominazione della BMC) decise di rendere la Mini una marca a sé stante (abolendo la doppia denominazione Austin e Morris) e d'intervenire sul modello in due direzioni: migliorando la Mini classica e introducendone una versione di lusso (modificata anche esteticamente) in grado di prendere il posto delle dismesse Hornet ed Elf. Il miglioramento della Mini classica si sostanziò, essenzialmente, nell'abolizione delle cerniere a vista sulle porte, nell'adozione dei vetri discendenti (prima erano scorrevoli) e nell'eliminazione delle sospensioni Hydrolastic. All'interno venne modificata la plancia (con la strumentazione spostata al centro e racchiusa in un pannello ovale). La versione station wagon, priva di cornici in legno, si chiamava ora Traveller. Per la versione di lusso la British Leyland decise di puntare su un sostanzioso restyling interno ed esterno. Venne così lanciata, sempre nel 1969, la Mini Clubman. Rispetto alla versione classica la Clubman differiva solo nel frontale (squadrato e allungato) e negli interni (con plancia e sedili ridisegnati). La gamma Clubman comprendeva anche la versione station wagon (con muso ristilizzato e coda identica a quella della Traveller classica), denominata semplicemente Estate. La Clubman berlina soffriva di un evidente squilibrio estetico, generato dalla cattiva armonizzazione tra il frontale squadrato e la coda tondeggiante della Mini. Molto più riuscita la Estate (con la fiancata percorsa da una fascia in finto legno), nella quale le linee tese della coda ed il passo lungo si fondevano meglio (persino della Traveller) col nuovo frontale.
Dal punto di vista tecnico la Mini classica rimaneva disponibile col solo motore di 848cc (ma potenziato a 37cv), mentre la Clubman era mossa dal 998cc portato a 44cv. Rimanevano, infine, in produzione, con le modifiche previste per la Mini classica, le Cooper 1.0 (55cv) e Cooper S 1.3 (76cv), ma non più verniciate in doppia colorazione (per risparmiare!!). Dalla seconda metà del 1971 vi fu l'uscita dal listino di tutti i modelli Cooper con l'esordio però della Mini Clubman GT, mossa dal 1275cc della Cooper S, ma in versione monocarburatore da 58cv. Nel 1974 le Clubman standard adottarono il motore di 1098cc da 48cv. Lo stesso anno la Clubman GT venne equipaggiata con cerchi da 12 pollici, anziché 10.
Nel 1976 la Clubman Estate perse la fascia in finto legno, rimpiazzata da una semplice striscia adesiva in due colori in abbinamento al colore della carrozzeria: argento o bronzo. Lo stesso anno tutte le Clubman adottarono una nuova calandra con una sola feritoia cromata in luogo di quella con tre feritoie cromate, mentre la versione Traveller della Mini classica venne tolta di produzione.
Nel 1976, in considerazione del poco successo della Clubman berlina, la British Leyland decise d'intervenire sulla Mini classica, lanciandone la quarta serie. Nessuna rivoluzione, ma tanti affinamenti: calandra in plastica nera, rivestimenti interni in tessuto, strumentazione rivista. La Mini MK4 era disponibile, inizialmente, nella sola versione 1000 (998cc, 42cv) negli allestimenti base o Special. Nel 1979 tuttavia tornò il motore di 848cc da 37cv abbinato al livello di finitura (semplificato) City.
Gli anni ottanta: la rivincita della Mini classica [modifica]
Nel 1980 la Clubman berlina uscì di listino (rimpiazzata dall'Austin Metro), mentre la Mini City adottò il motore di 998cc. Nel 1982, con l'uscita di scena della Mini Clubman Estate (che pure aveva goduto di un buon successo, molto superiore a quello della berlina) la gamma Mini venne riorganizzata. Alla base si poneva la Mini 1.0 E (riconoscibile per i paraurti neri, la strumentazione ridotta, dotata di un unico strumento al centro della plancia, e i rivestimenti meno pregiati), mentre al top c'erano la Mini 1.0 HLE (con interni migliori e strumentazione spostata davanti al guidatore) e la Mini Mayfair, che presentava la dotazione della HLE con in più interni di maggior pregio, poggiatesta anteriori e contagiri. Nel 1984, la British leyland intervenne ancora sulla Mini classica, dotandola di carreggiate allargate, freni anteriori a disco, codolini in plastica nera sulle ruote, diversi rivestimenti interni. La versione base tornò a chiamarsi City. Una serie impressionante di versioni speciali si susseguì senza tregua tra il 1985 ed il 1991: Mini 25, Mini Red Flame, Mini Red Hot, Mini Check Mate, Mini Studio 2, Mini Piccadilly, per citarne alcune.
La Mini classica negli anni novanta [modifica]
Dal punto di vista tecnico la Mini classica rimaneva disponibile col solo motore di 848cc (ma potenziato a 37cv), mentre la Clubman era mossa dal 998cc portato a 44cv. Rimanevano, infine, in produzione, con le modifiche previste per la Mini classica, le Cooper 1.0 (55cv) e Cooper S 1.3 (76cv), ma non più verniciate in doppia colorazione (per risparmiare!!). Dalla seconda metà del 1971 vi fu l'uscita dal listino di tutti i modelli Cooper con l'esordio però della Mini Clubman GT, mossa dal 1275cc della Cooper S, ma in versione monocarburatore da 58cv. Nel 1974 le Clubman standard adottarono il motore di 1098cc da 48cv. Lo stesso anno la Clubman GT venne equipaggiata con cerchi da 12 pollici, anziché 10.
Nel 1976 la Clubman Estate perse la fascia in finto legno, rimpiazzata da una semplice striscia adesiva in due colori in abbinamento al colore della carrozzeria: argento o bronzo. Lo stesso anno tutte le Clubman adottarono una nuova calandra con una sola feritoia cromata in luogo di quella con tre feritoie cromate, mentre la versione Traveller della Mini classica venne tolta di produzione.
Nel 1976, in considerazione del poco successo della Clubman berlina, la British Leyland decise d'intervenire sulla Mini classica, lanciandone la quarta serie. Nessuna rivoluzione, ma tanti affinamenti: calandra in plastica nera, rivestimenti interni in tessuto, strumentazione rivista. La Mini MK4 era disponibile, inizialmente, nella sola versione 1000 (998cc, 42cv) negli allestimenti base o Special. Nel 1979 tuttavia tornò il motore di 848cc da 37cv abbinato al livello di finitura (semplificato) City.
Gli anni ottanta: la rivincita della Mini classica [modifica]
Nel 1980 la Clubman berlina uscì di listino (rimpiazzata dall'Austin Metro), mentre la Mini City adottò il motore di 998cc. Nel 1982, con l'uscita di scena della Mini Clubman Estate (che pure aveva goduto di un buon successo, molto superiore a quello della berlina) la gamma Mini venne riorganizzata. Alla base si poneva la Mini 1.0 E (riconoscibile per i paraurti neri, la strumentazione ridotta, dotata di un unico strumento al centro della plancia, e i rivestimenti meno pregiati), mentre al top c'erano la Mini 1.0 HLE (con interni migliori e strumentazione spostata davanti al guidatore) e la Mini Mayfair, che presentava la dotazione della HLE con in più interni di maggior pregio, poggiatesta anteriori e contagiri. Nel 1984, la British leyland intervenne ancora sulla Mini classica, dotandola di carreggiate allargate, freni anteriori a disco, codolini in plastica nera sulle ruote, diversi rivestimenti interni. La versione base tornò a chiamarsi City. Una serie impressionante di versioni speciali si susseguì senza tregua tra il 1985 ed il 1991: Mini 25, Mini Red Flame, Mini Red Hot, Mini Check Mate, Mini Studio 2, Mini Piccadilly, per citarne alcune.
La Mini classica negli anni novanta [modifica]
Nel 1990 il Gruppo Rover intervenne sulla Mini, principalmente per ragioni di sicurezza ed inquinamento. La scocca venne rinforzata, mentre il motore, ora di 1275cc, adottò l'alimentazione a iniezione elettronica single point e la marmitta catalitica. La potenza era di 50cv. L'unica versione disponibile sul mercato italiano era la Mayfair (con carrozzeria chiusa o dotata di tetto apribile in tela Open Classic). La calandra tornò cromata. Nel 1991 venne reintrodotta la versione Cooper (riconoscibile per il tetto bianco o nero, i cerchi "Minilite" da 12 pollici e le strip adesive sul cofano motore), con motore 1275cc a carburatore (MK5) fino al 1992 e poi a iniezione singlepoint "spi" (MK6) sempre da 63cv e catalizzate. In questi anni si dà vita ad un acceso campionato mononomarca di velocità su pista riservato alle Cooper. Ci sono competizioni che tuttora, in più parti del mondo, vedono le mini come protagoniste.
Nel 1993 arrivò anche la Mini Cabriolet, con motore della Cooper, allestimenti arricchiti (la plancia era in legno) e vistose appendici aerodinamiche.
Nel 1997, in seguito all'acquisto del Gruppo Rover da parte della BMW (1994), la gamma venne ulteriormente aggiornata: motore ad iniezione elettronica multipoint, airbag lato guida, barre antintrusione nelle portiere, cinture di sicurezza con pretensionatore, radiatore frontale, nuovi interni. La gamma comprendeva le versioni Classic, Cooper (MK7), Cooper Sport-Pack. Quest'ultima aveva fari supplementari, cerchi da 13 pollici, carreggiate allargate e codolini maggiorati. Non venne riproposta la Cabriolet.
Nel 1999 arrivò la versione speciale 40 LE.
La Mini classica uscì di produzione il 4 ottobre 2000, salutata dall'edizione speciale Final Edition che comprendeva quattro modelli: la Seven, la Cooper, la Cooper Sport e la Knightsbridge.
Sostituzione [modifica]
Nel 1993 arrivò anche la Mini Cabriolet, con motore della Cooper, allestimenti arricchiti (la plancia era in legno) e vistose appendici aerodinamiche.
Nel 1997, in seguito all'acquisto del Gruppo Rover da parte della BMW (1994), la gamma venne ulteriormente aggiornata: motore ad iniezione elettronica multipoint, airbag lato guida, barre antintrusione nelle portiere, cinture di sicurezza con pretensionatore, radiatore frontale, nuovi interni. La gamma comprendeva le versioni Classic, Cooper (MK7), Cooper Sport-Pack. Quest'ultima aveva fari supplementari, cerchi da 13 pollici, carreggiate allargate e codolini maggiorati. Non venne riproposta la Cabriolet.
Nel 1999 arrivò la versione speciale 40 LE.
La Mini classica uscì di produzione il 4 ottobre 2000, salutata dall'edizione speciale Final Edition che comprendeva quattro modelli: la Seven, la Cooper, la Cooper Sport e la Knightsbridge.
Sostituzione [modifica]
La British Motor Corporation iniziò a studiare un erede per la Mini alla fine degli anni Sessanta.
Un primo progetto fu affidato ad Alec Issigonis, che nel 1968 sviluppò la 9X: questa vettura, pur essendo più piccola della Mini originale, garantiva un maggiore spazio interno ed era dotata di portellone posteriore, ma non entrò mai in produzione per una questione di costi. Altri progetti si susseguirono negli anni successivi, come la Minissima del 1973 o l'ipotesi di costruire e vendere anche nel Regno Unito la Innocenti Nuova Mini, che debuttò in Italia nel 1974; nessuno di questi, però, arrivò in fase di produzione.
Ulteriori tentativi vennero compiuti negli anni Settanta (progetti ADO 74 e ADO 88), ma un successivo cambio di intenzioni nella dirigenza della British Leyland fece dirigere questi progetti verso la realizzazione di un'automobile di segmento B (e quindi di dimensioni maggiori) che avrebbe affiancato e non sostituito la Mini; debutterà nel 1980 con il nome di Austin Metro.
Il Gruppo Rover iniziò a pensare alla sostituzione della Mini nel 1992. Inizialmente gli sforzi si concentrarono su una rielaborazione in chiave moderna della Mini: venne così ideato e realizzato il prototipo della Minki, una Mini dotata di motore Rover serie K, cambio a 5 marce, sospensioni Hydragas, portellone posteriore, cruscotto completamente nuovo e posizione di guida migliorata; questo progetto venne però abbandonato a causa del rapporto tra investimenti necessari e vendite previste, che secondo gli analisti sarebbe stato piuttosto sfavorevole. Nel 1994 il gruppo Rover venne acquistato dalla BMW: la casa bavarese trovò l'idea della Minky interessante, e l'anno successivo fece costruire un secondo prototipo (chiamato Minki II), con delle sospensioni Hydragas perfezionate e altri piccoli miglioramenti.[2]
Nel frattempo, tuttavia, i piani per la sostituzione della Mini si erano concentrati sulla produzione di un'automobile completamente nuova, e l'idea della Minki fu abbandonata. Si susseguirono diverse proposte, avanzate sia dal gruppo Rover che dalla BMW, ma quella definitiva venne realizzata da Frank Stephenson; nel 2000 la BMW si appropriò del marchio Mini ai danni del gruppo Rover (che divenne gruppo MG Rover) e l'anno seguente mise in commercio la nuova vettura (BMW Mini).
Un primo progetto fu affidato ad Alec Issigonis, che nel 1968 sviluppò la 9X: questa vettura, pur essendo più piccola della Mini originale, garantiva un maggiore spazio interno ed era dotata di portellone posteriore, ma non entrò mai in produzione per una questione di costi. Altri progetti si susseguirono negli anni successivi, come la Minissima del 1973 o l'ipotesi di costruire e vendere anche nel Regno Unito la Innocenti Nuova Mini, che debuttò in Italia nel 1974; nessuno di questi, però, arrivò in fase di produzione.
Ulteriori tentativi vennero compiuti negli anni Settanta (progetti ADO 74 e ADO 88), ma un successivo cambio di intenzioni nella dirigenza della British Leyland fece dirigere questi progetti verso la realizzazione di un'automobile di segmento B (e quindi di dimensioni maggiori) che avrebbe affiancato e non sostituito la Mini; debutterà nel 1980 con il nome di Austin Metro.
Il Gruppo Rover iniziò a pensare alla sostituzione della Mini nel 1992. Inizialmente gli sforzi si concentrarono su una rielaborazione in chiave moderna della Mini: venne così ideato e realizzato il prototipo della Minki, una Mini dotata di motore Rover serie K, cambio a 5 marce, sospensioni Hydragas, portellone posteriore, cruscotto completamente nuovo e posizione di guida migliorata; questo progetto venne però abbandonato a causa del rapporto tra investimenti necessari e vendite previste, che secondo gli analisti sarebbe stato piuttosto sfavorevole. Nel 1994 il gruppo Rover venne acquistato dalla BMW: la casa bavarese trovò l'idea della Minky interessante, e l'anno successivo fece costruire un secondo prototipo (chiamato Minki II), con delle sospensioni Hydragas perfezionate e altri piccoli miglioramenti.[2]
Nel frattempo, tuttavia, i piani per la sostituzione della Mini si erano concentrati sulla produzione di un'automobile completamente nuova, e l'idea della Minki fu abbandonata. Si susseguirono diverse proposte, avanzate sia dal gruppo Rover che dalla BMW, ma quella definitiva venne realizzata da Frank Stephenson; nel 2000 la BMW si appropriò del marchio Mini ai danni del gruppo Rover (che divenne gruppo MG Rover) e l'anno seguente mise in commercio la nuova vettura (BMW Mini).
Versioni derivate [modifica]
Questa sezione sull'argomento trasporti è solo un abbozzo. Contribuisci a migliorarla secondo le convenzioni di Wikipedia. Segui i suggerimenti del progetto di riferimento.
Innocenti Mini [modifica]
Una Innocenti Mini Cooper
La Innocenti Mini fu prodotta su licenza dalla Innocenti di Milano tra il 1965 ed il 1975. Rispetto alle originali inglesi, le versioni Innocenti (comprese le Cooper) presentavano alcune differenze. Avevano interni più accessoriati e meglio rifiniti e molti particolari interni ed esterni furono prodotti da marche italiane (IPRA). Anche per ciò che riguarda la parte meccanica vennero fatte delle scelte diverse come ad esempio l'adozione del servofreno su tutti i modelli Cooper indipendentemente dalla cilindrata (le inglesi montavano il servofreno solamente sulle Cooper S).
Gamma e date di produzione:
Innocenti Mini Mk1 1965-1967 (Mini Cooper 997cc da 55Cv introdotta nel '66)
Innocenti Mini Mk2 1967-1970 (Mini Cooper 998cc da 60Cv introdotta nel '68)
Innocenti Mini Mk3 1970-1973 (Mini Cooper 1275cc da 71Cv introdotta nel '72 e contemporanea uscita di produzione della Cooper 1000)
Innocenti Mini Mk4 1973-1975 (Mini Cooper 1275cc Export da 71Cv introdotta nel '73)
Dalla meccanica della Mini originale la casa milanese trasse anche un modello totalmente separato, la Innocenti Nuova Mini identificata dal mercato anche con le denominazioni (non sempre corrispondenti alla nomenclatura ufficiale della casa dei vari modlli) di "Mini Bertone", "Mini 90" e "Mini DeTomaso".
Elaboratori anni sessanta [modifica]
Qui di seguito è riportata in ordine alfabetico la lunga lista dei preparatori più famosi che hanno dedicato anni all'ideazione di Kit, anche per privati, per far correre e vincere le Mini in tutti i tipi di competizioni:
Alexander conversion
Aquaplane CO ltd.
Arden Conversions
Barwell motors
British Vita
Broadspeed
Cooper
Derrington
Downton
Janspeed
Mangoletsi
Nerus
Oselli
Speedwell
Shorrock
SPQR
Sprinzel
Taurus
Note [modifica]
^ (EN) Production figures in aronline.co.uk. URL consultato il 06-01-2011.
^ http://www.austinmemories.com/page46/page46.html
Voci correlate [modifica]
BMW Mini
Altri progetti [modifica]
Wikimedia Commons contiene file multimediali su BMC Mini
Collegamenti esterni [modifica]
(EN) La Mini su austin-rover.co.uk
Questa sezione sull'argomento trasporti è solo un abbozzo. Contribuisci a migliorarla secondo le convenzioni di Wikipedia. Segui i suggerimenti del progetto di riferimento.
Innocenti Mini [modifica]
Una Innocenti Mini Cooper
La Innocenti Mini fu prodotta su licenza dalla Innocenti di Milano tra il 1965 ed il 1975. Rispetto alle originali inglesi, le versioni Innocenti (comprese le Cooper) presentavano alcune differenze. Avevano interni più accessoriati e meglio rifiniti e molti particolari interni ed esterni furono prodotti da marche italiane (IPRA). Anche per ciò che riguarda la parte meccanica vennero fatte delle scelte diverse come ad esempio l'adozione del servofreno su tutti i modelli Cooper indipendentemente dalla cilindrata (le inglesi montavano il servofreno solamente sulle Cooper S).
Gamma e date di produzione:
Innocenti Mini Mk1 1965-1967 (Mini Cooper 997cc da 55Cv introdotta nel '66)
Innocenti Mini Mk2 1967-1970 (Mini Cooper 998cc da 60Cv introdotta nel '68)
Innocenti Mini Mk3 1970-1973 (Mini Cooper 1275cc da 71Cv introdotta nel '72 e contemporanea uscita di produzione della Cooper 1000)
Innocenti Mini Mk4 1973-1975 (Mini Cooper 1275cc Export da 71Cv introdotta nel '73)
Dalla meccanica della Mini originale la casa milanese trasse anche un modello totalmente separato, la Innocenti Nuova Mini identificata dal mercato anche con le denominazioni (non sempre corrispondenti alla nomenclatura ufficiale della casa dei vari modlli) di "Mini Bertone", "Mini 90" e "Mini DeTomaso".
Elaboratori anni sessanta [modifica]
Qui di seguito è riportata in ordine alfabetico la lunga lista dei preparatori più famosi che hanno dedicato anni all'ideazione di Kit, anche per privati, per far correre e vincere le Mini in tutti i tipi di competizioni:
Alexander conversion
Aquaplane CO ltd.
Arden Conversions
Barwell motors
British Vita
Broadspeed
Cooper
Derrington
Downton
Janspeed
Mangoletsi
Nerus
Oselli
Speedwell
Shorrock
SPQR
Sprinzel
Taurus
Note [modifica]
^ (EN) Production figures in aronline.co.uk. URL consultato il 06-01-2011.
^ http://www.austinmemories.com/page46/page46.html
Voci correlate [modifica]
BMW Mini
Altri progetti [modifica]
Wikimedia Commons contiene file multimediali su BMC Mini
Collegamenti esterni [modifica]
(EN) La Mini su austin-rover.co.uk
estratto da: http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMC_Mini
he Mini is the car that, more than any other, has changed the face of motoring forever. One cannot imagine a cityscape without a Mini being present, but more significantly, it is impossible to look at a small car today without seeing very real evidence of the influence the Mini has had on it. Back in 1990, a panel of 100 industry experts and commentators voted it the most significant car of the century for Autocar magazine in the UK. This sentiment was reflected by the readership of the magazine who, when polled, also named it the most important car of the century, voting it ahead of such cars as the VW Beetle, Ford Model T and Citroën DS.
But what was the reasoning for such a car to be produced, and by the terribly conservative BMC, of all companies?
Response to a crisis
In a word, the Mini was conceived in response to a crisis: it was created from the situation that erupted in the Middle East in less enlightened times, when the Arabs discovered that they could hold the world to ransom using their control of the majority the world’s oil supplies. The situation blew up in September 1956 when Colonel Nasser decided to nationalise the Suez Canal, which the British did not appreciate one bit. The British and French tried to stop him, the Americans pulled the rug from beneath them and the Arabs decided to close their oil pipeline across the Mediterranean. In the ensuing war, the Arabs blew up the Syrian pipeline that provided 20% of Britain’s petrol supply. The upshot of this was that all oil supplies from the Middle East would need to be transported in giant oil tankers around the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa, as the Suez Canal was well and truly closed. This resulted in oil shortages and the renewed popularity of small cars in Europe.
Due to the Middle East crisis, petrol rationing returned to the UK in December 1956 and people began to clamour for more economical means of travel. The sales of 900-1000cc cars quadrupled in the period from 1956 to 1957, while car sales in the wider market slumped. German bubble cars began to appear on these shores, and although they may have been awful to drive, with questionable safety, they did achieve more than 40 miles per gallon, which was the most important statistic a car could boast in those petrol-starved times.
But what was the reasoning for such a car to be produced, and by the terribly conservative BMC, of all companies?
Response to a crisis
In a word, the Mini was conceived in response to a crisis: it was created from the situation that erupted in the Middle East in less enlightened times, when the Arabs discovered that they could hold the world to ransom using their control of the majority the world’s oil supplies. The situation blew up in September 1956 when Colonel Nasser decided to nationalise the Suez Canal, which the British did not appreciate one bit. The British and French tried to stop him, the Americans pulled the rug from beneath them and the Arabs decided to close their oil pipeline across the Mediterranean. In the ensuing war, the Arabs blew up the Syrian pipeline that provided 20% of Britain’s petrol supply. The upshot of this was that all oil supplies from the Middle East would need to be transported in giant oil tankers around the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa, as the Suez Canal was well and truly closed. This resulted in oil shortages and the renewed popularity of small cars in Europe.
Due to the Middle East crisis, petrol rationing returned to the UK in December 1956 and people began to clamour for more economical means of travel. The sales of 900-1000cc cars quadrupled in the period from 1956 to 1957, while car sales in the wider market slumped. German bubble cars began to appear on these shores, and although they may have been awful to drive, with questionable safety, they did achieve more than 40 miles per gallon, which was the most important statistic a car could boast in those petrol-starved times.
One of the earliest sketches for the Mini design as penned by Alec Issigonis. Note how the car changedremarkably little between concept and production.
The Suez crisis came at a turbulent time in BMC’s history, when the company was grappling with the very real problem of trying to reinvent itself. Alec Issigonis had been working on a front wheel drive Morris Minor replacement, with transverse engine and end-on gearbox, before he was seduced away from the newly-formed BMC in 1952 on the promise of developing a supercar for Alvis Motors. This did not work out for Issigonis, and a call from Leonard Lord at the end of 1955, inviting him back to BMC, could not have come at a better time. Newly back in the fold, Issigonis built a small team of engineers – most notably Jack Daniels, his old associate from the Minor days – and resumed his work for the company.
In a parallel response to Herbert Austin’s disgust at the proliferation of motorcycle/sidecar combinations on UK roads thirty-five years previously, Leonard Lord viewed the popularity of bubble cars with the same distaste. As Lord informed Issigonis in March 1957, “God damn these bloody awful bubble cars. We must drive them off the streets by designing a proper small car”. At this point the emphasis of BMC’s new car development programme was changed from replacing the Minor to producing something new and smaller: a car designated XC9003.
A talented team
The Suez crisis came at a turbulent time in BMC’s history, when the company was grappling with the very real problem of trying to reinvent itself. Alec Issigonis had been working on a front wheel drive Morris Minor replacement, with transverse engine and end-on gearbox, before he was seduced away from the newly-formed BMC in 1952 on the promise of developing a supercar for Alvis Motors. This did not work out for Issigonis, and a call from Leonard Lord at the end of 1955, inviting him back to BMC, could not have come at a better time. Newly back in the fold, Issigonis built a small team of engineers – most notably Jack Daniels, his old associate from the Minor days – and resumed his work for the company.
In a parallel response to Herbert Austin’s disgust at the proliferation of motorcycle/sidecar combinations on UK roads thirty-five years previously, Leonard Lord viewed the popularity of bubble cars with the same distaste. As Lord informed Issigonis in March 1957, “God damn these bloody awful bubble cars. We must drive them off the streets by designing a proper small car”. At this point the emphasis of BMC’s new car development programme was changed from replacing the Minor to producing something new and smaller: a car designated XC9003.
A talented team
Issigonis brought Chris Kingham over from Alvis to join Daniels, and these three men set about defining the Mini. Kingham and Daniels were both extremely gifted engineers who not only made many of Issigonis’ ideas happen, but also helped keep his feet on the ground, without tying him down. The entire team comprised these three, four draftsmen and a brace of student engineers. For project ADO15 (the car’s code name was changed when development was moved to the Austin HQ at Longbridge), there was absolutely no question of this being a high budget affair – and yet the demands that Lord placed on these men were extraordinary.
For Issigonis, the car to emulate and ultimately beat in terms of size and packaging was Dante Giacosa’s FIAT 600 (a modernised version of the famous Cinquecento), for this was a practical four-seater which was contained within a size envelope only slightly larger than that intended for the Mini. The packaging solution employed by FIAT was to place the in-line four-cylinder engine out beyond the back axle and the luggage up-front. At the time, BMC were working on an advanced transverse rear-engined saloon in conjunction with ERA, and it is not inconceivable that this idea was mooted, but this package was not the line of thought that Issigonis wanted to pursue. He saw front wheel drive as the vehicle for his future cars, and the stringent disciplines involved in designing a small car had always fascinated and challenged him. ADO15 would be the first production car to make the point, because he had new ideas that he wished to put into metal.
John Cutler, one of the Mini design team, described how Issigonis arrived at the car's packaging: 'The designs originated from putting seats on the shopfloor. Then we got all sorts of people to sit on them – secretaries from the offices, 6ft manual workers – and we got them to indicate what space they needed in the car. We measured how much space would be needed to open a map, where a pocket would be needed to stow the map. It is a very ergonomic car.'
For Issigonis, the car to emulate and ultimately beat in terms of size and packaging was Dante Giacosa’s FIAT 600 (a modernised version of the famous Cinquecento), for this was a practical four-seater which was contained within a size envelope only slightly larger than that intended for the Mini. The packaging solution employed by FIAT was to place the in-line four-cylinder engine out beyond the back axle and the luggage up-front. At the time, BMC were working on an advanced transverse rear-engined saloon in conjunction with ERA, and it is not inconceivable that this idea was mooted, but this package was not the line of thought that Issigonis wanted to pursue. He saw front wheel drive as the vehicle for his future cars, and the stringent disciplines involved in designing a small car had always fascinated and challenged him. ADO15 would be the first production car to make the point, because he had new ideas that he wished to put into metal.
John Cutler, one of the Mini design team, described how Issigonis arrived at the car's packaging: 'The designs originated from putting seats on the shopfloor. Then we got all sorts of people to sit on them – secretaries from the offices, 6ft manual workers – and we got them to indicate what space they needed in the car. We measured how much space would be needed to open a map, where a pocket would be needed to stow the map. It is a very ergonomic car.'
Pulling, not pushing
Issigonis had proved with his work on the original Minor replacement he was working on before his misadventure at Alvis that he could package an engine and gearbox into a space that occupied only two feet of the car’s entire length. He could achieve this by mounting the engine transversely, which would give massive benefits in terms of packaging efficiency, but it created the problem of how the engine and gearbox would be accommodated across the car’s width; as the Mini was intended to be a narrow car, the engine with the gearbox mounted end-on would be very difficult to fit between the wheels, whilst maintaining useful steering lock. One way of shortening the engine/gearbox package was to chop off two cylinders from the A-Series engine, creating an in-line, two-cylinder engine of roughly 500cc displacement. The end result was a gutless and rough engine, which was certainly not man enough for the job required.
Just when Issigonis decided to mount the gearbox beneath the engine as part of an in-sump arrangement has now escaped into the mists of time, but this arrangement was incorporated as part of the first Mini mock-up. Not only did it have the now-famous in-sump gearbox, but it also included special Dunlop-developed 10-inch wheels and tyres, Alex Moulton’s rubber suspension and the familiar Mini shape in almost the form in which it was launched, the styling being a scaled down version of the XC9000, a mid-sized Farina replacement that was in the early stages of development.
These three innovations were certainly the making of the Mini, and it is all the more remarkable to note that the conception of the car was such a rapid process: Work on X9003, the original code name for the ADO15 Mini began in March 1957 and by July 1957 the first prototype was running. Another one of the Mini's design team was John Sheppard, who later described what it was like working for Alec Issigonis: 'He knew what he wanted and he made sure he got it. He'd come round holding an ounce weight and say, "Have you saved that for me today?". Weight was very critical. The Mini had to be 10ft long – no more, no less. He was very pedantic like that and very domineering. When it went into production, it was a quarter of an inch over 10ft long. That really annoyed him.'
John Cutler again: 'The principle was to come up with the bare basics for a car, without ostentation, whilst maximising the space available, and making it as fuel efficient as possible. One of Issigonis' peeves about American cars was the thickness of their doors. He used to say that you could build a whole car out of the metal they used for one door. He was very insistent that the Mini should have thinner, and therefore lighter, doors.'
Issigonis and his team were eventually able to make the Mini 100lb lighter than the existing Austin A35. The emphasis on weight saving probably helped to ensure the resulting car remained competitive in the fuel economy stakes for a long time to come and set a benchmark that proved difficult to beat, as later British Leyland engineers were to find out.
It was on 19 July 1957 that BMC chairman Leonard Lord and his deputy George Harriman first drove the prototype Mini around the Longbridge complex and the former told Alec Issigonis to 'build the bloody thing.' The long accepted version of events, The Mini Story by Laurence Pomeroy published in 1964, dated this event as July 1958. Documentary evidence has now emerged to reveal that the decision to push ahead with the ADO15 project was taken a whole year earlier. The first prototype was soon joined by a second car. The two cars, disguised with Austin A35 grilles, were known internally as the 'Orange Boxes' and were based at Cowley for these preliminary trials. The engineers from Morris Motors, Cowley, were headed by Charles Griffin, who would play a significant part in the Mini story and all the later front wheel drive cars that would spring from it.
At night they were thrashed around a well-used test route that Morris test drivers relied on for new car development, taking in a circuitous route through the Cotswolds. During the day, they were driven at the local disused airfield at Chalgrove, circulating around the badly maintained perimeter taxiway. In 500 hours, the cars covered 30,000 miles and this process highlighted weaknesses in the design at that stage. It was at motor show time in October 1957 that BMC's joint managing director George Harriman teased journalists, telling them that the corporations market researchers had discovered that consumers did not want bubble cars, but a low priced, fully engineered car. He was quoted as saying, 'Obviously if the corporation can produce such a car which will sell more cheaply, they will do so.'
Issigonis had proved with his work on the original Minor replacement he was working on before his misadventure at Alvis that he could package an engine and gearbox into a space that occupied only two feet of the car’s entire length. He could achieve this by mounting the engine transversely, which would give massive benefits in terms of packaging efficiency, but it created the problem of how the engine and gearbox would be accommodated across the car’s width; as the Mini was intended to be a narrow car, the engine with the gearbox mounted end-on would be very difficult to fit between the wheels, whilst maintaining useful steering lock. One way of shortening the engine/gearbox package was to chop off two cylinders from the A-Series engine, creating an in-line, two-cylinder engine of roughly 500cc displacement. The end result was a gutless and rough engine, which was certainly not man enough for the job required.
Just when Issigonis decided to mount the gearbox beneath the engine as part of an in-sump arrangement has now escaped into the mists of time, but this arrangement was incorporated as part of the first Mini mock-up. Not only did it have the now-famous in-sump gearbox, but it also included special Dunlop-developed 10-inch wheels and tyres, Alex Moulton’s rubber suspension and the familiar Mini shape in almost the form in which it was launched, the styling being a scaled down version of the XC9000, a mid-sized Farina replacement that was in the early stages of development.
These three innovations were certainly the making of the Mini, and it is all the more remarkable to note that the conception of the car was such a rapid process: Work on X9003, the original code name for the ADO15 Mini began in March 1957 and by July 1957 the first prototype was running. Another one of the Mini's design team was John Sheppard, who later described what it was like working for Alec Issigonis: 'He knew what he wanted and he made sure he got it. He'd come round holding an ounce weight and say, "Have you saved that for me today?". Weight was very critical. The Mini had to be 10ft long – no more, no less. He was very pedantic like that and very domineering. When it went into production, it was a quarter of an inch over 10ft long. That really annoyed him.'
John Cutler again: 'The principle was to come up with the bare basics for a car, without ostentation, whilst maximising the space available, and making it as fuel efficient as possible. One of Issigonis' peeves about American cars was the thickness of their doors. He used to say that you could build a whole car out of the metal they used for one door. He was very insistent that the Mini should have thinner, and therefore lighter, doors.'
Issigonis and his team were eventually able to make the Mini 100lb lighter than the existing Austin A35. The emphasis on weight saving probably helped to ensure the resulting car remained competitive in the fuel economy stakes for a long time to come and set a benchmark that proved difficult to beat, as later British Leyland engineers were to find out.
It was on 19 July 1957 that BMC chairman Leonard Lord and his deputy George Harriman first drove the prototype Mini around the Longbridge complex and the former told Alec Issigonis to 'build the bloody thing.' The long accepted version of events, The Mini Story by Laurence Pomeroy published in 1964, dated this event as July 1958. Documentary evidence has now emerged to reveal that the decision to push ahead with the ADO15 project was taken a whole year earlier. The first prototype was soon joined by a second car. The two cars, disguised with Austin A35 grilles, were known internally as the 'Orange Boxes' and were based at Cowley for these preliminary trials. The engineers from Morris Motors, Cowley, were headed by Charles Griffin, who would play a significant part in the Mini story and all the later front wheel drive cars that would spring from it.
At night they were thrashed around a well-used test route that Morris test drivers relied on for new car development, taking in a circuitous route through the Cotswolds. During the day, they were driven at the local disused airfield at Chalgrove, circulating around the badly maintained perimeter taxiway. In 500 hours, the cars covered 30,000 miles and this process highlighted weaknesses in the design at that stage. It was at motor show time in October 1957 that BMC's joint managing director George Harriman teased journalists, telling them that the corporations market researchers had discovered that consumers did not want bubble cars, but a low priced, fully engineered car. He was quoted as saying, 'Obviously if the corporation can produce such a car which will sell more cheaply, they will do so.'
Someone literally took a chainsaw to a Mini to produce this, but it shows very eloquently just how efficiently packaged it really is. The passenger area accounted for an unprecedented 60% of the car’slength, a tribute to the intelligent design.
From the airing of the first prototype, to the car’s launch in August 1959, only a few major mechanical changes were made; a reduction in engine size from 948cc to 848cc was ordered as a direct result of the fact that early prototypes had been clocked at over 92mph, which was considered far too fast for the market the Mini was aimed at. The new capacity was arrived at by reducing the stroke from 73mm in the 948cc version to 68mm in the final 848cc incarnation.
Last minute changes
At this time, the engine was rotated through 180 degrees to face the bulkhead, so that the carburettor was now to the rear of the engine, instead of at the front, where it tended to ice up in cold conditions. According to John Cooper, the real reason why the engine was reversed, however, was that Mini prototypes kept destroying their synchromeshes after about 100 miles. Issigonis was reportedly very upset that this change was required because the car was faster in its original form. Why the engine was rotated, rather than Austin designing a more durable synchomesh can be put down to two factors: time and money - or more correctly, the lack of it. So, carburettor icing was cited as the reason for this reversal of the position of the engine, but the response of John Cooper to this suggestion was that it, 'was a load of bull!'
Interestingly, the whole point of the re-orientation and the resultant introduction of the transfer gears was to allow for much smaller gears, which produced much less inertia, meaning that there would be less stress on the gearbox’s synchromesh. Testing had shown that even with this fundamental alteration, the Austin A35 synchromesh would not be up to the job, but because the development of the Porsche baulk ring Synchro would not be complete by the planned launch date, they went ahead with the A35 system, anyway!
Another myth perpetuated by Laurence Pomeroy was that the width of the car was increased by two inches, in order to improve accommodation for passengers and engine alike. In fact two inches was taken out of the rear track for purely aesthetic reasons. It was also found as a result of all that flogging round Chalgrove that the body shell around the suspension mounting points was breaking. This led to the suspension being changed so that the rubber units would be mounted on their own subframes, front and rear, in order to lessen stresses on the structure, at the expense of weight and cost.
Wheel size was an ongoing issue at the time and when the Mini finally appeared, few critics saw the significance of this new, smaller design of road wheel – most were convinced that they could not work. Issigonis had furthered the development of the small car by working with Dunlop to produce a road tyre of record-breaking diminutiveness, a process that he had begun with the Morris Minor. At that time, the Minor had the smallest tyres of any volume production car – when Giacosa had conceived the FIAT 500, for example, he had asked Pirelli to produce special tyres to fit on 15in wheel rims. The industry average at the time was a much larger 16 or 17in rim size.
The question of wheel size was very important because the smaller the wheel, the smaller the wheel arch, meaning less intrusion into the passenger compartment. At the start of the Mini project, Issigonis had approached Dunlop, as he had done with the Minor, to develop a new type of tyre that would sit on a wheel that was 4.20 x 10in – almost wheelbarrow dimensions – and Dunlop managed to develop a suitable tyre for the car. The tyres that finally appeared on the Mini were 5.20in in width, rather wider than the prototypes’ 4.80in tyres, and it was as a direct result of the car’s unexpectedly good performance that this change was made.
From the airing of the first prototype, to the car’s launch in August 1959, only a few major mechanical changes were made; a reduction in engine size from 948cc to 848cc was ordered as a direct result of the fact that early prototypes had been clocked at over 92mph, which was considered far too fast for the market the Mini was aimed at. The new capacity was arrived at by reducing the stroke from 73mm in the 948cc version to 68mm in the final 848cc incarnation.
Last minute changes
At this time, the engine was rotated through 180 degrees to face the bulkhead, so that the carburettor was now to the rear of the engine, instead of at the front, where it tended to ice up in cold conditions. According to John Cooper, the real reason why the engine was reversed, however, was that Mini prototypes kept destroying their synchromeshes after about 100 miles. Issigonis was reportedly very upset that this change was required because the car was faster in its original form. Why the engine was rotated, rather than Austin designing a more durable synchomesh can be put down to two factors: time and money - or more correctly, the lack of it. So, carburettor icing was cited as the reason for this reversal of the position of the engine, but the response of John Cooper to this suggestion was that it, 'was a load of bull!'
Interestingly, the whole point of the re-orientation and the resultant introduction of the transfer gears was to allow for much smaller gears, which produced much less inertia, meaning that there would be less stress on the gearbox’s synchromesh. Testing had shown that even with this fundamental alteration, the Austin A35 synchromesh would not be up to the job, but because the development of the Porsche baulk ring Synchro would not be complete by the planned launch date, they went ahead with the A35 system, anyway!
Another myth perpetuated by Laurence Pomeroy was that the width of the car was increased by two inches, in order to improve accommodation for passengers and engine alike. In fact two inches was taken out of the rear track for purely aesthetic reasons. It was also found as a result of all that flogging round Chalgrove that the body shell around the suspension mounting points was breaking. This led to the suspension being changed so that the rubber units would be mounted on their own subframes, front and rear, in order to lessen stresses on the structure, at the expense of weight and cost.
Wheel size was an ongoing issue at the time and when the Mini finally appeared, few critics saw the significance of this new, smaller design of road wheel – most were convinced that they could not work. Issigonis had furthered the development of the small car by working with Dunlop to produce a road tyre of record-breaking diminutiveness, a process that he had begun with the Morris Minor. At that time, the Minor had the smallest tyres of any volume production car – when Giacosa had conceived the FIAT 500, for example, he had asked Pirelli to produce special tyres to fit on 15in wheel rims. The industry average at the time was a much larger 16 or 17in rim size.
The question of wheel size was very important because the smaller the wheel, the smaller the wheel arch, meaning less intrusion into the passenger compartment. At the start of the Mini project, Issigonis had approached Dunlop, as he had done with the Minor, to develop a new type of tyre that would sit on a wheel that was 4.20 x 10in – almost wheelbarrow dimensions – and Dunlop managed to develop a suitable tyre for the car. The tyres that finally appeared on the Mini were 5.20in in width, rather wider than the prototypes’ 4.80in tyres, and it was as a direct result of the car’s unexpectedly good performance that this change was made.
As with all of the next two generations of the corporation’s cars, Alex Moulton was responsible for suspension system. In the Mini, he designed all-new rubber suspension units to replace the spring units that were employed in conventionally suspended cars. Moulton made great use of the variable rate properties provided by using rubber as a springing medium – the advantage being that in a small car, the weight difference between fully-laden and driver-only was proportionally greater than it would be in a larger, heavier car. These rubber cones were smaller than conventional spring/damper units, which meant that Moulton’s system also had significant packaging advantages.
By March 1958 the first two X9003 prototypes had amassed 50,000 miles apiece and the decision was taken to build ten pilot production cars, each differing in detail to the previous example as the design evolved. The ADO15 Mini proved to be a difficult design to productionise and this was a cause of friction between the production engineers and Alec Issigonis. Indeed as early as October 1958 development engineers were having trouble with water leaks and persuading Issigonis to modify his design was proving problematical.
When BMC managing director George Harriman was shown the first pre-production Mini he was not impressed with its bland, plain and austere appearance. He is alleged to have said to Issigonis: 'What a bloody mess! We'll never sell that. Spend another few quid on it Alec, and jazz it up a bit. Put some chrome plate on it or something.'
The pre-production Minis had a plain metal front panel with slots stamped in it for a grille, as seen in BMC's original 1959 promotional film. Dick Burzi's styling department duly obliged their superiors by adding a grille and other chrome embellishments to the Mini. The original metal grille was later used on the commercial variants of the car.
So, was 621 AOK the first Mini?
The exact chronology of Mini production has been distorted through the passage of time which has resulted in a series of half truths becoming the accepted story. For a long time it has been accepted that 621 AOK, now at the BMH Gaydon museum, was the first production Mini. The truth is as follows. The first production Mini with the chassis number 101 was an Austin Mini Seven built at Longbridge on 3 April 1959. 101 Has long since disappeared into the great scrapyard in the sky, but 102 built the same day amazingly survives. Registered 627 HUE, in 1965 this car was bought by Donald Healey and transformed into a convertible two seater, apparently with the blessing of Alec Issigonis. 627 HUE is now owned by a Japanese Mini collector. Both Minis 101 and 102/627 HUE were delivered to one Alec Issigonis. The initial Austin production was as follows. Austin chassis 103 also survives, registered KEG 77, it was exported to Japan in 1996.
Austin 101 and 102 built 3 April Austin 103 and 104 built 4 May Austin 105 built 5 May
It was on 8 May 1959 that Mini production began at Cowley when Morris chassis numbers 101,102, 103, 105, 106, 107, 108, 110, 111, 112 were all built. Bizarrely 104 and 109 were built a few days later. Morris Mini Minor chassis 101 was registered as 621 AOK. So why the confusion ? One can only assume that in February 1965, when the millionth Mini was produced in the aftermath of the second Monte Carlo rally win, that BMC's PR machine simply made the understandable mistake of assuming Morris 101/621 AOK was the first car of all and it and Alec Issigonis posed outside Longbridge with a 1965 model for PR photographs that have appeared in the printed media ever since. In fact Morris 101/621 AOK was the sixth production Mini. By the time the error was realised it was too late to backtrack and Morris 101/621 AOK has now become the official first Mini.
However Jeff Ruggles of MINI magazine was told an alternative story. According to retired BMC engineer Peter Tothill, who was responsible for the design and supervision of the Mini production line at Cowley and performed rectification work on Mini prototypes, 621 AOK was the first production Mini. Peter Tothill's story is that four employees - Bob Moore, Tony Monk, Bob Hollis and Peter Tothill himself - built 621 AOK over the weekend of Good Friday 27 March to Easter Monday 30 March 1959.
'There is absolutely no doubt in my mind, because on the Wednesday of that week, Les Ford (chief planning engineer) said to me, "We want you to build the first ADO15 over the Easter weekend when there will be no-one in the factory, and I want you there." I had recently got married and we had planned to go away for the weekend, so I had to tell my wife that the trip was off! The car was loaded onto a truck, sheeted up and delivered to Longbridge on the Tuesday, ready for the directors to view on the Wednesday. Tuesday was a holiday in Birmingham because they always worked on Good Friday.'
This version of the Mini story has it that 621 AOK was used as the reference for Longbridge foreman Albert Green to build the first Austin Minis. Peter Tothill reckoned it was impossible for Cowley to pilot build ten ADO15s in one day and that these cars were built in the preceding weeks with records commencing on 8 May 1959. Unfortunately no evidence has emerged to support his story.
By June, 100 cars a day were being built, in order to build up dealer stocks in preparation for the launch in August. In total, the gestation of this car from the instigation of the ADO15 project to its launch was two years and five months. This achievement was all the more remarkable when one considers that the Mini did not follow any other car’s design concepts and was a totally new idea that was implemented in a totally new way.
The first public admission that something new was on the way came on the 17 June 1959, when BMC chairman Sir Leonard Lord revealed some details of the forthcoming cars. He stated that these cars had been through extensive trials and had taken three years to develop. New buildings had been erected and new plant and equipment using the most up-to-date methods installed at a total cost of well over £10m. At the same time it was also revealed that the Austin A40 and Morris Minor would remain in production. The Daily Express newspaper quoted Sir Leonard directly as saying: 'The most up-to-date methods in the world are being used in the production of the new models which will come out at the end of August.'
Those who think that industrial action was something that resulted as a consequence of the formation of British Leyland will be surprised to read that the situation in the UK car industry in 1959 was as bad as anything that occurred in the 1970s. 1959 Was a terrible year for strikes. The launch of the Mini was endangered by industrial action at the Morris Motors plant at Cowley, where on 15 July 1959, BMC dismissed Mr Frank Horsman, senior shop steward at the factory. Cowley was soon brought to a halt by strike action in a scenario similar to that of two decades later involving Derek Robinson and Longbridge, and it was August 13th before normal working resumed. With launch of the Mini only 13 days away, it was a close run thing.
1959: Mini is launched
By March 1958 the first two X9003 prototypes had amassed 50,000 miles apiece and the decision was taken to build ten pilot production cars, each differing in detail to the previous example as the design evolved. The ADO15 Mini proved to be a difficult design to productionise and this was a cause of friction between the production engineers and Alec Issigonis. Indeed as early as October 1958 development engineers were having trouble with water leaks and persuading Issigonis to modify his design was proving problematical.
When BMC managing director George Harriman was shown the first pre-production Mini he was not impressed with its bland, plain and austere appearance. He is alleged to have said to Issigonis: 'What a bloody mess! We'll never sell that. Spend another few quid on it Alec, and jazz it up a bit. Put some chrome plate on it or something.'
The pre-production Minis had a plain metal front panel with slots stamped in it for a grille, as seen in BMC's original 1959 promotional film. Dick Burzi's styling department duly obliged their superiors by adding a grille and other chrome embellishments to the Mini. The original metal grille was later used on the commercial variants of the car.
So, was 621 AOK the first Mini?
The exact chronology of Mini production has been distorted through the passage of time which has resulted in a series of half truths becoming the accepted story. For a long time it has been accepted that 621 AOK, now at the BMH Gaydon museum, was the first production Mini. The truth is as follows. The first production Mini with the chassis number 101 was an Austin Mini Seven built at Longbridge on 3 April 1959. 101 Has long since disappeared into the great scrapyard in the sky, but 102 built the same day amazingly survives. Registered 627 HUE, in 1965 this car was bought by Donald Healey and transformed into a convertible two seater, apparently with the blessing of Alec Issigonis. 627 HUE is now owned by a Japanese Mini collector. Both Minis 101 and 102/627 HUE were delivered to one Alec Issigonis. The initial Austin production was as follows. Austin chassis 103 also survives, registered KEG 77, it was exported to Japan in 1996.
Austin 101 and 102 built 3 April Austin 103 and 104 built 4 May Austin 105 built 5 May
It was on 8 May 1959 that Mini production began at Cowley when Morris chassis numbers 101,102, 103, 105, 106, 107, 108, 110, 111, 112 were all built. Bizarrely 104 and 109 were built a few days later. Morris Mini Minor chassis 101 was registered as 621 AOK. So why the confusion ? One can only assume that in February 1965, when the millionth Mini was produced in the aftermath of the second Monte Carlo rally win, that BMC's PR machine simply made the understandable mistake of assuming Morris 101/621 AOK was the first car of all and it and Alec Issigonis posed outside Longbridge with a 1965 model for PR photographs that have appeared in the printed media ever since. In fact Morris 101/621 AOK was the sixth production Mini. By the time the error was realised it was too late to backtrack and Morris 101/621 AOK has now become the official first Mini.
However Jeff Ruggles of MINI magazine was told an alternative story. According to retired BMC engineer Peter Tothill, who was responsible for the design and supervision of the Mini production line at Cowley and performed rectification work on Mini prototypes, 621 AOK was the first production Mini. Peter Tothill's story is that four employees - Bob Moore, Tony Monk, Bob Hollis and Peter Tothill himself - built 621 AOK over the weekend of Good Friday 27 March to Easter Monday 30 March 1959.
'There is absolutely no doubt in my mind, because on the Wednesday of that week, Les Ford (chief planning engineer) said to me, "We want you to build the first ADO15 over the Easter weekend when there will be no-one in the factory, and I want you there." I had recently got married and we had planned to go away for the weekend, so I had to tell my wife that the trip was off! The car was loaded onto a truck, sheeted up and delivered to Longbridge on the Tuesday, ready for the directors to view on the Wednesday. Tuesday was a holiday in Birmingham because they always worked on Good Friday.'
This version of the Mini story has it that 621 AOK was used as the reference for Longbridge foreman Albert Green to build the first Austin Minis. Peter Tothill reckoned it was impossible for Cowley to pilot build ten ADO15s in one day and that these cars were built in the preceding weeks with records commencing on 8 May 1959. Unfortunately no evidence has emerged to support his story.
By June, 100 cars a day were being built, in order to build up dealer stocks in preparation for the launch in August. In total, the gestation of this car from the instigation of the ADO15 project to its launch was two years and five months. This achievement was all the more remarkable when one considers that the Mini did not follow any other car’s design concepts and was a totally new idea that was implemented in a totally new way.
The first public admission that something new was on the way came on the 17 June 1959, when BMC chairman Sir Leonard Lord revealed some details of the forthcoming cars. He stated that these cars had been through extensive trials and had taken three years to develop. New buildings had been erected and new plant and equipment using the most up-to-date methods installed at a total cost of well over £10m. At the same time it was also revealed that the Austin A40 and Morris Minor would remain in production. The Daily Express newspaper quoted Sir Leonard directly as saying: 'The most up-to-date methods in the world are being used in the production of the new models which will come out at the end of August.'
Those who think that industrial action was something that resulted as a consequence of the formation of British Leyland will be surprised to read that the situation in the UK car industry in 1959 was as bad as anything that occurred in the 1970s. 1959 Was a terrible year for strikes. The launch of the Mini was endangered by industrial action at the Morris Motors plant at Cowley, where on 15 July 1959, BMC dismissed Mr Frank Horsman, senior shop steward at the factory. Cowley was soon brought to a halt by strike action in a scenario similar to that of two decades later involving Derek Robinson and Longbridge, and it was August 13th before normal working resumed. With launch of the Mini only 13 days away, it was a close run thing.
1959: Mini is launched
When the press first got their hands on BMC’s new car on the 18-19 August 1959 at Chobham in Surrey, they were not shy to praise it; the Mini’s unique personality, exceptional space efficiency, relatively good performance and tenacious front-wheel-drive handling meant that it was a sure fire hit with the critics. It swept aside the conservatism that was rife in the corporation and the perception of BMC in the public’s eye was changed indelibly.
In a sense the press were driving the personalised car of its designer. Because Issigonis didn't wear a seatbelt or listen to the radio, they were not designed into the Mini, but as he was a chain smoker the car did have an ashtray. The seats were pushed as far forward as possible and set in an upright fashion resulting in the infamous 'bus driver' position so beloved of motoring writers and found on later Issigonis cars and even the Metro of 1980.
Launch day itself was the 26 August 1959. This was also the day that the car the Mini was replacing, the Austin A35, went out of production. Perhaps this was because launch day had been brought forward from the 2 September at the last minute. According to Derek Robinson, more of whom later, whereas the A35 had been produced at a track speed of 20 cars per hour at Longbridge, the Mini was produced at a rate of 30 cars per hour. Because BMC had separate dealerships for its component companies, there were two different variants of the ADO15 at launch, the Austin Se7en and the Morris Mini Minor.
At one stage during ADO15's development, it was referred to as the Austin Newmarket, partly because it was aimed at a new market and because BMC had a track record of naming its cars after places: Oxford, Cambridge, Somerset and Westminster come to mind. The initial production target was 3000 vehicles a week, divided equally between the Longbridge and Cowley plants. The Fisher and Ludlow plant was already geared to produce 4000 bodies a week. Preliminary plans had been made for the cars to be constructed by the Innocenti firm in Milan. Some 2000 of the new cars had already been sent abroad and they were displayed in motor showrooms in nearly 100 countries.
And by the 1st September 1959, the first stoppage had occurred; the first of many in the cars lifetime. On 23 November 1959, BMC announced a £49m expansion plan and stated to shareholders that the planned output of 4000 Minis a week had already become insufficient. It was taking steps immediately to double this output to 8000 a week, and by the end of 1959, 19,749 Minis had been produced.
The word 'mini' is now an everyday part of the english vocabulary, but was it in regular use before the ADO15 arrived on the scene, and who came up with the name 'Mini' for the car? One assumes 'Mini' is a shortened version of either 'minimum' or 'miniature'? Between 1948 and 1966, Bond built the three wheel Minicar with a motorcycle engine, so BMC were not the originators of the word 'Mini'. According to Thirty Mini Years, the 1989 official Rover souvenir booklet to mark the car's 30th birthday, it was none other than Lord Nuffield, BMC's Honourary President who pushed for the adoption of the name 'Mini'.
Lord Nuffield, who allegedly always referred to Issigonis as 'that foreign chap' was quoted as saying, 'I have a hunch that "Mini" may well prove to be the catchword of the next decade.'
Of course the other issue with the Mini that must be addressed is whether it made or lost money for its maker. The price for the base model of the world's most advanced family car was £496.95 - astonishingly low. According to some historians, Austin had based the pricing of its cars in the pre-BMC era by mirroring what Morris charged. Austin supremo Leonard Lord believed that William Morris was the master in cost control and simply assumed that Longbridge's cars cost a similar amount to manufacture. With the formation of BMC, the corporation now looked at Ford for its pricing policy. It appears that BMC simply decided to sell its new baby at a similar price to the sit-up-and-beg Ford Popular, which ceased production in 1959.
In an interview with Jonathan Wood for his book Alec Issigonis: The Man Who Made The Mini, former BMC executive Geoffrey Rose stated: 'George Harriman (BMC deputy chairman in 1959) would have decided the Mini's price and one of the key figures in the decision was Harry Williams, a cost accountant... Both Len Lord and George Harriman thought to some extent "volume will deal with it". It's on the basis that you make cars all the week until Thursday afternoon and Friday is when all the overheads have been covered and you make the profit. Sad to say, it came down to the sheer arrogance of 'we're BMC, we know what we're doing'. But Alec (Issigonis) would have been completely outside the pricing process. In some board meetings that I attended I used to have to help him through the balance sheet, through the figures.'
The launch of the Mini had upstaged Ford's own debutante, the Anglia 105E, and both cars were aimed at the same market sector. The base Mini compared with the £589 - the Dagenham product costing a whopping £93 more. How could BMC do it undercut the Anglia so handsomely?
One of the criticisms of BMC by armchair pundits is that it had too many plants spread out over the country. The production of the Mini perfectly illustrates this. The A-Series engines came from Morris Engines at Courthouse Green, Coventry, the front wheel drive transmission came from both Longbridge and Drews Lane, also in Birmingham. The components for Cowley had to be transported from the Coventry and Birmingham areas all the way to Oxford. Body pressings came from the Fisher and Ludlow plant at Llanelli in Wales, one of many factories that the motor industry had been forced to build in areas of high unemployment by the MacMillan government, far away from the midlands. These pressing were then taken to two locations in Birmingham for assembly into bodyshells, the Fisher and Ludlow plant at Castle Bromwich and the West Works at Longbridge.
In a sense the press were driving the personalised car of its designer. Because Issigonis didn't wear a seatbelt or listen to the radio, they were not designed into the Mini, but as he was a chain smoker the car did have an ashtray. The seats were pushed as far forward as possible and set in an upright fashion resulting in the infamous 'bus driver' position so beloved of motoring writers and found on later Issigonis cars and even the Metro of 1980.
Launch day itself was the 26 August 1959. This was also the day that the car the Mini was replacing, the Austin A35, went out of production. Perhaps this was because launch day had been brought forward from the 2 September at the last minute. According to Derek Robinson, more of whom later, whereas the A35 had been produced at a track speed of 20 cars per hour at Longbridge, the Mini was produced at a rate of 30 cars per hour. Because BMC had separate dealerships for its component companies, there were two different variants of the ADO15 at launch, the Austin Se7en and the Morris Mini Minor.
At one stage during ADO15's development, it was referred to as the Austin Newmarket, partly because it was aimed at a new market and because BMC had a track record of naming its cars after places: Oxford, Cambridge, Somerset and Westminster come to mind. The initial production target was 3000 vehicles a week, divided equally between the Longbridge and Cowley plants. The Fisher and Ludlow plant was already geared to produce 4000 bodies a week. Preliminary plans had been made for the cars to be constructed by the Innocenti firm in Milan. Some 2000 of the new cars had already been sent abroad and they were displayed in motor showrooms in nearly 100 countries.
And by the 1st September 1959, the first stoppage had occurred; the first of many in the cars lifetime. On 23 November 1959, BMC announced a £49m expansion plan and stated to shareholders that the planned output of 4000 Minis a week had already become insufficient. It was taking steps immediately to double this output to 8000 a week, and by the end of 1959, 19,749 Minis had been produced.
The word 'mini' is now an everyday part of the english vocabulary, but was it in regular use before the ADO15 arrived on the scene, and who came up with the name 'Mini' for the car? One assumes 'Mini' is a shortened version of either 'minimum' or 'miniature'? Between 1948 and 1966, Bond built the three wheel Minicar with a motorcycle engine, so BMC were not the originators of the word 'Mini'. According to Thirty Mini Years, the 1989 official Rover souvenir booklet to mark the car's 30th birthday, it was none other than Lord Nuffield, BMC's Honourary President who pushed for the adoption of the name 'Mini'.
Lord Nuffield, who allegedly always referred to Issigonis as 'that foreign chap' was quoted as saying, 'I have a hunch that "Mini" may well prove to be the catchword of the next decade.'
Of course the other issue with the Mini that must be addressed is whether it made or lost money for its maker. The price for the base model of the world's most advanced family car was £496.95 - astonishingly low. According to some historians, Austin had based the pricing of its cars in the pre-BMC era by mirroring what Morris charged. Austin supremo Leonard Lord believed that William Morris was the master in cost control and simply assumed that Longbridge's cars cost a similar amount to manufacture. With the formation of BMC, the corporation now looked at Ford for its pricing policy. It appears that BMC simply decided to sell its new baby at a similar price to the sit-up-and-beg Ford Popular, which ceased production in 1959.
In an interview with Jonathan Wood for his book Alec Issigonis: The Man Who Made The Mini, former BMC executive Geoffrey Rose stated: 'George Harriman (BMC deputy chairman in 1959) would have decided the Mini's price and one of the key figures in the decision was Harry Williams, a cost accountant... Both Len Lord and George Harriman thought to some extent "volume will deal with it". It's on the basis that you make cars all the week until Thursday afternoon and Friday is when all the overheads have been covered and you make the profit. Sad to say, it came down to the sheer arrogance of 'we're BMC, we know what we're doing'. But Alec (Issigonis) would have been completely outside the pricing process. In some board meetings that I attended I used to have to help him through the balance sheet, through the figures.'
The launch of the Mini had upstaged Ford's own debutante, the Anglia 105E, and both cars were aimed at the same market sector. The base Mini compared with the £589 - the Dagenham product costing a whopping £93 more. How could BMC do it undercut the Anglia so handsomely?
One of the criticisms of BMC by armchair pundits is that it had too many plants spread out over the country. The production of the Mini perfectly illustrates this. The A-Series engines came from Morris Engines at Courthouse Green, Coventry, the front wheel drive transmission came from both Longbridge and Drews Lane, also in Birmingham. The components for Cowley had to be transported from the Coventry and Birmingham areas all the way to Oxford. Body pressings came from the Fisher and Ludlow plant at Llanelli in Wales, one of many factories that the motor industry had been forced to build in areas of high unemployment by the MacMillan government, far away from the midlands. These pressing were then taken to two locations in Birmingham for assembly into bodyshells, the Fisher and Ludlow plant at Castle Bromwich and the West Works at Longbridge.
In its first year of production, the Mini overtook the Morris Minor as the corporation’s bestseller, but it was not all plain sailing for the Issigonis box. The initial problem, as far as UK sales were concerned, was that the Mini was considered too clever and too small for the typical customer that Leonard Lord had designed the car for. Many buyers were from the “blue collar” end of the social spectrum and adjudged the Mini as not for them – how could a car so small have room for them and their families? This response reflects the age-old buyer’s attitude that size is equal to status, and many decided that for the same money they could buy the larger and simpler Ford 100E Popular or Austin A40. No matter that Ford’s runabout was no roomier, had far poorer road-holding and was slower – it was a known quantity to the man in the street.
The other setback for the Mini was that as a car with an accelerated development programme, its reliability was somewhat questionable, and there were some design flaws that became apparent very quickly. The most famous of these early teething troubles was what was known back then as the “great floating carpet epic”. If driven in the rain, the carpets would soon emit a musty odour, which coupled with the squelching sounds they made when one stood on them, meant only one thing: water ingress.
The editor of Motorsport magazine in the winter of 1959/60 wrote: 'When driving the "World's Most Exciting Car" I found it to live up to its reputation – part of the excitement being to see which foot got wet first!' It didn't help that Issigonis appeared to be in denial about the problem, despite getting his own feet wet on a test drive. The engineers grappled with this problem for some time before the cause was traced to the late addition of a reinforcing box sill to the outer edge of the body, through which water was trickling. What made this all the more painful for BMC was that the only solution to the problem was an expensive re-design of the floorpan. In total BMC had to repair some 8000 leaking Minis under warranty.
The other setback for the Mini was that as a car with an accelerated development programme, its reliability was somewhat questionable, and there were some design flaws that became apparent very quickly. The most famous of these early teething troubles was what was known back then as the “great floating carpet epic”. If driven in the rain, the carpets would soon emit a musty odour, which coupled with the squelching sounds they made when one stood on them, meant only one thing: water ingress.
The editor of Motorsport magazine in the winter of 1959/60 wrote: 'When driving the "World's Most Exciting Car" I found it to live up to its reputation – part of the excitement being to see which foot got wet first!' It didn't help that Issigonis appeared to be in denial about the problem, despite getting his own feet wet on a test drive. The engineers grappled with this problem for some time before the cause was traced to the late addition of a reinforcing box sill to the outer edge of the body, through which water was trickling. What made this all the more painful for BMC was that the only solution to the problem was an expensive re-design of the floorpan. In total BMC had to repair some 8000 leaking Minis under warranty.
Other problems included internal oil leaks that sprayed the clutch plate; a mis-specified synchromesh that resulted in crunchy gear changes; exposed plugs and distributor at the front of the engine, which had Minis spluttering to a halt in the rain – water again! Not to mention a floor mounted starter switch that would also get a soaking, with predictable results. So, the early customers were acting as unpaid development engineers for BMC, and it was lucky for the corporation that the Mini’s design was so intrinsically right that these early setbacks did not push the car under and result in BMC reverting to the production of stolid and uninspiring cars.
All these problems were eventually licked, but it did mean that sales were slower to pick up than Leonard Lord had first expected.
1960: expansion
In January 1960, the Mini Van was launched - and on the 18th of that month, 800 workers began a night shift at Cowley to boost production of the Mini. On the 16th September, BMC announced two new estate car versions of the Mini, the Morris Mini Traveller and the Austin Seven Countryman. Both these cars featured an external wooden frame, but unlike other BMC estates, these were for decoration and were not structural. The autumn of 1960 was blighted by a series of industrial disputes as BMC tried to ramp up Mini production. Then, due to a recession in the motor trade BMC were forced to put 23,500 men on short time working, but the Mini was unaffected as demand for the car increased. Weekly production at the time was 3000.
1960 Was the year the Mini really took off, some 116,677 leaving the factories and already selling better than the Austin A35 at its peak. The success of the ADO15 soon brought it to the attention of Ford UK's senior product planner, a native of Walsall, Terry Beckett.
He later commented: 'We were very frustrated from 1959 onwards with the advent of the Mini. This was in view of the fact that historically, since the mid-'30s and the Ford £100 car, we had pre-eminence in that sector of the market by offering the lowest priced car which we coupled with value for money service. I can remember in one month in 1960, the Mini achieved a 19% market penetration. That was just one model'.
One of the legends about the Mini is how Ford bought an example and took it apart down to the spot welds to see how BMC could sell it for such a low price. Although it has never been stated whether the car they took apart was the basic or De Luxe model. Terry Beckett recalled: 'We then determined how much it would cost us to build it. On our cost analysis, which we thought was ahead of theirs, we really didn't see how the car could be produced in this way to make a profit.'
According to Beckett, Ford calculated that BMC was losing £30 on every Mini it made. He added: 'I could see ways in which we could take cost out of the Mini without in any way reducing its sales appeal... BMC could have priced it at £30 more, and not lost any sales at all. You can track the decline of BMC from that single product: it took up a huge amount of resources, it sterilised cash flow and it was a pretty disastrous venture'.
Strong words indeed, but Terry Beckett became one of British industry's most outstanding executives, ultimately becoming the chairman of Ford of Britain, and head of the CBI. Beckett revealed that Ford of Britain did come under pressure from dealers, customers, fleet owners and above all the parent company in Detroit to respond to the Mini. 'The great thing was that the Mini was a fine piece of innovative engineering and there we were with very conventional motor cars,' Just to ensure that Ford UK had got their sums right, another Mini was taken to the Company's product planning headquarters at Aveley in Essex and stripped down to the last nut and bolt.
'...and we arrived at the same results we had achieved in the first place,' commented Sir Terence Beckett.
Ford could now relax, they had proved that if they tackled the Mini head on in the marketplace, they could only do so by making a loss themselves. The major back-story of the car sales wars of the 1960s would be Beckett's marketing brilliance versus Issigonis' engineering genius. And in 1976 Ford overtook British Leyland as Britain's favourite vendor of automobiles. One of Terence Beckett's team was the late Alex Trotman, who rose even higher, heading Ford worldwide and gaining a peerage in the process. In a television interview, he recalled that the Mini cost around the same as the Anglia to manufacture - and Ford was making £50 profit car. In Ford's opinion, the Mini cost around £539 to build, a similar figure to the list price of the De Luxe. By September, 1960 BMC was claiming that weekly Mini production had now reached 3300.
1961: race on Sunday, sell on Monday...
In January 1961 the Mini Pick Up arrived on the market. However the Mini's immunity to the recession ended and production was now down to 2000 cars a week, although this was still higher than most British cars at the time. By February business had picked up and it was soon back to normal. BMC's Australian subsidiary began producing Minis in March 1961, known locally as the Morris 850. The antipodean Mini was produced at BMC Australia's Zetland plant in a suburb of Sydney. In BMC's annual report for 1960-61, the company stated that Mini production had risen by 62% in the period, despite an overall drop in production for all vehicles of 10%. The Riley Elf (along with its brother, the Wolseley Hornet) was the first of two attempts (the second, being the Clubman, pictured below) to extend the Mini concept by lengthening it: the structural modifications to the Mini were all aft of the B-pillar, where out back a saloon-type boot was added. Oneadvantage of the Riley (and Wolseley) front-end treatment, was the full-depth radiator grille, which allowed for improved under-bonnet access when compared with the standard item.
Be that as it may, while the average man in the street remained largely ignorant of the Mini’s strong points, other people began to notice them – most notably John Cooper. Cooper was aware of the car’s basic strengths, as both his Formula One drivers, Jack Brabham and Bruce McLaren drove and raved about Minis, and Cooper himself knew all about the tuning potential of the A-Series engine following his experiences with it in his Formula Junior cars. Cooper made tentative approaches to Issigonis in 1960, selling the idea of a high performance variation of the Mini, but Sir Alec was still harbouring a dream that his Mini was a car for everyman and as such was not that keen on it being seen as a performance car. Such was Cooper’s persistence that he ended up going over his colleague Issigonis’ head and straight to George Harriman, explaining the advantages of his idea. After a brief meeting Harriman told John Cooper to go away and build the car, but as Cooper later recalled with one proviso: 'Harriman said that we had to make 1000 – but we eventually made 150,000!'
The Mini-Cooper, launched on the 20th September 1961, eventually went on to become part of motoring folklore, amassing countless rally wins, particularly in the Monte Carlo, where the Cooper performed remarkable feats of giant killing. On the road, the Mini-Cooper was also a remarkable success, becoming the performance car for a generation; but considering the car was such a success, it seems all the more sad that the BMC-Cooper arrangement was never made official, and John Cooper only earned a £2 royalty payment (plus reasonably healthy retainer) for the use of his name on each one sold. However, on the back of the success of the Cooper models, and the countless celebrity endorsements, the rest of the range received a shot in the arm in terms of sales success.
Curiously the Mini-Cooper received a new internal project code, ADO50, while other versions of the ADO15 platform which had more substantial differences, such as the commercial variants remained ADO15s. For a fuller description of events, see the separate development story. 12 October 1961 saw the announcement of two more variations on the Mini theme, the Riley Elf and Wolseley Hornet. These were the posh Minis with Riley the slightly more upmarket.
According to LJK Setright they were designed, '...to appeal to those small minded snobs who found the idea of a Mini intriguing but the name of Austin or Morris offensive and the evidence of austerity.' Jeff Daniels wrote, in 1980, harshly of the cars. 'The Wolseley Hornet and Riley Elf are awful reminders of what happened when every BMC dealer and marque manager demanded his version of the Mini.'
The Elf/Hornet employed an extended boot and vertical fins. At the front they both had a vertical grille and wood trim in the interior as well as more chrome than the standard Mini's. Of course when Jeff Daniels wrote his words, the Rover badge adorned the imposing five door Rover SD1 executive car and the Austin Metro was about to launched. He couldn't have possibly imagined a Rover badged Metro...
Some journalists were just as harsh when the cars were current. Small Car magazine, soon to morph into CAR wrote: 'We guess it's no exaggeration to say that the first Issigonis Wolseley Hornet was among the ugliest, most uncomfortable and least desirable cars ever offered to the great British public. At any rate the one we tested in the winter of 1962 so disappointed us we couldn't bring ourselves to write a word about it.'
Alec Issigonis seems to have distanced himself from these models and delegated development to the engineers working under him and BMC's senior stylist, the Argentinean born Dick Burzi. The Elf/Hornets were shamelessly aimed at women drivers as a sort of miniaturized Jaguar or Rover and seemed to epitomise the kind of Britain that was fading away as the 1960s progressed. Also in the Autumn of 1961 BMC introduced stronger steel wheels on the Mini. This was in response the the racing fraternities experience of shattering wheels under extreme cornering.
On 7 November 1961, the first of many corporate changes occurred in the Mini's lifespan when Sir Leonard Lord retired to be replaced as chairman of BMC by Sir George Harriman and on 13 November, Alec Issigonis was appointed BMC Technical Director. This was followed by the appointment of Charles Griffin as Chief Engineer, Cars. By now Alec Issigonis had divided BMC's engineering staff into three cells. Cell A was responsible for the continuing development of the Mini, and was headed by Jack Daniels. Cell B worked on the project known as the ADO17 and was led by Chris Kingham. Cell C worked on the forthcoming ADO16, and was led by the aforementioned Charles Griffin. From 1962, the Austin Seven was renamed the Austin Mini. By now BMC was claiming that Mini production was running at 3800 per week.
1962
On the 15 August 1962, the ADO16 was announced as the Morris 1100, and later in every conceivable BMC guise. With a 1098cc A-Series engine, Pininfarina styling and Alex Moulton's Hydrolastic suspension, the ADO16 was a more refined, larger, roomier supermini, before the term was coined. The ADO16 was an instant hit and would remain Britain's best selling car for a decade. The ADO16 would form a partnership with the Mini that would span the globe and attain the zenith of the British motor industry. Unfortunately only 10% of parts were common to both vehicles.
On the 21st September, Ford's impeccably-costed Cortina was launched. Even the steering wheel had been re-designed four times to bring it in under budget. Now the four cars that would define the 1960s in automotive terms, were all on the market, the Mini, the Jaguar E-type, the BMC 1100 and the Ford Cortina. A sign that perhaps the Mini was underpriced was printed by The Times on the 23 November: 'British Motor Corporation's Mini range has certainly proved a success so far as sales are concerned, but the competitive pricing has bitten deeply into profit margins.
'Mr George Harriman now reveals in his statement that the £5m plus fall in profits to £11.5m was based on a turnover of £311m, almost exactly the same level as in the previous year. Last year 60% of the group's total output was represented by products of under 1000cc. This compares with 57% for the previous year, and only 43% five years ago. Clearly this trend, plus the narrow margins, makes it essential to maintain turnover by expanding output. In the last trading period the output of Minis reached 182,864 units, of which the home market absorbed 125,877. Exports are; however, increasing steadily and in the last three months of the financial year were averaging 1308 a week.'
During the life of the Mk1 Mini, BMC did make an effort to reduce manufacturing costs, although, no pun intended, the savings were miniscule. It can't have helped that there were allegedly 48 different makes of carpet for the car. Fortunately by now demand for the basic Mini had now dropped to 9% of production.
1963: the range expands across the globe
In October 1962 the Mini-Cooper was also launched in Australia, while back in the UK an all metal version of the Countryman and Traveller estates was launched which retailed at a lower price than the wood framed models. The winter of 1962/63 was cold and bitter, and outside Longbridge in the snow on the 7 January 1963, Alec Issigonis and Charles Griffin demonstrated the prototype twin engined Mini Moke to the media. Even Norman Wisdom, who was appearing in pantomime in Birmingham, was in attendance.
George Harriman told the Times: 'This was originally conceived by Mr Issigonis and myself from the idea of an 0-8-0 locomotive, which has its wheels linked on either side. After producing some experimental versions we found that the traction of the two Mini engines balanced each other and that it was possible to run one in top gear and the other in bottom simultaneously.'
However it would be another year before the Moke went into production and the twin engined version proved to be a technical cul de sac. Also in January 1963 BMC announced Mk2 versions of the Riley Elf and Wolseley Hornet featuring a single carburettor 998cc engine, the first type of Mini to use what eventually became the mainstream unit.
On 2 April 1963, the Mini-Cooper 1071S was announced, followed by the news on April 19th that Alec Issigonis, the BMC Technical Director had been appointed to the main board. On 7 May it was revealed that weekly Mini production had reached 5500. On November 22nd 1963 BMC released a financial statement, with chairman George Harriman outlining a rosy future. Frederick Ellis of the Daily Express wrote: 'And it is a case of the Mini-cars making a giant size impact on the market. For Mr Harriman also reveals that whereas in the previous year 60% of his sales were cars under 1000cc, last year the proportion rose to 73% of total output. The BMC chief makes the point that this makes the company more than ever dependent on a vast production in order to boost profits. With the profit on Minis far smaller than on the bigger cars, Mr Harriman says that a further lift in output is , "the vital need".'
On 30 August 1963 the Guardian reported: 'The BMC Austin Mini and Morris Mini-Minor are four years old today. A total of 662,337 Minis of all types have been produced, and 200,000 have been exported, 50% to Europe and 25% to Australia, where the Mini is second best selling car after the locally produced Holden. BMC is now producing 5750 cars of this type every week. There are 18 different models in four different marques, ranging from the basic saloons to the Wolseley Hornet and Riley Elf, from plain vans to estate cars.'
In its 25 November 1963 edition the Times reported, 'BMC's net profit on each Mini has been little more than £5, and their market outside Europe has been negligible.'
BMC had become dependent on volume to pay its way in the world and attaining the desired production would prove problematical. The Mini's most successful year as far as UK sales was early on in the cars life span. 134,346 Were sold in Britain in 1963, followed by 123,429 in 1964. It never came close to matching these figures again.
All these problems were eventually licked, but it did mean that sales were slower to pick up than Leonard Lord had first expected.
1960: expansion
In January 1960, the Mini Van was launched - and on the 18th of that month, 800 workers began a night shift at Cowley to boost production of the Mini. On the 16th September, BMC announced two new estate car versions of the Mini, the Morris Mini Traveller and the Austin Seven Countryman. Both these cars featured an external wooden frame, but unlike other BMC estates, these were for decoration and were not structural. The autumn of 1960 was blighted by a series of industrial disputes as BMC tried to ramp up Mini production. Then, due to a recession in the motor trade BMC were forced to put 23,500 men on short time working, but the Mini was unaffected as demand for the car increased. Weekly production at the time was 3000.
1960 Was the year the Mini really took off, some 116,677 leaving the factories and already selling better than the Austin A35 at its peak. The success of the ADO15 soon brought it to the attention of Ford UK's senior product planner, a native of Walsall, Terry Beckett.
He later commented: 'We were very frustrated from 1959 onwards with the advent of the Mini. This was in view of the fact that historically, since the mid-'30s and the Ford £100 car, we had pre-eminence in that sector of the market by offering the lowest priced car which we coupled with value for money service. I can remember in one month in 1960, the Mini achieved a 19% market penetration. That was just one model'.
One of the legends about the Mini is how Ford bought an example and took it apart down to the spot welds to see how BMC could sell it for such a low price. Although it has never been stated whether the car they took apart was the basic or De Luxe model. Terry Beckett recalled: 'We then determined how much it would cost us to build it. On our cost analysis, which we thought was ahead of theirs, we really didn't see how the car could be produced in this way to make a profit.'
According to Beckett, Ford calculated that BMC was losing £30 on every Mini it made. He added: 'I could see ways in which we could take cost out of the Mini without in any way reducing its sales appeal... BMC could have priced it at £30 more, and not lost any sales at all. You can track the decline of BMC from that single product: it took up a huge amount of resources, it sterilised cash flow and it was a pretty disastrous venture'.
Strong words indeed, but Terry Beckett became one of British industry's most outstanding executives, ultimately becoming the chairman of Ford of Britain, and head of the CBI. Beckett revealed that Ford of Britain did come under pressure from dealers, customers, fleet owners and above all the parent company in Detroit to respond to the Mini. 'The great thing was that the Mini was a fine piece of innovative engineering and there we were with very conventional motor cars,' Just to ensure that Ford UK had got their sums right, another Mini was taken to the Company's product planning headquarters at Aveley in Essex and stripped down to the last nut and bolt.
'...and we arrived at the same results we had achieved in the first place,' commented Sir Terence Beckett.
Ford could now relax, they had proved that if they tackled the Mini head on in the marketplace, they could only do so by making a loss themselves. The major back-story of the car sales wars of the 1960s would be Beckett's marketing brilliance versus Issigonis' engineering genius. And in 1976 Ford overtook British Leyland as Britain's favourite vendor of automobiles. One of Terence Beckett's team was the late Alex Trotman, who rose even higher, heading Ford worldwide and gaining a peerage in the process. In a television interview, he recalled that the Mini cost around the same as the Anglia to manufacture - and Ford was making £50 profit car. In Ford's opinion, the Mini cost around £539 to build, a similar figure to the list price of the De Luxe. By September, 1960 BMC was claiming that weekly Mini production had now reached 3300.
1961: race on Sunday, sell on Monday...
In January 1961 the Mini Pick Up arrived on the market. However the Mini's immunity to the recession ended and production was now down to 2000 cars a week, although this was still higher than most British cars at the time. By February business had picked up and it was soon back to normal. BMC's Australian subsidiary began producing Minis in March 1961, known locally as the Morris 850. The antipodean Mini was produced at BMC Australia's Zetland plant in a suburb of Sydney. In BMC's annual report for 1960-61, the company stated that Mini production had risen by 62% in the period, despite an overall drop in production for all vehicles of 10%. The Riley Elf (along with its brother, the Wolseley Hornet) was the first of two attempts (the second, being the Clubman, pictured below) to extend the Mini concept by lengthening it: the structural modifications to the Mini were all aft of the B-pillar, where out back a saloon-type boot was added. Oneadvantage of the Riley (and Wolseley) front-end treatment, was the full-depth radiator grille, which allowed for improved under-bonnet access when compared with the standard item.
Be that as it may, while the average man in the street remained largely ignorant of the Mini’s strong points, other people began to notice them – most notably John Cooper. Cooper was aware of the car’s basic strengths, as both his Formula One drivers, Jack Brabham and Bruce McLaren drove and raved about Minis, and Cooper himself knew all about the tuning potential of the A-Series engine following his experiences with it in his Formula Junior cars. Cooper made tentative approaches to Issigonis in 1960, selling the idea of a high performance variation of the Mini, but Sir Alec was still harbouring a dream that his Mini was a car for everyman and as such was not that keen on it being seen as a performance car. Such was Cooper’s persistence that he ended up going over his colleague Issigonis’ head and straight to George Harriman, explaining the advantages of his idea. After a brief meeting Harriman told John Cooper to go away and build the car, but as Cooper later recalled with one proviso: 'Harriman said that we had to make 1000 – but we eventually made 150,000!'
The Mini-Cooper, launched on the 20th September 1961, eventually went on to become part of motoring folklore, amassing countless rally wins, particularly in the Monte Carlo, where the Cooper performed remarkable feats of giant killing. On the road, the Mini-Cooper was also a remarkable success, becoming the performance car for a generation; but considering the car was such a success, it seems all the more sad that the BMC-Cooper arrangement was never made official, and John Cooper only earned a £2 royalty payment (plus reasonably healthy retainer) for the use of his name on each one sold. However, on the back of the success of the Cooper models, and the countless celebrity endorsements, the rest of the range received a shot in the arm in terms of sales success.
Curiously the Mini-Cooper received a new internal project code, ADO50, while other versions of the ADO15 platform which had more substantial differences, such as the commercial variants remained ADO15s. For a fuller description of events, see the separate development story. 12 October 1961 saw the announcement of two more variations on the Mini theme, the Riley Elf and Wolseley Hornet. These were the posh Minis with Riley the slightly more upmarket.
According to LJK Setright they were designed, '...to appeal to those small minded snobs who found the idea of a Mini intriguing but the name of Austin or Morris offensive and the evidence of austerity.' Jeff Daniels wrote, in 1980, harshly of the cars. 'The Wolseley Hornet and Riley Elf are awful reminders of what happened when every BMC dealer and marque manager demanded his version of the Mini.'
The Elf/Hornet employed an extended boot and vertical fins. At the front they both had a vertical grille and wood trim in the interior as well as more chrome than the standard Mini's. Of course when Jeff Daniels wrote his words, the Rover badge adorned the imposing five door Rover SD1 executive car and the Austin Metro was about to launched. He couldn't have possibly imagined a Rover badged Metro...
Some journalists were just as harsh when the cars were current. Small Car magazine, soon to morph into CAR wrote: 'We guess it's no exaggeration to say that the first Issigonis Wolseley Hornet was among the ugliest, most uncomfortable and least desirable cars ever offered to the great British public. At any rate the one we tested in the winter of 1962 so disappointed us we couldn't bring ourselves to write a word about it.'
Alec Issigonis seems to have distanced himself from these models and delegated development to the engineers working under him and BMC's senior stylist, the Argentinean born Dick Burzi. The Elf/Hornets were shamelessly aimed at women drivers as a sort of miniaturized Jaguar or Rover and seemed to epitomise the kind of Britain that was fading away as the 1960s progressed. Also in the Autumn of 1961 BMC introduced stronger steel wheels on the Mini. This was in response the the racing fraternities experience of shattering wheels under extreme cornering.
On 7 November 1961, the first of many corporate changes occurred in the Mini's lifespan when Sir Leonard Lord retired to be replaced as chairman of BMC by Sir George Harriman and on 13 November, Alec Issigonis was appointed BMC Technical Director. This was followed by the appointment of Charles Griffin as Chief Engineer, Cars. By now Alec Issigonis had divided BMC's engineering staff into three cells. Cell A was responsible for the continuing development of the Mini, and was headed by Jack Daniels. Cell B worked on the project known as the ADO17 and was led by Chris Kingham. Cell C worked on the forthcoming ADO16, and was led by the aforementioned Charles Griffin. From 1962, the Austin Seven was renamed the Austin Mini. By now BMC was claiming that Mini production was running at 3800 per week.
1962
On the 15 August 1962, the ADO16 was announced as the Morris 1100, and later in every conceivable BMC guise. With a 1098cc A-Series engine, Pininfarina styling and Alex Moulton's Hydrolastic suspension, the ADO16 was a more refined, larger, roomier supermini, before the term was coined. The ADO16 was an instant hit and would remain Britain's best selling car for a decade. The ADO16 would form a partnership with the Mini that would span the globe and attain the zenith of the British motor industry. Unfortunately only 10% of parts were common to both vehicles.
On the 21st September, Ford's impeccably-costed Cortina was launched. Even the steering wheel had been re-designed four times to bring it in under budget. Now the four cars that would define the 1960s in automotive terms, were all on the market, the Mini, the Jaguar E-type, the BMC 1100 and the Ford Cortina. A sign that perhaps the Mini was underpriced was printed by The Times on the 23 November: 'British Motor Corporation's Mini range has certainly proved a success so far as sales are concerned, but the competitive pricing has bitten deeply into profit margins.
'Mr George Harriman now reveals in his statement that the £5m plus fall in profits to £11.5m was based on a turnover of £311m, almost exactly the same level as in the previous year. Last year 60% of the group's total output was represented by products of under 1000cc. This compares with 57% for the previous year, and only 43% five years ago. Clearly this trend, plus the narrow margins, makes it essential to maintain turnover by expanding output. In the last trading period the output of Minis reached 182,864 units, of which the home market absorbed 125,877. Exports are; however, increasing steadily and in the last three months of the financial year were averaging 1308 a week.'
During the life of the Mk1 Mini, BMC did make an effort to reduce manufacturing costs, although, no pun intended, the savings were miniscule. It can't have helped that there were allegedly 48 different makes of carpet for the car. Fortunately by now demand for the basic Mini had now dropped to 9% of production.
1963: the range expands across the globe
In October 1962 the Mini-Cooper was also launched in Australia, while back in the UK an all metal version of the Countryman and Traveller estates was launched which retailed at a lower price than the wood framed models. The winter of 1962/63 was cold and bitter, and outside Longbridge in the snow on the 7 January 1963, Alec Issigonis and Charles Griffin demonstrated the prototype twin engined Mini Moke to the media. Even Norman Wisdom, who was appearing in pantomime in Birmingham, was in attendance.
George Harriman told the Times: 'This was originally conceived by Mr Issigonis and myself from the idea of an 0-8-0 locomotive, which has its wheels linked on either side. After producing some experimental versions we found that the traction of the two Mini engines balanced each other and that it was possible to run one in top gear and the other in bottom simultaneously.'
However it would be another year before the Moke went into production and the twin engined version proved to be a technical cul de sac. Also in January 1963 BMC announced Mk2 versions of the Riley Elf and Wolseley Hornet featuring a single carburettor 998cc engine, the first type of Mini to use what eventually became the mainstream unit.
On 2 April 1963, the Mini-Cooper 1071S was announced, followed by the news on April 19th that Alec Issigonis, the BMC Technical Director had been appointed to the main board. On 7 May it was revealed that weekly Mini production had reached 5500. On November 22nd 1963 BMC released a financial statement, with chairman George Harriman outlining a rosy future. Frederick Ellis of the Daily Express wrote: 'And it is a case of the Mini-cars making a giant size impact on the market. For Mr Harriman also reveals that whereas in the previous year 60% of his sales were cars under 1000cc, last year the proportion rose to 73% of total output. The BMC chief makes the point that this makes the company more than ever dependent on a vast production in order to boost profits. With the profit on Minis far smaller than on the bigger cars, Mr Harriman says that a further lift in output is , "the vital need".'
On 30 August 1963 the Guardian reported: 'The BMC Austin Mini and Morris Mini-Minor are four years old today. A total of 662,337 Minis of all types have been produced, and 200,000 have been exported, 50% to Europe and 25% to Australia, where the Mini is second best selling car after the locally produced Holden. BMC is now producing 5750 cars of this type every week. There are 18 different models in four different marques, ranging from the basic saloons to the Wolseley Hornet and Riley Elf, from plain vans to estate cars.'
In its 25 November 1963 edition the Times reported, 'BMC's net profit on each Mini has been little more than £5, and their market outside Europe has been negligible.'
BMC had become dependent on volume to pay its way in the world and attaining the desired production would prove problematical. The Mini's most successful year as far as UK sales was early on in the cars life span. 134,346 Were sold in Britain in 1963, followed by 123,429 in 1964. It never came close to matching these figures again.
1964: Monte magic
On 23 January 1964, things really started to come together for the Mini when Paddy Hopkirk and Henry Liddon won the Monte Carlo Rally in Mini-Cooper 1071S 33 EJB. The returning car was given a heroes welcome by the media. One of the world's premier motorsport events had been won by a low budget small car that looked like something a district nurse would drive, or so BMC's PR men would have you believe. In reality the Cooper S Minis cost a bit more than the basic 850.
In the aftermath of the Monte Carlo win, Alec Issigonis said: 'The amazing point is that I planned the ADO15 not as a competition car but as family transport. But I think that when exceptional drivers get hold of the car, they can exploit its steering, suspension and roadholding-all of which I felt were important for a family car.' The motor sport success of the Mini created a whole go faster and accessories industry, ranging from the likes of Downton Engineering to back street bodgers as owners of even 850 cars craved more get up and go. The cars go-kart handling and low ride height made the driver feel like they were in a racing car, even if in reality there was a limitation to performance from the 848cc engine. Also in January 1964, production of the Mini Moke began, but it was not available in Britain until August of that year.
In February 1964, BMC announced it had built one million front wheel drive vehicles. BMC said that 1,002,129 had been produced, including 782,838 Austin and Morris Minis and 219,291 Morris, MG, and Austin 1100s. Of the total, 325,441 or 32.5%-were exported. BMC was producing 11,350 Issigonis-designed front-wheel-drive models a week, with demand still exceeding production and being further increased.
In March, BMC announced they would be launching two more Mini variants at the forthcoming Geneva Motor Show. They were the Cooper 970S and 1275S. Although the Mini developed the image as a peoples car, the purchaser needed to be in a different income bracket to afford the 1275S. In September 1964, the basic Morris Mini Minor cost £449, which didn't get you a heater. The Morris Mini-Cooper 1275S cost £757, a whopping 68% more. By June, the US army was reported to be evaluating the Mini Moke, but the trials came to nothing. In September, BMC revealed details to the press about the new Hydrolastic Minis. Hydrolastic was to be fitted to the mainstream Minis to give that big car ride, or so BMC believed its potential customers thought.
The fitment of Hydrolastic suspension to the Mini was and is controversial. Did it improve the car, or was it a costly diversion? Certainly many BMC engineers felt it was not worth the effort on a car which had dubious profitability. Hydrolastic appeared to improve the ride of the Mini, but impaired the handling. Also BMC engineers allegedly altered Alex Moulton's suspension settings. Production at BMC's Cowley factory, which was dominated by the Mini and ADO16 was not going well. In the year to September 1964, 254 unofficial strikes which caused 750,000 lost man-hours occurred, which was not good news for a company now dependent on high volume production to make a profit.
In October 1964, BMC announced B-Series engined Austin 1800, codenamed ADO17, intended to sell at a higher price than the 1100 and earn the corporation serious profits. This proved to be a step to far in expanding the Mini formula. Alec Issigonis' ego, dogmatism and contempt for market research had produced a car that was both to big and expensive for its intended market slot and plans for producing 4000 a week had to be hastily revised downwards and the car never remotely approached the sales success of the Mini and ADO16.
To be fair to Issigonis, at the time the media felt he could do no wrong and most pundits felt the 1800 would be another triumph for BMC. Indeed, after the success of 1964 with both the Mini and 1100, Issigonis became seen as some sort of motoring guru by the media, the Albert Einstein of the auto industry, the man who could predict the future of the car. The ADO17, although incredibly spacious, exposed Issigonis's flaws in expanding the Mini formula. Whereas the 1100 had evolved from the Mini in being more styled and input from Charles Griffin's team at Cowley had resulted in improved interior ergonomics, the 1800 reverted to the basic Mini's stark interior, complete with bus driver steering position and in a bigger car the switches were even harder to reach.
The ADO17 dispensed with subframes, but to compensate the body was over-engineered, suggesting some of the design discipline that had characterised the Mini's development was lacking. Early cars were unreliable and consumers bought the Ford Cortina in droves instead, much to Terry Beckett's delight. The upshot of all this was to strengthen Ford and weaken BMC and this was later to come to a head in 1967.
1965
In January 1965 the Mini-Cooper 1275S AJB 44B of Timo Makinen and Paul Easter won the Monte Carlo Rally. Alec Issigonis, speaking after the event said: 'Racing, while valuable in spectacle and publicity, I am certain, does not improve the breed.'
He then added: 'But rallying does, because it is so closely allied to road use. It forces development. It tends to exaggerate many mechanical features, to underline weaknesses. It is directly through rally experience that we have strengthened our gearboxes enormously.' Had the Mini's competition work directly influenced his designs? 'I do not know. We used to think that if you had very good engine breathing it gave no low-speed torque. But this kind of rallying shows that you can have both. I would say the influence of rally work is quite subtle. But, given these conditions of ice and snow, we see the Mini could not be a more suitable engineering package, enabling us to take on the five- or seven-litre cars, which we cannot do on the race track. Even so, it was not designed as a competition car.'
On 3 February 1965, the millionth Mini was produced, which conveniently dovetailed with the second Monte Carlo win, enabled BMC's publicity machine to exploit the situation. It had become a mini world, where small was beautiful. No one could possibly have imagined that a decade later the Mini's manufacturer would be effectively bankrupt.
During May 1965, the UK production of the Mini attained its highest weekly production figure, when both Cowley and Longbridge produced 5000 cars. On 22 July, BMC announced it was taking over the Pressed Steel Company, the Oxford based car body manufacturer, for £34m. Then on August 6 BMC announced it would be producing some of its vehicles at a plant at Seneffe in southern Belgium. This enabled the company to circumvent tariffs on imported non-European Union vehicles. In October 1965, the Italian firm of Innocenti began to licence build its own version of the Mini, known as the Innocenti Mini Minor 850 at its factory in Milan. At 860,000 lire, the Innocenti Mini Minor 850 was quite a bit more expensive than the rival Fiat 850, but as the Milan firm was to be an extremely profitable operation, it is quite possible that unlike BMC, the Italians had thoroughly costed the price of Mini manufacture.
In October, BMC announced the automatic transmission Mini and 1100. The all-British system was designed by the Automotive Products Group and developed with BMC over the previous 18 months, the joint investment amounting to £3m. It was the first marriage of an automatic transmission to a transverse engine - achieved by putting it in the sump - and the world's smallest automatic with a torque converter replacing the clutch. By then, UK Mini and 1100 production was recorded as running at 11,000 to 12,000 a week.
1965 Was a year of significant developments for the Australian Mini. In May 1965 the Mini Van was introduced down under and in June the Morris 850 was renamed the Morris Mini Minor, in line with the Cowley built cars. In September 1965 the 1275cc Cooper S joined the Antipodean range. The most interesting development was the introduction of wind-up windows to all Australian Minis; a luxury that European buyers would have to wait for.
1966: production changes
January 1966 arrived and the works Minis were disqualified from the Monte Carlo Rally for headlight infringements. Once again Timo Makinen and Paul Easter finished first on the road. BMC exploited the furore over the disqualification to its advantage. In February, Moke production began in Australia. There were more corporate changes in June 1966, when Joe Edwards, boss of the newly absorbed Pressed Steel Company, was appointed managing director of BMC; while Sir George Harriman remained chairman.
BMC had started to drift aimlessly with disappointing financial results; and it was Joe Edwards' task to restore it to health. This was followed on 11 July 1966 by the merger of BMC and Sir William Lyons Jaguar group of companies to form British Motor Holdings (BMH). This was effectively a takeover of Jaguar by BMC, with Sir George Harriman remaining chairman. At about the same time, the newly re-elected Labour government imposed some deflationary measures on the economy, resulting in a slow down in the new car trade. By November 1966, BMC had announced plans to make 10,000 workers redundant, as part of Joe Edwards' plan to reduce overmanning, and had put over 20,000 more on short-time working.
This sparked off protest strikes, but the most serious was a strike by delivery drivers, which resulted in BMC plants becoming overcrowded with new cars to such an extent that the company was forced to shut down all production. The media had a field day, publishing photographs of disused airfields overcrowded with cars that could not be delivered to dealers. Although the various disputes were resolved by December, the ramifications of what for BMC was an embarrassing period, was far reaching.
While BMC was losing face in public, and market share, it also announced another revision to the Mini range in October 1966. The Wolseley Hornet and Riley Elf went into Mk3 guise with wind-up windows and internal door hinges.
1967
Soon it was January 1967 and Monte Carlo Rally time. Rauno Aaltonen and Henry Liddon swept to victory in Cooper 1275S LBL 6D, and this time it was official. The Times quoted Alec Issigonis at the Geneva Motor Show in March saying of the Mini: 'In a four-seater of that size there is no room for styling.' However on the 13 April 1967, British Motor Holdings declared it had lost £7.5m in the six months to January 1967. This represented an adverse swing of £13m in pre-tax profit. Although there had been mitigating circumstances for this big loss - the problems of 1966 were a major factor - the government became convinced that BMH, or at least the BMC component, was going to hit the rocks. From then, on the Wilson government actively encouraged a merger between BMH and Sir Donald Stokes Leyland Motor Corporation.
The pundits in the media all had their say, denigrating BMC and exulting Ford and Vauxhall's business methods. The business editor of the Observer newspaper, Anthony Bambridge, was one of them, although he did make an interesting point when he wrote: 'Mini sales are slipping. In 1963 they held 15% of the home market. Last year this had slid to 10%, and is now under 7%.'
It appears the real reason for the Mini's sales decline in the UK market was BMC's inability to satisfy domestic demand and that a considerable portion of British production was earmarked for export regardless of home demand. The post-war Atlee Government's exhortation to 'export or die' still had a powerful hold over manufacturing industry and the feeling that Britain had to earn its keep in the world still held sway. Back in 1963, the Mini had been just another small car, albeit an innovative one, with little appeal to overseas buyers, by 1967 it was a fashionable automotive sensation, and production had still not peaked.
Just to reinforce the seriousness that BMC regarded exports, in June 1967 it announced the appointment of the improbably named 48-year-old Filmer (Phil) Paradise, the extrovert cigar-smoking American who had headed Ford's operation in Italy until a few months before. He became managing director BMC International Services, BMC Europe and BMC Switzerland and he was based at the corporation's European headquarters at Lausanne. By September 1967 Paradise was extolling the Mini's virtues to the press.
'The Mini craze', he told reporters at the Frankfurt motor show, 'has brought much pleasure to a world that seems to enjoy expressing in a shorthand, diminutive way, and the Mini is a lot of automobile in a small package.'
While all this was going on BMC began, rather late in the day, to investigate a facelift, which went on to become the Mk2 Mini. The Motor Show of October 1967 brought the arrival of the Mk2 Austin and Morris Mini, as announced on the 17 October; and from there on, there was no Mini Minor nomenclature. The revised car featured a larger rear window, near rear light clusters, and a restyled grille, which was probably intended to give the Mini a family resemblance to the other Issigonis front wheel drive cars. In truth, the new grille was probably more time consuming to fit on the production line than the Mk1 moustache surround and grille. The Austin and Morris each had alternate grilles, although there does seem to have been more of an effort to commonise parts. The Mk2 models also offered the 998cc engine, previously found in the Elf/Hornet models. From now on the familiar Mini 850 and 1000 appeared in the BMC range.
But because the design of the facelifted model had not been started until March 1967, BMC's component suppliers could not supply the new grille and tail lamps in adequate numbers - if at all. BMC ended up storing 22,000 incomplete cars, again this was reported in the media. There was also a shortage of the 998cc A-Series engine, which now that it was fitted to the mainstream Mini was expected to prove the most popular power unit. And these shortages were to endure for at least four months. This apparent mismanagement and administrative chaos further played into the hands of the Wilson government who saw the Leyland Motor Corporation as the saviours of the British owned motor industry.
On 19 October, BMC announced that Roy Haynes, Ford of Britain's chief stylist who shaped the Mk2 Cortina and MkIV Zephyr/Zodiac, was to become BMC's director of styling. Haynes was also trained as a product planner and was recruited as part of Joe Edwards' plan to rejuvenate BMC. And the Mini would feature on Haynes list of things to do.
When Autocar got its hands on a MK2 Mini, KOV 247F, a Morris Mini 1000, it wrote: 'We were expecting the new Mini to be announced with winding windows, like certain versions built in Australia. This must now be the only car without them, and they are sadly missed. It is also time such economies as cable release interior door handles were brought up to date; and some of the standards of fit and finish were disappointing. Carpets still do not lie snugly on the floor – a criticism we made in 1959.'
Overall the magazine felt the Mk2 was a 'great improvement', but while the press clamoured for wind-up windows, it was not something that BMC's technical director was prepared to give them.
Sometime between 1965 and 1967, the concept that BMC was not making money on Mini began to seep into the minds of the company's senior executives. Production engineer Peter Tothill, quoted in Jonathan Wood's book, Alec Issigonis: The Man Who Made The Mini, recalled a meeting at Longbridge: 'They'd come to realise the massive cost penalty being incurred by the Mini. A cost comparison was done between it, the (Austin) A40 and the (Morris) Minor and all the bits were laid out to see if any parts could be commonised. If, for instance, we used the same sun visor we'd save half a penny a visor. The trouble was the Mini was over-engineered, there was so much cost built into the car with, for example, a penalty of £20 to £25 on the sub frames and suspension. Because it worked at a ratio of 5:1 you've got forged arms instead of pressings and ball and roller bearings for the pivots.'
1968: the big year
As part of Joe Edwards rationalisation plan, production of the Mini ceased at Cowley in January 1968, thus eliminating the transportation costs from Morris engines and Castle Bromwich. From now on all UK production of the Mini would be at Longbridge. Following the formation of British Leyland Motor Corporation (BLMC), the BMC directors' zones of responsibility were reshuffled - mainly because of Alec Issigonis' decision to devote himself full-time to more creative and forward looking concepts of research and development. This was when Issigonis decided to design a new Mini, the project that became the 9X.
Tensions between BMH and Leyland executives resulted in Joe Edwards resigning from BLMC, leaving the old BMC effectively under Leyland's control. The BLMC officially came into existence on the 14 May 1968 with Sir George Harriman as chairman and Sir Donald Stokes as chief executive. Harriman had in reality agreed to stand down after a few months, while Stokes temporarily took over running the former BMC. He drafted in Harry Webster, Triumph's technical director, to take over the equivalent post at Longbridge, usurping Issigonis, who was sidelined into research and development.
While these corporate moves were taking place, while Issigonis was working away on the 9X, at his styling studio at Cowley, Roy Haynes and his team were beavering away on the Mk3 Mini and Clubman. On 30 May, a camera recorded for posterity a Mini Clubman hatchback. Sadly money for development projects was now hard to come by, and money, or lack of it would now dictate British Leyland's small car policy.
On 17 September, Sir Donald Stokes replaced Sir George Harriman as chairman of BLMC. George Turnbull was imported from running Triumph to become the managing director of the Austin Morris division. Also that month all the Mini models now received an all synchromesh gearbox. Graham Turner in his book The Leyland Papers claimed that in 1968 the Mini was making a profit of £15 per unit, although the method of calculating this was later disputed.
In October, the Authi factory at Pamplona in Spain produced its first Mini, a car known as the 1275C. During 1965 BMC had gone into partnership with the wholly Spanish owned AUTHI (Automoviles de Turismo Hispano Ingleses SA) in an attempt to circumvent government restrictions on cars imported into Spain. Authi was already manufacturing ADO16 1100 models in an upmarket local version and hoped to perform the same trick with the Mini in what was Europe's fastest growing car market, albeit one still presided over by dictator General Franco. Further models followed in 1969; the 1000E and 1000S models. In the same month, UK production of the Moke ceased. It was not a car suitable for the British climate, and production would now centre on sunnier climes.
In May 1969, the final Alec Issigonis design (excepting the aborted 9X Mini replacement) was announced. The Austin Maxi was a further evolution of the original Mini theme, this time using a five door spacious hatchback body, a new overhead cam engine mated to a transmission in sump five-speed gearbox. However, like the 1800 it had boxy styling and was plagued with reliability issues which deterred buyers. By 1969 consumers had become used to the Issigonis design philosophy and were no longer prepared to put up with poor quality and unreliability in the name of innovation as they had done in 1959. Like the 1800 the Maxi flopped, further re-enforcing the view of some BLMC executives that Alec Issigonis was a liability, not an asset to the corporation.
During 1968 Alec Issigonis calculated that an inline RWD 1275cc engine and gearbox cost just over £42, but the transverse equivalent cost around £54. And there were more expensive add-ons as a consequence of this. All this was not lost on Roy Haynes, who although was working on the Mini Clubman, was not a fan of Issigonis' baby. He and other Ford imports like product planner John Bacchus saw it as an expensive, unprofitable financial disaster. Perhaps a legacy of Terry Beckett's dissection and costing of a Mini soon after its launch? Within days of the official formation of British Leyland in May 1968, Roy Haynes had written to the Company's Finance Director John Barber, another Ford import, advocating the development of a simple, profitable rear wheel drive car to appeal to the fleet market. This became the Morris Marina.
1969: Mark 3 and Clubman arrives
On 23 January 1964, things really started to come together for the Mini when Paddy Hopkirk and Henry Liddon won the Monte Carlo Rally in Mini-Cooper 1071S 33 EJB. The returning car was given a heroes welcome by the media. One of the world's premier motorsport events had been won by a low budget small car that looked like something a district nurse would drive, or so BMC's PR men would have you believe. In reality the Cooper S Minis cost a bit more than the basic 850.
In the aftermath of the Monte Carlo win, Alec Issigonis said: 'The amazing point is that I planned the ADO15 not as a competition car but as family transport. But I think that when exceptional drivers get hold of the car, they can exploit its steering, suspension and roadholding-all of which I felt were important for a family car.' The motor sport success of the Mini created a whole go faster and accessories industry, ranging from the likes of Downton Engineering to back street bodgers as owners of even 850 cars craved more get up and go. The cars go-kart handling and low ride height made the driver feel like they were in a racing car, even if in reality there was a limitation to performance from the 848cc engine. Also in January 1964, production of the Mini Moke began, but it was not available in Britain until August of that year.
In February 1964, BMC announced it had built one million front wheel drive vehicles. BMC said that 1,002,129 had been produced, including 782,838 Austin and Morris Minis and 219,291 Morris, MG, and Austin 1100s. Of the total, 325,441 or 32.5%-were exported. BMC was producing 11,350 Issigonis-designed front-wheel-drive models a week, with demand still exceeding production and being further increased.
In March, BMC announced they would be launching two more Mini variants at the forthcoming Geneva Motor Show. They were the Cooper 970S and 1275S. Although the Mini developed the image as a peoples car, the purchaser needed to be in a different income bracket to afford the 1275S. In September 1964, the basic Morris Mini Minor cost £449, which didn't get you a heater. The Morris Mini-Cooper 1275S cost £757, a whopping 68% more. By June, the US army was reported to be evaluating the Mini Moke, but the trials came to nothing. In September, BMC revealed details to the press about the new Hydrolastic Minis. Hydrolastic was to be fitted to the mainstream Minis to give that big car ride, or so BMC believed its potential customers thought.
The fitment of Hydrolastic suspension to the Mini was and is controversial. Did it improve the car, or was it a costly diversion? Certainly many BMC engineers felt it was not worth the effort on a car which had dubious profitability. Hydrolastic appeared to improve the ride of the Mini, but impaired the handling. Also BMC engineers allegedly altered Alex Moulton's suspension settings. Production at BMC's Cowley factory, which was dominated by the Mini and ADO16 was not going well. In the year to September 1964, 254 unofficial strikes which caused 750,000 lost man-hours occurred, which was not good news for a company now dependent on high volume production to make a profit.
In October 1964, BMC announced B-Series engined Austin 1800, codenamed ADO17, intended to sell at a higher price than the 1100 and earn the corporation serious profits. This proved to be a step to far in expanding the Mini formula. Alec Issigonis' ego, dogmatism and contempt for market research had produced a car that was both to big and expensive for its intended market slot and plans for producing 4000 a week had to be hastily revised downwards and the car never remotely approached the sales success of the Mini and ADO16.
To be fair to Issigonis, at the time the media felt he could do no wrong and most pundits felt the 1800 would be another triumph for BMC. Indeed, after the success of 1964 with both the Mini and 1100, Issigonis became seen as some sort of motoring guru by the media, the Albert Einstein of the auto industry, the man who could predict the future of the car. The ADO17, although incredibly spacious, exposed Issigonis's flaws in expanding the Mini formula. Whereas the 1100 had evolved from the Mini in being more styled and input from Charles Griffin's team at Cowley had resulted in improved interior ergonomics, the 1800 reverted to the basic Mini's stark interior, complete with bus driver steering position and in a bigger car the switches were even harder to reach.
The ADO17 dispensed with subframes, but to compensate the body was over-engineered, suggesting some of the design discipline that had characterised the Mini's development was lacking. Early cars were unreliable and consumers bought the Ford Cortina in droves instead, much to Terry Beckett's delight. The upshot of all this was to strengthen Ford and weaken BMC and this was later to come to a head in 1967.
1965
In January 1965 the Mini-Cooper 1275S AJB 44B of Timo Makinen and Paul Easter won the Monte Carlo Rally. Alec Issigonis, speaking after the event said: 'Racing, while valuable in spectacle and publicity, I am certain, does not improve the breed.'
He then added: 'But rallying does, because it is so closely allied to road use. It forces development. It tends to exaggerate many mechanical features, to underline weaknesses. It is directly through rally experience that we have strengthened our gearboxes enormously.' Had the Mini's competition work directly influenced his designs? 'I do not know. We used to think that if you had very good engine breathing it gave no low-speed torque. But this kind of rallying shows that you can have both. I would say the influence of rally work is quite subtle. But, given these conditions of ice and snow, we see the Mini could not be a more suitable engineering package, enabling us to take on the five- or seven-litre cars, which we cannot do on the race track. Even so, it was not designed as a competition car.'
On 3 February 1965, the millionth Mini was produced, which conveniently dovetailed with the second Monte Carlo win, enabled BMC's publicity machine to exploit the situation. It had become a mini world, where small was beautiful. No one could possibly have imagined that a decade later the Mini's manufacturer would be effectively bankrupt.
During May 1965, the UK production of the Mini attained its highest weekly production figure, when both Cowley and Longbridge produced 5000 cars. On 22 July, BMC announced it was taking over the Pressed Steel Company, the Oxford based car body manufacturer, for £34m. Then on August 6 BMC announced it would be producing some of its vehicles at a plant at Seneffe in southern Belgium. This enabled the company to circumvent tariffs on imported non-European Union vehicles. In October 1965, the Italian firm of Innocenti began to licence build its own version of the Mini, known as the Innocenti Mini Minor 850 at its factory in Milan. At 860,000 lire, the Innocenti Mini Minor 850 was quite a bit more expensive than the rival Fiat 850, but as the Milan firm was to be an extremely profitable operation, it is quite possible that unlike BMC, the Italians had thoroughly costed the price of Mini manufacture.
In October, BMC announced the automatic transmission Mini and 1100. The all-British system was designed by the Automotive Products Group and developed with BMC over the previous 18 months, the joint investment amounting to £3m. It was the first marriage of an automatic transmission to a transverse engine - achieved by putting it in the sump - and the world's smallest automatic with a torque converter replacing the clutch. By then, UK Mini and 1100 production was recorded as running at 11,000 to 12,000 a week.
1965 Was a year of significant developments for the Australian Mini. In May 1965 the Mini Van was introduced down under and in June the Morris 850 was renamed the Morris Mini Minor, in line with the Cowley built cars. In September 1965 the 1275cc Cooper S joined the Antipodean range. The most interesting development was the introduction of wind-up windows to all Australian Minis; a luxury that European buyers would have to wait for.
1966: production changes
January 1966 arrived and the works Minis were disqualified from the Monte Carlo Rally for headlight infringements. Once again Timo Makinen and Paul Easter finished first on the road. BMC exploited the furore over the disqualification to its advantage. In February, Moke production began in Australia. There were more corporate changes in June 1966, when Joe Edwards, boss of the newly absorbed Pressed Steel Company, was appointed managing director of BMC; while Sir George Harriman remained chairman.
BMC had started to drift aimlessly with disappointing financial results; and it was Joe Edwards' task to restore it to health. This was followed on 11 July 1966 by the merger of BMC and Sir William Lyons Jaguar group of companies to form British Motor Holdings (BMH). This was effectively a takeover of Jaguar by BMC, with Sir George Harriman remaining chairman. At about the same time, the newly re-elected Labour government imposed some deflationary measures on the economy, resulting in a slow down in the new car trade. By November 1966, BMC had announced plans to make 10,000 workers redundant, as part of Joe Edwards' plan to reduce overmanning, and had put over 20,000 more on short-time working.
This sparked off protest strikes, but the most serious was a strike by delivery drivers, which resulted in BMC plants becoming overcrowded with new cars to such an extent that the company was forced to shut down all production. The media had a field day, publishing photographs of disused airfields overcrowded with cars that could not be delivered to dealers. Although the various disputes were resolved by December, the ramifications of what for BMC was an embarrassing period, was far reaching.
While BMC was losing face in public, and market share, it also announced another revision to the Mini range in October 1966. The Wolseley Hornet and Riley Elf went into Mk3 guise with wind-up windows and internal door hinges.
1967
Soon it was January 1967 and Monte Carlo Rally time. Rauno Aaltonen and Henry Liddon swept to victory in Cooper 1275S LBL 6D, and this time it was official. The Times quoted Alec Issigonis at the Geneva Motor Show in March saying of the Mini: 'In a four-seater of that size there is no room for styling.' However on the 13 April 1967, British Motor Holdings declared it had lost £7.5m in the six months to January 1967. This represented an adverse swing of £13m in pre-tax profit. Although there had been mitigating circumstances for this big loss - the problems of 1966 were a major factor - the government became convinced that BMH, or at least the BMC component, was going to hit the rocks. From then, on the Wilson government actively encouraged a merger between BMH and Sir Donald Stokes Leyland Motor Corporation.
The pundits in the media all had their say, denigrating BMC and exulting Ford and Vauxhall's business methods. The business editor of the Observer newspaper, Anthony Bambridge, was one of them, although he did make an interesting point when he wrote: 'Mini sales are slipping. In 1963 they held 15% of the home market. Last year this had slid to 10%, and is now under 7%.'
It appears the real reason for the Mini's sales decline in the UK market was BMC's inability to satisfy domestic demand and that a considerable portion of British production was earmarked for export regardless of home demand. The post-war Atlee Government's exhortation to 'export or die' still had a powerful hold over manufacturing industry and the feeling that Britain had to earn its keep in the world still held sway. Back in 1963, the Mini had been just another small car, albeit an innovative one, with little appeal to overseas buyers, by 1967 it was a fashionable automotive sensation, and production had still not peaked.
Just to reinforce the seriousness that BMC regarded exports, in June 1967 it announced the appointment of the improbably named 48-year-old Filmer (Phil) Paradise, the extrovert cigar-smoking American who had headed Ford's operation in Italy until a few months before. He became managing director BMC International Services, BMC Europe and BMC Switzerland and he was based at the corporation's European headquarters at Lausanne. By September 1967 Paradise was extolling the Mini's virtues to the press.
'The Mini craze', he told reporters at the Frankfurt motor show, 'has brought much pleasure to a world that seems to enjoy expressing in a shorthand, diminutive way, and the Mini is a lot of automobile in a small package.'
While all this was going on BMC began, rather late in the day, to investigate a facelift, which went on to become the Mk2 Mini. The Motor Show of October 1967 brought the arrival of the Mk2 Austin and Morris Mini, as announced on the 17 October; and from there on, there was no Mini Minor nomenclature. The revised car featured a larger rear window, near rear light clusters, and a restyled grille, which was probably intended to give the Mini a family resemblance to the other Issigonis front wheel drive cars. In truth, the new grille was probably more time consuming to fit on the production line than the Mk1 moustache surround and grille. The Austin and Morris each had alternate grilles, although there does seem to have been more of an effort to commonise parts. The Mk2 models also offered the 998cc engine, previously found in the Elf/Hornet models. From now on the familiar Mini 850 and 1000 appeared in the BMC range.
But because the design of the facelifted model had not been started until March 1967, BMC's component suppliers could not supply the new grille and tail lamps in adequate numbers - if at all. BMC ended up storing 22,000 incomplete cars, again this was reported in the media. There was also a shortage of the 998cc A-Series engine, which now that it was fitted to the mainstream Mini was expected to prove the most popular power unit. And these shortages were to endure for at least four months. This apparent mismanagement and administrative chaos further played into the hands of the Wilson government who saw the Leyland Motor Corporation as the saviours of the British owned motor industry.
On 19 October, BMC announced that Roy Haynes, Ford of Britain's chief stylist who shaped the Mk2 Cortina and MkIV Zephyr/Zodiac, was to become BMC's director of styling. Haynes was also trained as a product planner and was recruited as part of Joe Edwards' plan to rejuvenate BMC. And the Mini would feature on Haynes list of things to do.
When Autocar got its hands on a MK2 Mini, KOV 247F, a Morris Mini 1000, it wrote: 'We were expecting the new Mini to be announced with winding windows, like certain versions built in Australia. This must now be the only car without them, and they are sadly missed. It is also time such economies as cable release interior door handles were brought up to date; and some of the standards of fit and finish were disappointing. Carpets still do not lie snugly on the floor – a criticism we made in 1959.'
Overall the magazine felt the Mk2 was a 'great improvement', but while the press clamoured for wind-up windows, it was not something that BMC's technical director was prepared to give them.
Sometime between 1965 and 1967, the concept that BMC was not making money on Mini began to seep into the minds of the company's senior executives. Production engineer Peter Tothill, quoted in Jonathan Wood's book, Alec Issigonis: The Man Who Made The Mini, recalled a meeting at Longbridge: 'They'd come to realise the massive cost penalty being incurred by the Mini. A cost comparison was done between it, the (Austin) A40 and the (Morris) Minor and all the bits were laid out to see if any parts could be commonised. If, for instance, we used the same sun visor we'd save half a penny a visor. The trouble was the Mini was over-engineered, there was so much cost built into the car with, for example, a penalty of £20 to £25 on the sub frames and suspension. Because it worked at a ratio of 5:1 you've got forged arms instead of pressings and ball and roller bearings for the pivots.'
1968: the big year
As part of Joe Edwards rationalisation plan, production of the Mini ceased at Cowley in January 1968, thus eliminating the transportation costs from Morris engines and Castle Bromwich. From now on all UK production of the Mini would be at Longbridge. Following the formation of British Leyland Motor Corporation (BLMC), the BMC directors' zones of responsibility were reshuffled - mainly because of Alec Issigonis' decision to devote himself full-time to more creative and forward looking concepts of research and development. This was when Issigonis decided to design a new Mini, the project that became the 9X.
Tensions between BMH and Leyland executives resulted in Joe Edwards resigning from BLMC, leaving the old BMC effectively under Leyland's control. The BLMC officially came into existence on the 14 May 1968 with Sir George Harriman as chairman and Sir Donald Stokes as chief executive. Harriman had in reality agreed to stand down after a few months, while Stokes temporarily took over running the former BMC. He drafted in Harry Webster, Triumph's technical director, to take over the equivalent post at Longbridge, usurping Issigonis, who was sidelined into research and development.
While these corporate moves were taking place, while Issigonis was working away on the 9X, at his styling studio at Cowley, Roy Haynes and his team were beavering away on the Mk3 Mini and Clubman. On 30 May, a camera recorded for posterity a Mini Clubman hatchback. Sadly money for development projects was now hard to come by, and money, or lack of it would now dictate British Leyland's small car policy.
On 17 September, Sir Donald Stokes replaced Sir George Harriman as chairman of BLMC. George Turnbull was imported from running Triumph to become the managing director of the Austin Morris division. Also that month all the Mini models now received an all synchromesh gearbox. Graham Turner in his book The Leyland Papers claimed that in 1968 the Mini was making a profit of £15 per unit, although the method of calculating this was later disputed.
In October, the Authi factory at Pamplona in Spain produced its first Mini, a car known as the 1275C. During 1965 BMC had gone into partnership with the wholly Spanish owned AUTHI (Automoviles de Turismo Hispano Ingleses SA) in an attempt to circumvent government restrictions on cars imported into Spain. Authi was already manufacturing ADO16 1100 models in an upmarket local version and hoped to perform the same trick with the Mini in what was Europe's fastest growing car market, albeit one still presided over by dictator General Franco. Further models followed in 1969; the 1000E and 1000S models. In the same month, UK production of the Moke ceased. It was not a car suitable for the British climate, and production would now centre on sunnier climes.
In May 1969, the final Alec Issigonis design (excepting the aborted 9X Mini replacement) was announced. The Austin Maxi was a further evolution of the original Mini theme, this time using a five door spacious hatchback body, a new overhead cam engine mated to a transmission in sump five-speed gearbox. However, like the 1800 it had boxy styling and was plagued with reliability issues which deterred buyers. By 1969 consumers had become used to the Issigonis design philosophy and were no longer prepared to put up with poor quality and unreliability in the name of innovation as they had done in 1959. Like the 1800 the Maxi flopped, further re-enforcing the view of some BLMC executives that Alec Issigonis was a liability, not an asset to the corporation.
During 1968 Alec Issigonis calculated that an inline RWD 1275cc engine and gearbox cost just over £42, but the transverse equivalent cost around £54. And there were more expensive add-ons as a consequence of this. All this was not lost on Roy Haynes, who although was working on the Mini Clubman, was not a fan of Issigonis' baby. He and other Ford imports like product planner John Bacchus saw it as an expensive, unprofitable financial disaster. Perhaps a legacy of Terry Beckett's dissection and costing of a Mini soon after its launch? Within days of the official formation of British Leyland in May 1968, Roy Haynes had written to the Company's Finance Director John Barber, another Ford import, advocating the development of a simple, profitable rear wheel drive car to appeal to the fleet market. This became the Morris Marina.
1969: Mark 3 and Clubman arrives
Development by marketing: how not to improve the Mini in two easy steps. Graft on a Maxi front end andreplace the cult performance Cooper models with a de-tuned version. The Clubman was soon nicknamedthe “Clubfoot” by Mini aficionados.
On 19 June 1969 the two millionth Mini rolled off the production line at Longbridge, the first British car to attain this mark. Sir Alec Issigonis, as he now was, was there posing with Austin Morris managing director George Turnbull, who in a advance press release stated: 'The Mini will be the backbone of our production in the Longbridge plant, the biggest in the group, for many years to come. Harry Webster, our chief engineer, and his team have many good ideas up their sleeves for keeping the Mini ever fresh in the future.'
The statement alludes to the fact that Issigonis no longer had any real influence on the development of his baby. On the day itself Turnbull added: 'Alec is British Leyland's secret weapon. No one else in the car industry has anyone quite in his class. He is essentially a man of vision, of long term thinking, but always with a revolutionary approach to design problems. We don't care how way out his ideas are. We can soon put them through the commercial mincer.'
In July 1969 BLMC bought a 50% stake in Nueva Montana Quijano (NMQ), a heavy industrial group in the north of Spain and owners of Authi, and assumed responsibility for the management of Authi of Pamplona and the other NMQ automotive operations. Now British Leyland was taking direct control of Spanish Mini and ADO16 manufacture.
Lord Stokes and his new management team, which included Filmer Paradise, now promoted and brought back from Europe, were not fans of badge-engineering, and so began phasing out some of the multiplicity of marque and model types. In August 1969 the Riley Elf and Wolseley Hornet ceased production after 59,367 examples. The booted Minis were only produced at a rate of 125 per week with a bodyshell subtlely different to the rest of the range and BLMC had a replacement on the way in the shape of the Clubman. In the Autumn of 1969, production of the Mk3 Mini and Clubman began, but production of the Mk2 range was to continue until the end of the year.
The new bodyshell was substantially re-jigged, and doors with wind up windows and internal hinges were now standard across the range. And the separate marque badges were gone. No more Austin or Morris Mini; it was now Mini in its own right. With Alec Issigonis now sidelined the introduction of wind-up windows was a formality, although they would prove to be something of a bête noire with the man himself and he would have his own MK3 Minis converted to sliding door windows.
There was a new upmarket Mini, the Clubman, with a new nose designed by Roy Haynes and his team. The estate now came with a Clubman nose and the 1275GT arrived to replace the 998cc Mini-Cooper. The 1275GT was a parts bin special, using Cooper S brake discs and a single carburettor 59bhp 1275cc engine. For the first five years of its life the 1275GT wore 10in Rostye wheels manufactured by Rubery Owen, from which the wheels name was derived. This steel wheel design was very fashionable at the time and featured on several other top selling cars of the era. The Owen family in fact owned the BRM Formula One team. Lord Stokes and Filmer Paradise's loathing for badge engineering must have been justified in sales terms, because the Mini Clubman proved far more popular than the Elf/Hornet they replaced.
With the Mk3 Mini, there seems to have been a conscious effort to reduce the cost of manufacture. Out went Hydrolastic suspension, and a reversion to the rubber cones of 1959-1964. Also gone from the Mini was some of the chrome brightwork, such as upper doortrims and the bumper overriders. Eliminating time consuming activities such as this in the factory seems to have had some effect, as the Mk3s were produced in greater numbers - with the best year being 1971 when 318,475 left Longbridge and overseas plants. Although the Mk3 was announced in October 1969, the only cars to have escape Longbridge before 1970 were for press use only; for the last Austin and Morris Mini Mk2s weren't manufactured until December 1969 - and the last Mk2 Cooper S was completed on the 23 February 1970.
In late 1969, the Mini K was launched in Australia, fitted with a 51bhp 1098cc engine, the local content of the car was now up to 80%.
If the Mini became one of the iconic symbols of the 1960s, the company that made it came to symbolise the malaise in Britain during the 1970s. Strikes, picket lines and idle men warming their hands outside factory gates over braziers, thwarting the ambitions of the salesman who wanted to sell Britain and its products to the world. But the decision to group all of Britain's independent motor manufacturers under the British Leyland banner was a disaster. The public came to associate British Leyland with strikes, to negative effect.
One of the priorities BLMC had to deal with was the abolition of piece-work and its replacement by measured day work. All its American owned rivals were operating the measured day work system. Every time a model was modified in any way, piecework rates had to be re-negotiated with the shop stewards. This caused friction and led to many stoppages. The Mini was not immune to this and the change from the ADO15 to ADO20, resulted in production being restricted by disputes. However, on 21 January 1970, George Turnbull was confident enough to enough to announce that weekly production of the Mini was to increase by another 350 cars.
1970: big changes ahead
On 19 June 1969 the two millionth Mini rolled off the production line at Longbridge, the first British car to attain this mark. Sir Alec Issigonis, as he now was, was there posing with Austin Morris managing director George Turnbull, who in a advance press release stated: 'The Mini will be the backbone of our production in the Longbridge plant, the biggest in the group, for many years to come. Harry Webster, our chief engineer, and his team have many good ideas up their sleeves for keeping the Mini ever fresh in the future.'
The statement alludes to the fact that Issigonis no longer had any real influence on the development of his baby. On the day itself Turnbull added: 'Alec is British Leyland's secret weapon. No one else in the car industry has anyone quite in his class. He is essentially a man of vision, of long term thinking, but always with a revolutionary approach to design problems. We don't care how way out his ideas are. We can soon put them through the commercial mincer.'
In July 1969 BLMC bought a 50% stake in Nueva Montana Quijano (NMQ), a heavy industrial group in the north of Spain and owners of Authi, and assumed responsibility for the management of Authi of Pamplona and the other NMQ automotive operations. Now British Leyland was taking direct control of Spanish Mini and ADO16 manufacture.
Lord Stokes and his new management team, which included Filmer Paradise, now promoted and brought back from Europe, were not fans of badge-engineering, and so began phasing out some of the multiplicity of marque and model types. In August 1969 the Riley Elf and Wolseley Hornet ceased production after 59,367 examples. The booted Minis were only produced at a rate of 125 per week with a bodyshell subtlely different to the rest of the range and BLMC had a replacement on the way in the shape of the Clubman. In the Autumn of 1969, production of the Mk3 Mini and Clubman began, but production of the Mk2 range was to continue until the end of the year.
The new bodyshell was substantially re-jigged, and doors with wind up windows and internal hinges were now standard across the range. And the separate marque badges were gone. No more Austin or Morris Mini; it was now Mini in its own right. With Alec Issigonis now sidelined the introduction of wind-up windows was a formality, although they would prove to be something of a bête noire with the man himself and he would have his own MK3 Minis converted to sliding door windows.
There was a new upmarket Mini, the Clubman, with a new nose designed by Roy Haynes and his team. The estate now came with a Clubman nose and the 1275GT arrived to replace the 998cc Mini-Cooper. The 1275GT was a parts bin special, using Cooper S brake discs and a single carburettor 59bhp 1275cc engine. For the first five years of its life the 1275GT wore 10in Rostye wheels manufactured by Rubery Owen, from which the wheels name was derived. This steel wheel design was very fashionable at the time and featured on several other top selling cars of the era. The Owen family in fact owned the BRM Formula One team. Lord Stokes and Filmer Paradise's loathing for badge engineering must have been justified in sales terms, because the Mini Clubman proved far more popular than the Elf/Hornet they replaced.
With the Mk3 Mini, there seems to have been a conscious effort to reduce the cost of manufacture. Out went Hydrolastic suspension, and a reversion to the rubber cones of 1959-1964. Also gone from the Mini was some of the chrome brightwork, such as upper doortrims and the bumper overriders. Eliminating time consuming activities such as this in the factory seems to have had some effect, as the Mk3s were produced in greater numbers - with the best year being 1971 when 318,475 left Longbridge and overseas plants. Although the Mk3 was announced in October 1969, the only cars to have escape Longbridge before 1970 were for press use only; for the last Austin and Morris Mini Mk2s weren't manufactured until December 1969 - and the last Mk2 Cooper S was completed on the 23 February 1970.
In late 1969, the Mini K was launched in Australia, fitted with a 51bhp 1098cc engine, the local content of the car was now up to 80%.
If the Mini became one of the iconic symbols of the 1960s, the company that made it came to symbolise the malaise in Britain during the 1970s. Strikes, picket lines and idle men warming their hands outside factory gates over braziers, thwarting the ambitions of the salesman who wanted to sell Britain and its products to the world. But the decision to group all of Britain's independent motor manufacturers under the British Leyland banner was a disaster. The public came to associate British Leyland with strikes, to negative effect.
One of the priorities BLMC had to deal with was the abolition of piece-work and its replacement by measured day work. All its American owned rivals were operating the measured day work system. Every time a model was modified in any way, piecework rates had to be re-negotiated with the shop stewards. This caused friction and led to many stoppages. The Mini was not immune to this and the change from the ADO15 to ADO20, resulted in production being restricted by disputes. However, on 21 January 1970, George Turnbull was confident enough to enough to announce that weekly production of the Mini was to increase by another 350 cars.
1970: big changes ahead
At the end of February 1970, Lord Stokes revealed that BLMC had not made any profit for four months because of strikes. It was to be a bad year for the British motor industry in general in respect of industrial disputes, with major strikes at Dunlop, Pilkington, GKN-Sankey and Lucas hitting production. There was better news on 19 April: BLMC announced it planned to expand its production of Minis in Spain and to export from there to the rest of Europe. In cooperation with Nueva Montana Quijano, British Leyland was producing 85 Minis a day in Spain.
The first Spanish made Minis were expected to be exported later that year, and the production rate was to be boosted up to a possible maximum of 400 a day. Discussing the Spanish output of Minis at the opening of the Barcelona Motor Show, Richard Bergeson, managing director of British Leyland, said, 'Last year our European dealers were extremely short of Minis. They could easily have sold thousands more it we had been able to deliver them, but we couldn't.'
George Turnbull warned the 65,000 workers of the Austin Morris group that it was in serious financial trouble later that year. All its models had been inherited from BMC. This was echoed by BLMC's finance and planning director John Barber on 27 November. He said: 'At the moment we are just not earning enough to ensure that we will be competitive in the future, and that would mean contraction, fewer employees and, in the end death.' These were prophetic words by John Barber, and ultimately he was proven right.
1971: the big boom
Despite the disruption, total worldwide Mini production increased to 278,950, but total Longbridge production for all cars in 1969/70 was 280,439, indicating that a lot of the increased Mini production was coming from overseas factories. By April 1971, the Morris Minor was finally withdrawn after a run of 23 years. It was replaced by the Morris Marina, a simple rear wheel drive car, aimed at the profitable company car market. Although later much maligned as a car, as business venture, this apparent technical U-turn by BLMC, was a sales success. By 1973 it was Britain's second best selling car. Such was the state of BLMC's finances in 1968, the development of the Marina had taken priority over the Issigonis 9X.
Also launched the same month was the Fiat 127. That car was powered by a 903cc overhead valve, in conjunction with the state-of-the-art transverse engine and front wheel drive layout which had been pioneered in the Autobianchi Primula and the Fiat 128. The car was the first of the modern superminis, and won praise for its utilisation of space as well as its road-holding. The 127 was an instant success, winning the European Car of the Year award in 1972, quickly becoming one of the best-selling cars in Europe for several years. Later in 1972 a hatchback appeared. The opposition had not been idle and had been doing its market research - Renault came to a similar conclusion, launching the R5 in January 1972. These larger, more expensive hatchbacks proved to be highly successful and BLMC's inability to respond cost them sales.
In July, the last Mk3 Mini-Cooper S was produced, and in 2001 the then BLMC boss Lord Stokes retrospectively commented, 'We lost about £20 per Mini. Then people wonder why I scrapped the Cooper. We were giving more money to Mr Cooper than we were making in profit.' In August 1971 the Mini Clubman reached Australia, supplanting the round nosed cars. From now on Australian buyers had a choice from the Mini Clubman GT, which had a 1275cc engine and the Mini Clubman 1100, which had a locally made 1098cc engine.
Sir Alec Issigonis officially retired from British Leyland in December, but would stay on as a consultant. At a ceremony at Longbridge, George Turnbull said: 'We have had to bend the rules because we do not believe that Sir Alec's extraordinary talents have suddenly waned or dried up... But, I hope perhaps working slightly shorter hours.'
1971 Turned out to be the peak year of production with 318,475 Minis leaving British Leyland's worldwide production lines. 258,427 emerged from Longbridge and 60,048 from overseas plants. BLMC's total vehicle production for that year was 1,062,742, the Mini's contribution was nearly 30% of that figure. With the launch of the Morris Marina in May 1971, ADO16 Morris 1100/1300 production ceased at Cowley and with many loyal Morris buyers now opting for the new Marina, the Mini in terms of volume became the dominant car at Longbridge.
In January 1972, BLMC Finance Director John Barber was again issuing dire warnings about the Company's prospects: 'Unless we can make more vehicles and earn more money we shall not be able to replace our models and our plants sufficiently quickly and we shall, gradually wither away.'
1972
In Australia in April 1972, the Morris branded Minis were now re-badged as Leylands.
Despite its parlous financial state, BLMC managed to find £3m to buy out Innocenti Autoveicoli of Milan in May 1972. Innocenti produced around 700 Minis a week in a country that was second only to Britain in its enthusiasm for the Issigonis design. During the early '70s, the Italian market catered for 55,000 Minis a year. It was imperative that Innocenti did not fall into the hands of a hostile bidder, hence the BLMC buy out. Lord Stokes said at the time: 'This is quite a significant deal. In this market our sales are running at a rate of 60,000 a year, which is substantial . We could achieve 100,000 for only a modest investment.'
The new managing director of Innocenti was to be Geoffrey Robinson, the corporation's financial controller. He decided to expand Innocenti's exports throughout Europe and created the Mini Cooper 1300, a stylish car fitted with disc brakes and a British built 71bhp 1275cc engine that was in a similar state of tune to that in the 1300GT. This car first appeared in March 1973.
In the autumn of 1972 BLMC at last managed to persuade the Longbridge workforce to accept measured day work in place of piece-work, Cowley had capitulated the previous year. On the 4 October, it was revealed that the Mini was still BLMC's European best-seller, demonstrating, Lord Stokes said, that they were right to keep it as a basic small car. He added: 'No one can improve on its styling. I think it is a dateless car that will go on for many years yet.'
Later that month at the London Motor Show, British Leyland celebrated the production of three million Minis. Lord Stokes as always had a comment for the gentlemen of the press: 'Looking around the show you can see foreign manufacturers have copied our small car design. It won't take us 13 years to build the next three million — as we fully intend to do.'
As it turned out, it took around three more decades to build three million more Mini badged cars, and his Lordship lived long enough to see it, but it owed a lot to a nephew of the now-sidelined Alec Issigonis and some men in far away Munich.
By November 1972 Geoffrey Robinson, managing director of Leyland Innocenti as it was now called, was reporting record sales of British Leyland cars in Italy. He told the Guardian at the Turin Motor Show: 'Our success in the Italian market is based on the tremendous popularity of the Innocenti Mini range and we have recently stepped up Mini production at Milan from 60,000 to 75,000 units a year to meet increased demand. This increased production together with the fact that the strong Innocenti dealer network is now also selling Rovers, Triumphs and Jaguars will ensure that we improve our market penetration still further in the coming year.'
1973
In March, weekly Mini production at Longbridge peaked at 4100. Yet total Mini production at all plants for 1973 was 295,186, and Longbridge production of all models was down to 253,540 in 1972/73. Because of the strike-ridden nature of BLMC's UK plants, trying to analyse these figures is futile. This was the time of the 'Barber Boom' when chancellor of the exchequer in Edward Heath's Conservative government, Anthony Barber, pumped money into the economy. An economic boom ensued when demand for new cars rose. Unfortunately British Leyland's strike prone workforce prevented the company from taking advantage of this.
The ADO16's replacement was announced in May, the Austin Allegro. In preparation for the Allegro's appearance all the BLMC A-Series front wheel drive car transmissions received a new rod change mechanism. Shortly after the Allegro's launch, former BMC chairman Sir George Harriman died on 29 May. The same month Keith Hopkins, director of publicity at British Leyland told David Benson of the Daily Express about the company's export performance: 'The most popular car exported from Britain is the Mini, it is our biggest seller in Italy, Germany, and Switzerland. We can sell every Mini we make. last year we could have sold an extra 150,000 Minis in Europe if we could have produced them. But our total production of Minis was only around 300,000 for the year.'
Also in the summer, BLMC bought out its partner in the Spanish Authi concern, who built Austin Morris cars, including Minis in Pamplona, Spain. BLMC had ambitious plans to expand Authi. In August 1973 Authi began assembling the Mini-Cooper 1300, an almost identical car to the Innocenti Mini-Cooper 1300 which had been launched the previous March. Now British Leyland had full control of its European Mini manufacturing plants, but having spent some of its precious funds buying them, what would these factories produce in the future? The Issigonis Mini could not go on forever as a competitive front rank small car and the 1972-'74 period saw BLMC dithering about the kind of car to replace it, ADO74, ADO88 or perhaps something else?
BLMC executives started to jump ship, starting with Austin Morris sales director Filmer Paradise, who was replaced by Bernard Bates. Next to go was George Turnbull, who was replaced by Richard Perry in September. As part of the reshuffle caused by resignations, Geoffrey Robinson was posted from Innocenti in Italy to become Jaguar's managing director and chief executive. Events began to move quickly. On the 6 October, the Yom Kippur Arab-Israeli War began and then Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Abu Dhabi, Kuwait, and Qatar unilaterally raised oil prices by 17% to $3.65 per barrel while simultaneously announcing production cuts. The following day, the 17 October, OPEC oil ministers agreed to use oil as a weapon to punish the West for its support of Israel in the Arab-Israeli War.
It was 1956 all over again, and demand for economical small cars soared and the 14 year old Mini was now BLMC's most important car, but could it exploit the situation? Lord Stokes later said: 'Everyone stopped buying expensive cars in order to buy the ruddy Mini again.'
On 22 October, John Barber (by now BLMC's deputy chairman and managing director) said in an interview in The Times of the Mini: 'The Mini is a wonderful car though I think insufficient attention was paid during the design stage to the inherent problems of production costs. Even though we have increased the price it is still not a profitable model.' He added that because of the profitable replacement parts business generated by Mini sales it was, 'more in the nature of a break-even operation.'
The article then went on to claim that the Mini improved prospects for the group's dealers by providing them with a more complete range of models. Since it was launched in 1959 Sir Alec Issigonis's pioneering design had introduced standards of roadholding and passenger space for small cars which had been copied by motor manufacturers throughout the world. For the first ten years of its life, it was widely known that the Mini's complicated and expensive engineering prevented it being sold at a profitable price. Since then, however, a number of design changes to simplify suspension and transmission-together with substantial price increases, was generally thought to have given the Mini a small profit margin. Barber added: 'We priced it at what the market could stand. Then, almost as an afterthought, we would cost it and if it showed a loss, we would have to cost it again. BMC should have said "Where do we slot into the market? We’ve got the most sophisticated car in the world. We can afford to charge £100 more than the wretched Ford runabout". Then, having got the Mini into the wrong slot, they did the same with the 1100.'
Although BLMC was later criticised for not instigating a brutal programme of factory closures to rationalise the corporation, behind the scenes the firm had cut down the number of road journeys and distances travelled to transport components from place of manufacture to assembly at Longbridge, a process begun by Joe Edwards in the final days of BMC when Mini production ceased at Cowley.
Later that month, BLMC confirmed that their new financial director was 47 year old Alex Park. 1973 had been a dramatic year for BLMC, when blighted by strikes that prevented it from producing to its existing capacity, it announced massive expansion plans. 1974 Would also prove to be equally dramatic.
1974: The bubble bursts
On the 1st January 1974, the three-day week came into force and was to last until March. It was one of several measures introduced in the United Kingdom by Edward Heath's Conservative Government to conserve electricity, the production of which was severely limited due to industrial action by coal miners. The effect was that commercial users of electricity would be limited to three specified consecutive days' consumption each week and prohibited from working longer hours on those days. If the world wanted Minis, then BLMC would struggle to produce them, at least in the UK. No such restriction applied to imported cars. And when BLMC was working for its allotted three days it was still afflicted by disputes.
Charles Griffin, by then Austin Morris director of advanced engineering, kicked off the ADO88 at the same time. Unlike the previous ADO74 project, which was designed to use an all-new powertrain, the ADO88 was intended to use the existing A-Series engine and transmission to save money. Originally ADO88 was intended as a direct Mini replacement. A snap general election was held on 28 February and Harold Wilson's Labour party was returned to power, although it did not have an overall majority. The same day British Leyland announced it was selling the Authi company in Spain to General Motors for £26.7m. BLMC felt it could supply Minis to export markets using other factories and it needed the money.
The three-day week had eaten deeply into the corporations cash reserves and it could not remain profitable when operating at below 60% capacity. And by now Authi was losing money and suffering from labour disputes. John Barber, managing director of British Leyland put on a brave face when he said: 'This is a mutually advantageous deal for General Motors and ourselves. It gives GM an entree into Spain with already existing plants and enables us to continue to build up increasing support for our dealer network through the new Leyland sales company.'
Although the GM deal later fell through, it marked the beginning of retrenchment for British Leyland. The three-day week ended in March 1974 and production was soon back to normal. Later that month, Daniel Richmond of Downton Engineering and former BMC consultant, died. Plagued by strikes, things went from bad to worse at British Leyland. The 1st May brought more bad news: British Leyland's first half year loss turned out to be £16.6m, against a £22.8mn profit for the same period the previous year.
Harry Webster, the 57-year-old technical director of Austin Morris, resigned ar the end of the month. Webster, an engineer of immense standing in the motor industry, was the surviving member of the triumvirate chosen by Lord Stokes in 1968 to run the volume car operations of the newly merged Leyland-BMC empire. There had been persistent rumours in Midland motor industry circles over the previous nine months that he was far from happy with the reduced status of Austin Morris and the departure of George Turnbull. Webster joined Automotive Products. The man chosen to replace Harry Webster, and to oversee future Mini development, or lack of it, was Charles Griffin, who had been the loyal sidekick to both Issigonis and Webster. Griffin's approach to the Mini appears to have been not one of development, but of wholesale replacement with the ADO88.
Unfortunately this took longer than planned to reach fruition. Also at this time, news was seeping out that the mighty Ford Motor Company was planning a new small car. Ford, who had been reluctant to manufacture a model smaller than the Escort because of the low profit margins on small cars, planned to introduce a new model in the Fiat 127/Renault 5 class in 1976. The small car market was now getting serious. On 19 June, the last UK built ADO16 was produced, ending a long and successful partnership with the Mini. A partnership that at its peak had in terms of weekly production volume attained the zenith of British car manufacturing. No other British cars were as popular worldwide as the Mini and ADO16 were in their heyday, before or since.
During this period BLMC engineer and product planner John Bilton investigated the cost penalty of the Mini's 10-inch wheels. He told Jonathan Wood: '...when researching wheels and tyres I found the 12-inch wheel was cheaper than the 10-inch one. It was larger but the tyre was lighter, fundamentally you've got less material.'
Twelve inch wheels were used on the ADO16 1100/1300 and Hillman Imp. John Bilton continued: 'Philosophically you can't argue with it but proportionally it would actually have made very little difference to the Mini's interior space. The bit you had given away would have been more than compensated for by using a standard product.'
From the end of 1974 the Mini 1275GT was fitted with 12-inch wheels, but it would be another decade before the rest of the Mini range got them. There were more BLMC corporate moves in August 1974, when Austin Morris managing director Richard Perry was promoted to be replaced by Keith Hopkins (below), the 44 year-old head of British Leyland's public relations department. On the 10 October, there was a second of two UK general elections that year; and this time Harold Wilson's Labour party won a majority of three seats and this would affect the Mini and BLMC, as we shall see.
On 22 October 1974, the Innocenti 90/120 hatchback version of the Mini was announced.
The inevitable happened on 6 December, and after much speculation in financial and industry circles, the newly re-elected Labour government announced that it was to take a stake in the British Leyland Motor Corporation and act as guarantor for bank loans to provide working capital to keep the company going. Sir Don Ryder, then a government industry advisor, was asked to produce a report on the future options for BLMC. British Leyland had run out of money, and now there was no hiding it. December 1974 was perhaps the closest it came to a premature axe as its manufacturer became insolvent. Austin Morris had burned through the cash generated by the profitable parts of BLMC such as Rover, Jaguar and Leyland Vehicles, which in turn had starved them of inward investment, and now British Leyland and the Mini was saved from extinction by the taxpayer.
The first Spanish made Minis were expected to be exported later that year, and the production rate was to be boosted up to a possible maximum of 400 a day. Discussing the Spanish output of Minis at the opening of the Barcelona Motor Show, Richard Bergeson, managing director of British Leyland, said, 'Last year our European dealers were extremely short of Minis. They could easily have sold thousands more it we had been able to deliver them, but we couldn't.'
George Turnbull warned the 65,000 workers of the Austin Morris group that it was in serious financial trouble later that year. All its models had been inherited from BMC. This was echoed by BLMC's finance and planning director John Barber on 27 November. He said: 'At the moment we are just not earning enough to ensure that we will be competitive in the future, and that would mean contraction, fewer employees and, in the end death.' These were prophetic words by John Barber, and ultimately he was proven right.
1971: the big boom
Despite the disruption, total worldwide Mini production increased to 278,950, but total Longbridge production for all cars in 1969/70 was 280,439, indicating that a lot of the increased Mini production was coming from overseas factories. By April 1971, the Morris Minor was finally withdrawn after a run of 23 years. It was replaced by the Morris Marina, a simple rear wheel drive car, aimed at the profitable company car market. Although later much maligned as a car, as business venture, this apparent technical U-turn by BLMC, was a sales success. By 1973 it was Britain's second best selling car. Such was the state of BLMC's finances in 1968, the development of the Marina had taken priority over the Issigonis 9X.
Also launched the same month was the Fiat 127. That car was powered by a 903cc overhead valve, in conjunction with the state-of-the-art transverse engine and front wheel drive layout which had been pioneered in the Autobianchi Primula and the Fiat 128. The car was the first of the modern superminis, and won praise for its utilisation of space as well as its road-holding. The 127 was an instant success, winning the European Car of the Year award in 1972, quickly becoming one of the best-selling cars in Europe for several years. Later in 1972 a hatchback appeared. The opposition had not been idle and had been doing its market research - Renault came to a similar conclusion, launching the R5 in January 1972. These larger, more expensive hatchbacks proved to be highly successful and BLMC's inability to respond cost them sales.
In July, the last Mk3 Mini-Cooper S was produced, and in 2001 the then BLMC boss Lord Stokes retrospectively commented, 'We lost about £20 per Mini. Then people wonder why I scrapped the Cooper. We were giving more money to Mr Cooper than we were making in profit.' In August 1971 the Mini Clubman reached Australia, supplanting the round nosed cars. From now on Australian buyers had a choice from the Mini Clubman GT, which had a 1275cc engine and the Mini Clubman 1100, which had a locally made 1098cc engine.
Sir Alec Issigonis officially retired from British Leyland in December, but would stay on as a consultant. At a ceremony at Longbridge, George Turnbull said: 'We have had to bend the rules because we do not believe that Sir Alec's extraordinary talents have suddenly waned or dried up... But, I hope perhaps working slightly shorter hours.'
1971 Turned out to be the peak year of production with 318,475 Minis leaving British Leyland's worldwide production lines. 258,427 emerged from Longbridge and 60,048 from overseas plants. BLMC's total vehicle production for that year was 1,062,742, the Mini's contribution was nearly 30% of that figure. With the launch of the Morris Marina in May 1971, ADO16 Morris 1100/1300 production ceased at Cowley and with many loyal Morris buyers now opting for the new Marina, the Mini in terms of volume became the dominant car at Longbridge.
In January 1972, BLMC Finance Director John Barber was again issuing dire warnings about the Company's prospects: 'Unless we can make more vehicles and earn more money we shall not be able to replace our models and our plants sufficiently quickly and we shall, gradually wither away.'
1972
In Australia in April 1972, the Morris branded Minis were now re-badged as Leylands.
Despite its parlous financial state, BLMC managed to find £3m to buy out Innocenti Autoveicoli of Milan in May 1972. Innocenti produced around 700 Minis a week in a country that was second only to Britain in its enthusiasm for the Issigonis design. During the early '70s, the Italian market catered for 55,000 Minis a year. It was imperative that Innocenti did not fall into the hands of a hostile bidder, hence the BLMC buy out. Lord Stokes said at the time: 'This is quite a significant deal. In this market our sales are running at a rate of 60,000 a year, which is substantial . We could achieve 100,000 for only a modest investment.'
The new managing director of Innocenti was to be Geoffrey Robinson, the corporation's financial controller. He decided to expand Innocenti's exports throughout Europe and created the Mini Cooper 1300, a stylish car fitted with disc brakes and a British built 71bhp 1275cc engine that was in a similar state of tune to that in the 1300GT. This car first appeared in March 1973.
In the autumn of 1972 BLMC at last managed to persuade the Longbridge workforce to accept measured day work in place of piece-work, Cowley had capitulated the previous year. On the 4 October, it was revealed that the Mini was still BLMC's European best-seller, demonstrating, Lord Stokes said, that they were right to keep it as a basic small car. He added: 'No one can improve on its styling. I think it is a dateless car that will go on for many years yet.'
Later that month at the London Motor Show, British Leyland celebrated the production of three million Minis. Lord Stokes as always had a comment for the gentlemen of the press: 'Looking around the show you can see foreign manufacturers have copied our small car design. It won't take us 13 years to build the next three million — as we fully intend to do.'
As it turned out, it took around three more decades to build three million more Mini badged cars, and his Lordship lived long enough to see it, but it owed a lot to a nephew of the now-sidelined Alec Issigonis and some men in far away Munich.
By November 1972 Geoffrey Robinson, managing director of Leyland Innocenti as it was now called, was reporting record sales of British Leyland cars in Italy. He told the Guardian at the Turin Motor Show: 'Our success in the Italian market is based on the tremendous popularity of the Innocenti Mini range and we have recently stepped up Mini production at Milan from 60,000 to 75,000 units a year to meet increased demand. This increased production together with the fact that the strong Innocenti dealer network is now also selling Rovers, Triumphs and Jaguars will ensure that we improve our market penetration still further in the coming year.'
1973
In March, weekly Mini production at Longbridge peaked at 4100. Yet total Mini production at all plants for 1973 was 295,186, and Longbridge production of all models was down to 253,540 in 1972/73. Because of the strike-ridden nature of BLMC's UK plants, trying to analyse these figures is futile. This was the time of the 'Barber Boom' when chancellor of the exchequer in Edward Heath's Conservative government, Anthony Barber, pumped money into the economy. An economic boom ensued when demand for new cars rose. Unfortunately British Leyland's strike prone workforce prevented the company from taking advantage of this.
The ADO16's replacement was announced in May, the Austin Allegro. In preparation for the Allegro's appearance all the BLMC A-Series front wheel drive car transmissions received a new rod change mechanism. Shortly after the Allegro's launch, former BMC chairman Sir George Harriman died on 29 May. The same month Keith Hopkins, director of publicity at British Leyland told David Benson of the Daily Express about the company's export performance: 'The most popular car exported from Britain is the Mini, it is our biggest seller in Italy, Germany, and Switzerland. We can sell every Mini we make. last year we could have sold an extra 150,000 Minis in Europe if we could have produced them. But our total production of Minis was only around 300,000 for the year.'
Also in the summer, BLMC bought out its partner in the Spanish Authi concern, who built Austin Morris cars, including Minis in Pamplona, Spain. BLMC had ambitious plans to expand Authi. In August 1973 Authi began assembling the Mini-Cooper 1300, an almost identical car to the Innocenti Mini-Cooper 1300 which had been launched the previous March. Now British Leyland had full control of its European Mini manufacturing plants, but having spent some of its precious funds buying them, what would these factories produce in the future? The Issigonis Mini could not go on forever as a competitive front rank small car and the 1972-'74 period saw BLMC dithering about the kind of car to replace it, ADO74, ADO88 or perhaps something else?
BLMC executives started to jump ship, starting with Austin Morris sales director Filmer Paradise, who was replaced by Bernard Bates. Next to go was George Turnbull, who was replaced by Richard Perry in September. As part of the reshuffle caused by resignations, Geoffrey Robinson was posted from Innocenti in Italy to become Jaguar's managing director and chief executive. Events began to move quickly. On the 6 October, the Yom Kippur Arab-Israeli War began and then Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Abu Dhabi, Kuwait, and Qatar unilaterally raised oil prices by 17% to $3.65 per barrel while simultaneously announcing production cuts. The following day, the 17 October, OPEC oil ministers agreed to use oil as a weapon to punish the West for its support of Israel in the Arab-Israeli War.
It was 1956 all over again, and demand for economical small cars soared and the 14 year old Mini was now BLMC's most important car, but could it exploit the situation? Lord Stokes later said: 'Everyone stopped buying expensive cars in order to buy the ruddy Mini again.'
On 22 October, John Barber (by now BLMC's deputy chairman and managing director) said in an interview in The Times of the Mini: 'The Mini is a wonderful car though I think insufficient attention was paid during the design stage to the inherent problems of production costs. Even though we have increased the price it is still not a profitable model.' He added that because of the profitable replacement parts business generated by Mini sales it was, 'more in the nature of a break-even operation.'
The article then went on to claim that the Mini improved prospects for the group's dealers by providing them with a more complete range of models. Since it was launched in 1959 Sir Alec Issigonis's pioneering design had introduced standards of roadholding and passenger space for small cars which had been copied by motor manufacturers throughout the world. For the first ten years of its life, it was widely known that the Mini's complicated and expensive engineering prevented it being sold at a profitable price. Since then, however, a number of design changes to simplify suspension and transmission-together with substantial price increases, was generally thought to have given the Mini a small profit margin. Barber added: 'We priced it at what the market could stand. Then, almost as an afterthought, we would cost it and if it showed a loss, we would have to cost it again. BMC should have said "Where do we slot into the market? We’ve got the most sophisticated car in the world. We can afford to charge £100 more than the wretched Ford runabout". Then, having got the Mini into the wrong slot, they did the same with the 1100.'
Although BLMC was later criticised for not instigating a brutal programme of factory closures to rationalise the corporation, behind the scenes the firm had cut down the number of road journeys and distances travelled to transport components from place of manufacture to assembly at Longbridge, a process begun by Joe Edwards in the final days of BMC when Mini production ceased at Cowley.
Later that month, BLMC confirmed that their new financial director was 47 year old Alex Park. 1973 had been a dramatic year for BLMC, when blighted by strikes that prevented it from producing to its existing capacity, it announced massive expansion plans. 1974 Would also prove to be equally dramatic.
1974: The bubble bursts
On the 1st January 1974, the three-day week came into force and was to last until March. It was one of several measures introduced in the United Kingdom by Edward Heath's Conservative Government to conserve electricity, the production of which was severely limited due to industrial action by coal miners. The effect was that commercial users of electricity would be limited to three specified consecutive days' consumption each week and prohibited from working longer hours on those days. If the world wanted Minis, then BLMC would struggle to produce them, at least in the UK. No such restriction applied to imported cars. And when BLMC was working for its allotted three days it was still afflicted by disputes.
Charles Griffin, by then Austin Morris director of advanced engineering, kicked off the ADO88 at the same time. Unlike the previous ADO74 project, which was designed to use an all-new powertrain, the ADO88 was intended to use the existing A-Series engine and transmission to save money. Originally ADO88 was intended as a direct Mini replacement. A snap general election was held on 28 February and Harold Wilson's Labour party was returned to power, although it did not have an overall majority. The same day British Leyland announced it was selling the Authi company in Spain to General Motors for £26.7m. BLMC felt it could supply Minis to export markets using other factories and it needed the money.
The three-day week had eaten deeply into the corporations cash reserves and it could not remain profitable when operating at below 60% capacity. And by now Authi was losing money and suffering from labour disputes. John Barber, managing director of British Leyland put on a brave face when he said: 'This is a mutually advantageous deal for General Motors and ourselves. It gives GM an entree into Spain with already existing plants and enables us to continue to build up increasing support for our dealer network through the new Leyland sales company.'
Although the GM deal later fell through, it marked the beginning of retrenchment for British Leyland. The three-day week ended in March 1974 and production was soon back to normal. Later that month, Daniel Richmond of Downton Engineering and former BMC consultant, died. Plagued by strikes, things went from bad to worse at British Leyland. The 1st May brought more bad news: British Leyland's first half year loss turned out to be £16.6m, against a £22.8mn profit for the same period the previous year.
Harry Webster, the 57-year-old technical director of Austin Morris, resigned ar the end of the month. Webster, an engineer of immense standing in the motor industry, was the surviving member of the triumvirate chosen by Lord Stokes in 1968 to run the volume car operations of the newly merged Leyland-BMC empire. There had been persistent rumours in Midland motor industry circles over the previous nine months that he was far from happy with the reduced status of Austin Morris and the departure of George Turnbull. Webster joined Automotive Products. The man chosen to replace Harry Webster, and to oversee future Mini development, or lack of it, was Charles Griffin, who had been the loyal sidekick to both Issigonis and Webster. Griffin's approach to the Mini appears to have been not one of development, but of wholesale replacement with the ADO88.
Unfortunately this took longer than planned to reach fruition. Also at this time, news was seeping out that the mighty Ford Motor Company was planning a new small car. Ford, who had been reluctant to manufacture a model smaller than the Escort because of the low profit margins on small cars, planned to introduce a new model in the Fiat 127/Renault 5 class in 1976. The small car market was now getting serious. On 19 June, the last UK built ADO16 was produced, ending a long and successful partnership with the Mini. A partnership that at its peak had in terms of weekly production volume attained the zenith of British car manufacturing. No other British cars were as popular worldwide as the Mini and ADO16 were in their heyday, before or since.
During this period BLMC engineer and product planner John Bilton investigated the cost penalty of the Mini's 10-inch wheels. He told Jonathan Wood: '...when researching wheels and tyres I found the 12-inch wheel was cheaper than the 10-inch one. It was larger but the tyre was lighter, fundamentally you've got less material.'
Twelve inch wheels were used on the ADO16 1100/1300 and Hillman Imp. John Bilton continued: 'Philosophically you can't argue with it but proportionally it would actually have made very little difference to the Mini's interior space. The bit you had given away would have been more than compensated for by using a standard product.'
From the end of 1974 the Mini 1275GT was fitted with 12-inch wheels, but it would be another decade before the rest of the Mini range got them. There were more BLMC corporate moves in August 1974, when Austin Morris managing director Richard Perry was promoted to be replaced by Keith Hopkins (below), the 44 year-old head of British Leyland's public relations department. On the 10 October, there was a second of two UK general elections that year; and this time Harold Wilson's Labour party won a majority of three seats and this would affect the Mini and BLMC, as we shall see.
On 22 October 1974, the Innocenti 90/120 hatchback version of the Mini was announced.
The inevitable happened on 6 December, and after much speculation in financial and industry circles, the newly re-elected Labour government announced that it was to take a stake in the British Leyland Motor Corporation and act as guarantor for bank loans to provide working capital to keep the company going. Sir Don Ryder, then a government industry advisor, was asked to produce a report on the future options for BLMC. British Leyland had run out of money, and now there was no hiding it. December 1974 was perhaps the closest it came to a premature axe as its manufacturer became insolvent. Austin Morris had burned through the cash generated by the profitable parts of BLMC such as Rover, Jaguar and Leyland Vehicles, which in turn had starved them of inward investment, and now British Leyland and the Mini was saved from extinction by the taxpayer.
People's car: owned by the people on behalf of the people
1975
In February the Mini was Britain's best selling car, and to mark the occasion Austin Morris managing director Keith Hopkins and Sir Alec Issigonis posed with a Mini for a PR photo to celebrate. At the same time BLMC were phasing out the unloved 1800/2200 series, which had sold poorly over the previous decade, only 387,283 were made. Now the only Issigonis cars in production were the Mini and Maxi. The same month negotiations to sell Authi of Spain to General Motors broke down and BLMC announced they would close down their plants there.
At the Geneva Motor Show the next month Lord Stokes, still nominally BLMC chairman, and Austin Morris Managing Director Keith Hopkins talked about the Innocenti 90/120 hatchback Mini. Hopkins said: 'This is another example of the versatility of the original Mini concept which was presented to the public at Earls Court 15 years ago. This new Innocenti will consolidate and improve our position in the highly competitive Italian market where despite difficult economic conditions, sales of the current Mini range are running at 40,000 a year.'
Lord Stokes added: 'The Innocenti Mini is a delightful and desirable car which is selling well in Italy and we are extending its sale to markets outside Italy, starting with Switzerland. We will keep a decision about bringing it to Britain under constant review.'
On 24 April the Ryder report was published and it recommended that:
1: That capital expenditure of £1264m and working capital of £260m (both at constant prices) would have to be provided over the next eight years to make British Leyland viable and fully competitive.2: That £1400m (based on assumptions of inflation) would be needed from outside sources to achieve a positive cash flow by 1982, and that there was an 'overwhelmingly strong case' for the Government to provide those funds, up to £900m of them by the end of 1978.3: That British Leyland's operations should be divided into four separate businesses: cars, trucks and buses, special products, and international activities. Each would be a profit centre in its own right with its own managing director.4: That at corporate level there should be a non-executive chairman and a staff drastically reduced to the absolute minimum.5: That joint/management/bodies in which shop stewards play a major role; should be set up.'Means must be found', the report says, 'to take advantage of the ideas. enthusiasm and energy of BL's workers in' planning the future of the business on which their livelihood depends.'6: That a massive programme to modernize plant and equipment must be started immediately. Much of the group's plant and, machinery was 'old, outdated and inefficient.'7: That there must be changes in top level management.
The Government accepted Sir Don Ryder's recommendations. The upshot of all this was that BLMC was wound up, its board recommending its shareholders to accept the governments offer for their shares. During the transition period there was a lot going on in the world of the Mini. At the time, weekly production was said to be 3500, when disputes weren't ongoing. A month long dispute at the Castle Bromwich body pressing plant early in 1975, alone cost 9000 Minis in lost production. On 28 April, all Mini and most British Leyland production was halted because of a strike at Dunlop, which didn't just make tyres for the BL baby, it made the Alex Moulton designed suspension cones. In early May, British Leyland managed to restart Mini production by obtaining some suspension cones from Innocenti in Milan, Italy. The Dunlop dispute was finally settled in mid May.
Authi produced its last Spanish-built car, a Damask Red Mini, in May 1975. Explaining BLMC's decision to cease manufacturing cars in Spain, one British Leyland executive said: 'We just never reached our target of 50,000 units a year in the national market. Yet in terms of productivity, our operation was comparable to the operations of our competitors and to other operations of our company.'
More news from overseas Mini plants arrived when Leyland-Innocenti, the Italian subsidiary of British Leyland, re-affirmed its will to continue activities in Italy. A spokesman for the company, which employed 5000 workers in Milan, making chiefly Minis, said Leyland-Innocenti planned to keep up production and even expand it for more competitive models on the domestic and foreign markets. Leyland-Innocenti, whose output exceeded 61,000 cars in 1974, had a stock of 8000 unsold cars at the time. The company also announced a board reshuffle. David Andrews, Albert Lawrence and Percy Plant replaced John Barber, Geoffrey Robinson and Lord Stokes as members of the board. Mr Plant was also elected president. Signor Pier Giovanni Bella was reconfirmed as managing director. However in the summer and autumn of 1975, British Leyland became embroiled in an industrial dispute as its Milan workforce protested at plans to make 1500 of its number redundant, and make the remaining 3000 employees increase production by 25%.
On 22 July, British Leyland sold its Pamplona car assembly plant to SEAT for an agreed price of 1250m pesetas (about £8.8m). The sale included a commitment on the part of SEAT to employ the workers laid off in Pamplona earlier that year when Authi, BLMC's Spanish subsidiary, ended production in Spain. Authi produced about 200,000 BLMC cars in Spain, 140,000 of them Minis. SEAT is now part of the Volkswagen group and the Pamplona plant now manufactures Polos.
The newly named British Leyland Limited now had a new managing director - Alex Park. His predecessor, John Barber, became the Ryder report's scapegoat and was fired. Lord Stokes was given the role of President of British Leyland. British Leyland was reorganised into four separate divisions, with the Mini now came under the control of Leyland Cars, which oversaw all car activity, from Mini 850 to Jaguar XJ12. The managing director of Leyland Cars was Derek Whittaker, while Keith Hopkins now became sales and marketing director for the whole of British Leyland. Also that month, the Mini Clubman received the 1098cc A-Series engine for manual transmission models; the automatics continued to use the 998cc engine. British Leyland also introduced worker participation through new joint decision making bodies. This was industrial democracy in action, an effort to stop the strikes, boost output and turn British Leyland around.
In reality this made decision making painfully slow and enabled shop stewards who had no qualifications in business management to influence events. This is ironic as it was not until 1967 that BMC began recruiting university graduates, and many pundits feel that the recruitment of graduates is what gave rivals Ford the edge over BMC. Now in 1975 control of the destiny of the Mini had shifted from promoted BMC apprentices, BLMC university graduates to shop stewards, many of whom were anti-capitalist in outlook, and there was no business more capitalist than the motor industry, where customer satisfaction was paramount. Unfortunately those shop stewards not on the joint decision making bodies were to make their opinions known through industrial action. The whole concept concept of joint decision making bodies was a sop to the Trade Unions and left wing Labour MPs at a time when many pundits felt Britain was heading in a socialist direction. The concept would not stand the pressures of the free market.
1976: crisis year
In February the Mini was Britain's best selling car, and to mark the occasion Austin Morris managing director Keith Hopkins and Sir Alec Issigonis posed with a Mini for a PR photo to celebrate. At the same time BLMC were phasing out the unloved 1800/2200 series, which had sold poorly over the previous decade, only 387,283 were made. Now the only Issigonis cars in production were the Mini and Maxi. The same month negotiations to sell Authi of Spain to General Motors broke down and BLMC announced they would close down their plants there.
At the Geneva Motor Show the next month Lord Stokes, still nominally BLMC chairman, and Austin Morris Managing Director Keith Hopkins talked about the Innocenti 90/120 hatchback Mini. Hopkins said: 'This is another example of the versatility of the original Mini concept which was presented to the public at Earls Court 15 years ago. This new Innocenti will consolidate and improve our position in the highly competitive Italian market where despite difficult economic conditions, sales of the current Mini range are running at 40,000 a year.'
Lord Stokes added: 'The Innocenti Mini is a delightful and desirable car which is selling well in Italy and we are extending its sale to markets outside Italy, starting with Switzerland. We will keep a decision about bringing it to Britain under constant review.'
On 24 April the Ryder report was published and it recommended that:
1: That capital expenditure of £1264m and working capital of £260m (both at constant prices) would have to be provided over the next eight years to make British Leyland viable and fully competitive.2: That £1400m (based on assumptions of inflation) would be needed from outside sources to achieve a positive cash flow by 1982, and that there was an 'overwhelmingly strong case' for the Government to provide those funds, up to £900m of them by the end of 1978.3: That British Leyland's operations should be divided into four separate businesses: cars, trucks and buses, special products, and international activities. Each would be a profit centre in its own right with its own managing director.4: That at corporate level there should be a non-executive chairman and a staff drastically reduced to the absolute minimum.5: That joint/management/bodies in which shop stewards play a major role; should be set up.'Means must be found', the report says, 'to take advantage of the ideas. enthusiasm and energy of BL's workers in' planning the future of the business on which their livelihood depends.'6: That a massive programme to modernize plant and equipment must be started immediately. Much of the group's plant and, machinery was 'old, outdated and inefficient.'7: That there must be changes in top level management.
The Government accepted Sir Don Ryder's recommendations. The upshot of all this was that BLMC was wound up, its board recommending its shareholders to accept the governments offer for their shares. During the transition period there was a lot going on in the world of the Mini. At the time, weekly production was said to be 3500, when disputes weren't ongoing. A month long dispute at the Castle Bromwich body pressing plant early in 1975, alone cost 9000 Minis in lost production. On 28 April, all Mini and most British Leyland production was halted because of a strike at Dunlop, which didn't just make tyres for the BL baby, it made the Alex Moulton designed suspension cones. In early May, British Leyland managed to restart Mini production by obtaining some suspension cones from Innocenti in Milan, Italy. The Dunlop dispute was finally settled in mid May.
Authi produced its last Spanish-built car, a Damask Red Mini, in May 1975. Explaining BLMC's decision to cease manufacturing cars in Spain, one British Leyland executive said: 'We just never reached our target of 50,000 units a year in the national market. Yet in terms of productivity, our operation was comparable to the operations of our competitors and to other operations of our company.'
More news from overseas Mini plants arrived when Leyland-Innocenti, the Italian subsidiary of British Leyland, re-affirmed its will to continue activities in Italy. A spokesman for the company, which employed 5000 workers in Milan, making chiefly Minis, said Leyland-Innocenti planned to keep up production and even expand it for more competitive models on the domestic and foreign markets. Leyland-Innocenti, whose output exceeded 61,000 cars in 1974, had a stock of 8000 unsold cars at the time. The company also announced a board reshuffle. David Andrews, Albert Lawrence and Percy Plant replaced John Barber, Geoffrey Robinson and Lord Stokes as members of the board. Mr Plant was also elected president. Signor Pier Giovanni Bella was reconfirmed as managing director. However in the summer and autumn of 1975, British Leyland became embroiled in an industrial dispute as its Milan workforce protested at plans to make 1500 of its number redundant, and make the remaining 3000 employees increase production by 25%.
On 22 July, British Leyland sold its Pamplona car assembly plant to SEAT for an agreed price of 1250m pesetas (about £8.8m). The sale included a commitment on the part of SEAT to employ the workers laid off in Pamplona earlier that year when Authi, BLMC's Spanish subsidiary, ended production in Spain. Authi produced about 200,000 BLMC cars in Spain, 140,000 of them Minis. SEAT is now part of the Volkswagen group and the Pamplona plant now manufactures Polos.
The newly named British Leyland Limited now had a new managing director - Alex Park. His predecessor, John Barber, became the Ryder report's scapegoat and was fired. Lord Stokes was given the role of President of British Leyland. British Leyland was reorganised into four separate divisions, with the Mini now came under the control of Leyland Cars, which oversaw all car activity, from Mini 850 to Jaguar XJ12. The managing director of Leyland Cars was Derek Whittaker, while Keith Hopkins now became sales and marketing director for the whole of British Leyland. Also that month, the Mini Clubman received the 1098cc A-Series engine for manual transmission models; the automatics continued to use the 998cc engine. British Leyland also introduced worker participation through new joint decision making bodies. This was industrial democracy in action, an effort to stop the strikes, boost output and turn British Leyland around.
In reality this made decision making painfully slow and enabled shop stewards who had no qualifications in business management to influence events. This is ironic as it was not until 1967 that BMC began recruiting university graduates, and many pundits feel that the recruitment of graduates is what gave rivals Ford the edge over BMC. Now in 1975 control of the destiny of the Mini had shifted from promoted BMC apprentices, BLMC university graduates to shop stewards, many of whom were anti-capitalist in outlook, and there was no business more capitalist than the motor industry, where customer satisfaction was paramount. Unfortunately those shop stewards not on the joint decision making bodies were to make their opinions known through industrial action. The whole concept concept of joint decision making bodies was a sop to the Trade Unions and left wing Labour MPs at a time when many pundits felt Britain was heading in a socialist direction. The concept would not stand the pressures of the free market.
1976: crisis year
The Innocenti saga rumbled on. As related earlier British Leyland had said that 1500 of the Milan-based company's 4500 workers must be sacked and production increased 25% by the remainder. Otherwise they would allow Leyland-Innocenti to go bankrupt. Leyland-Innocenti was £10m in debt and British Leyland was refusing to cover the loss unless its new terms were met. The Italian government had now become involved.
Leyland-Innocenti director Mr Percy Plant said to the press in early November 1975: 'If the Italian Government does not come up with some concrete proposals, it's all over - we shut down.' Violence reared its ugly head. A senior Italian executive of Leyland-Innocenti, personnel director Valeric di Marco, was shot three times in the legs at pointblank range in Milan later in the month . A Communist terror-group, said the shooting was, 'a warning to all those who served the capitalistic repression of the working class.'
Then the Innocenti workforce rejected a possible takeover by Honda and British Leyland announced it was putting its Italian subsidiary into liquidation on 26 November. In its statement the company said: 'The situation has been reached where, during the past year, Leyland-Innocenti has lost its entire share capital, including a reinforcement of 15 billion lire (more than $22 million) made in July 1975.'
Italian government sources said that the stiff opposition of the Italian metal workers union to Leyland-Innocenti's proposal to fire one third of the workers was a key element in the company's decision to stop its activities in Italy. The same day workers occupied the Milan factory of the Leyland-Innocenti concern. On 4 December Milan was paralysed for four hours when a million people went on strike in support of the 4500 redundant car workers from Leyland Innocenti. The future of the Milan plant was being negotiated by the Italian Government, unions and British Leyland officials.
Back in Britain in December, it was revealed that Leyland Cars' financial position was so bad that capital expenditure for future developments had stopped. British Leyland announced a £123m loss with annual output was down 17% due to strikes and the motor industry recession. The Times reported on 23 December 1975: 'The exceptional losses of nearly £60m relate largely to closures of manufacturing operations in Australia, Spain and, more recently in the Italian Innocenti business. The Australian closure resulted in a provision of £15.7m in 1973/4, but, despite having sold one factory, British Leyland is making further provisions in Australia, this time of £5.7m. Spanish provisions were originally put at £29m arising from the closure of the Authi business, but following some disposals there, the provision has now been reduced to £19m. Finally, the company faces the Innocenti situation which while still unresolved is going to be costly. Hence, a provision, considered prudent of £34m to cover closure costs in Italy. Included in this total £60m for closures is the cost of making some 16,000 people redundant. The redundancy bill is thought to amount to some £10m.'
Despite the impression given above, Australian Manufacture of the Mini did not cease, although the locally made 1098cc engine was supplanted by the 998cc unit now imported from Britain. In fact the Zetland factory was closed and production transferred to Enfield, New South Wales, which produced its first Mini in early 1975. The Mini may not have been a money maker, but reducing the number of plants that made it was certainly proving costly. In 1975, the hyper-critical CAR magazine tested the Mini 1000 and was not impressed: 'The Mini is an embarrassment. It is painfully out of date in just about every respect except price, but will continue to find adherents regardless; it may not be a good car anymore, but it is a convenient one that the vast majority understand.'
However CAR's veteran columnist LJK Setright was a staunch defender, and later wrote the official Rover 40th anniversary book. So ended 1975. Also in the year Volkswagen had continued the revitalisation of its range following on the successful launch of the Golf in 1974, with the Polo, another entry in the supermini class. Mini production for 1975 was 200,293 compared with 255,336 in 1974. But Authi production had ceased in May 1975 and Innocenti had been strikebound since July and now enduring a workers sit-in, thus explaining much of the drop in output.
March 1976 brought more negative news. Reuters reported from Tokyo. 'British Leyland has decided to stop exporting its Mini range to Japan because they failed anti-pollution standards which take effect here in April its distributors said yesterday. The statement, by Capital Enterprises Ltd., said that about 3,000 Minis had been sold in Japan. This compares with 123,000 Japanese vehicles exported to Britain last year. The statement added that distributors here were now considering selling Renault cars in place of Minis. Japanese dealers handling British cars said that Britain had been extremely critical of Japan's new exhaust emission controls, which it regarded as a non-tariff trade barrier. The Transport Ministry here said that only one European car, the West German Volkswagen 1200 LS model, had so far passed the anti-pollution tests. It said it had tentatively decided to allow continued imports of foreign cars failing the tests if they were manufactured before April this year Japanese car makers, fearing retaliatory measures against their exports, have urged the Government to give special treatment to imported cars when applying the new controls."
Ironically it would be the Japanese market that would later prolong the life of the Mini.
There was more news from Milan in April: workers at Innocenti, voted to end a 132-day sit-in at the company's factory there. More than 4000 workers had occupied the factory when British Leyland decided to wind up the company. The plant was to be taken over by the Argentine-born industrialist Alessandro De Tomaso in partnership with the state intervention board GEPI The vote allowed British Leyland to sell some 8000 cars blocked in the factory. After the sell off, Innocenti managed to assemble some more round nosed Minis from old stock, bringing the total of Minis assembled by the company between 1965 to 1976 to around 450,000. Innocenti then concentrated on manufacturing the hatchback 90/120 model, which although based on the same floorpan and using Mini mechanicals, was no longer considered to be a British Leyland car.
Under the agreement reached between British Leyland, the Italian government and trade unions, a new company Nuova Innocenti, was set up by Alessandro de Tomaso and GEPI to assemble the Minis under licence from British Leyland International, while another company, Innocenti Commerciale, would market the vehicles. Of course what needs to be asked is how Innocenti found itself in a financial mess ? It had been a successful company before BLMC bought it out and became a successful company again after its purchase by De Tomaso. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but one can't help feeling that British Leyland panicked in disposing of Innocenti, with its ready made next generation Mini. The demise of Authi and then Innocenti, not only resulted in a major cutback in Mini production volume, it also signalled the end of British Leyland as a major international player, as for political reasons the British government, as the companies owner, had no interest in protecting overseas jobs.
British Leyland's inability to supply the market was costing it market share and the Mini was one of the cars in short supply. In May 1976 it received a major update: the interior gained some fittings from the Allegro and Princess and the suspension was modified, with softer rear springs and damper settings, plus new subframe mounts. In June 1976, BL was discussing ambitious plans with shop stewards to make the ADO88 at Longbridge at a rate of 6000 to 7000 a week to make it profitable. The plan was to make Longbridge a one model plant by switching Allegro assembly to Seneffe in Belgium. It was laughably optimistic plan in the light of events to come. By October, Leyland Cars were talking of an annual production target of 250,000 for the ADO88.
The ADO20 bodies were, in 1976, produced in a very inefficient way. Some were assembled at Longbridge from panel pressings brought by lorry from Castle Bromwich, Swindon and Rubery Owen at Darlaston. Others were brought to the 'Body In White' stage, at Castle Bromwich (ready for final painting) while still more were fully painted and trimmed at the same plant. At the time the car was thought to be only marginally profitable. However in an Autocar interview, Leyland Cars boss Derek Whittaker stated that the Mini was 'never better than break even.'
In October, the National Enterprise Board approved the planned £100m programme to develop ADO88, with a 1979 launch target. With its apparent demise on the horizon, one can perhaps understand why British Leyland was reluctant to update the Mini. By December a sense of urgency seemed to have gripped those in government circles to get ADO88 out as soon as possible. The Mini's UK market share had slumped to 6.5%, although strikes and the inability to supply the market may have been a factor. It was later claimed that in 1976 Longbridge was free of disputes for only 8% of working hours.
Also the Ford Fiesta was due to be launched in the UK and Dagenham was already producing 200 a day. British Leyland's Mini output was not helped by a never ending series of strikes at component suppliers Rubery Owen at Darlaston, who made Mini front subframes and wheels among other things. Despite all the problems, Mini production in 1976 rose slightly to 203,575, with around 160,000 coming from Longbridge. And 1976 was the year in which the four millionth Mini was built.
1977: focus on ADO88
By January 1977, Seneffe was reported to be producing 2000 Allegros and Minis a week, with probably the smaller car in the majority, after all continental buyers seemed to prefer the Volkswagen Golf to the Allegro. Seneffe began producing the Mini Special for sale on the continent from 1977 to the end of production in 1981. This was a round nosed Mini fitted with a 1098cc engine and production amounted to 73,753 cars. This model was produced in response to continental dealers pleas that the Mini Clubman saloon was not popular among European buyers.
Unfortunately strikes by key workers at the Castle Bromwich body plant brought the Mini lines and British Leyland to a standstill, and by the middle of February 1977 25,000 workers were laid off. Other disputes broke out, including Mini engine assemblers and then the tool-makers struck. By the middle of March the number of workers laid off had reached 46,000. The disputes, which had cost British Leyland £12m a day in lost production of all models, was over by March 21st 1977, but its effect had been catastrophic. So how was the Mini faring in the marketplace in the spring of 1977?
The then 18-year Mini was still capable of taking 6 to 7% of the United Kingdom market when it was freely available, a position dealers had not enjoyed for some time because of strikes. Despite the month long tool-makers' dispute which savagely interrupted production of most Leyland Cars models, the Mini still managed to outsell the new Ford Fiesta in March 1977. Mr Peter Green, chairman of PJ Evans, Leyland Cars biggest distributors in the Midlands, said at the time: 'We can still sell all the Minis we can get. We must have something in the future to enable us to continue to meet this strong demand.'
Leyland-Innocenti director Mr Percy Plant said to the press in early November 1975: 'If the Italian Government does not come up with some concrete proposals, it's all over - we shut down.' Violence reared its ugly head. A senior Italian executive of Leyland-Innocenti, personnel director Valeric di Marco, was shot three times in the legs at pointblank range in Milan later in the month . A Communist terror-group, said the shooting was, 'a warning to all those who served the capitalistic repression of the working class.'
Then the Innocenti workforce rejected a possible takeover by Honda and British Leyland announced it was putting its Italian subsidiary into liquidation on 26 November. In its statement the company said: 'The situation has been reached where, during the past year, Leyland-Innocenti has lost its entire share capital, including a reinforcement of 15 billion lire (more than $22 million) made in July 1975.'
Italian government sources said that the stiff opposition of the Italian metal workers union to Leyland-Innocenti's proposal to fire one third of the workers was a key element in the company's decision to stop its activities in Italy. The same day workers occupied the Milan factory of the Leyland-Innocenti concern. On 4 December Milan was paralysed for four hours when a million people went on strike in support of the 4500 redundant car workers from Leyland Innocenti. The future of the Milan plant was being negotiated by the Italian Government, unions and British Leyland officials.
Back in Britain in December, it was revealed that Leyland Cars' financial position was so bad that capital expenditure for future developments had stopped. British Leyland announced a £123m loss with annual output was down 17% due to strikes and the motor industry recession. The Times reported on 23 December 1975: 'The exceptional losses of nearly £60m relate largely to closures of manufacturing operations in Australia, Spain and, more recently in the Italian Innocenti business. The Australian closure resulted in a provision of £15.7m in 1973/4, but, despite having sold one factory, British Leyland is making further provisions in Australia, this time of £5.7m. Spanish provisions were originally put at £29m arising from the closure of the Authi business, but following some disposals there, the provision has now been reduced to £19m. Finally, the company faces the Innocenti situation which while still unresolved is going to be costly. Hence, a provision, considered prudent of £34m to cover closure costs in Italy. Included in this total £60m for closures is the cost of making some 16,000 people redundant. The redundancy bill is thought to amount to some £10m.'
Despite the impression given above, Australian Manufacture of the Mini did not cease, although the locally made 1098cc engine was supplanted by the 998cc unit now imported from Britain. In fact the Zetland factory was closed and production transferred to Enfield, New South Wales, which produced its first Mini in early 1975. The Mini may not have been a money maker, but reducing the number of plants that made it was certainly proving costly. In 1975, the hyper-critical CAR magazine tested the Mini 1000 and was not impressed: 'The Mini is an embarrassment. It is painfully out of date in just about every respect except price, but will continue to find adherents regardless; it may not be a good car anymore, but it is a convenient one that the vast majority understand.'
However CAR's veteran columnist LJK Setright was a staunch defender, and later wrote the official Rover 40th anniversary book. So ended 1975. Also in the year Volkswagen had continued the revitalisation of its range following on the successful launch of the Golf in 1974, with the Polo, another entry in the supermini class. Mini production for 1975 was 200,293 compared with 255,336 in 1974. But Authi production had ceased in May 1975 and Innocenti had been strikebound since July and now enduring a workers sit-in, thus explaining much of the drop in output.
March 1976 brought more negative news. Reuters reported from Tokyo. 'British Leyland has decided to stop exporting its Mini range to Japan because they failed anti-pollution standards which take effect here in April its distributors said yesterday. The statement, by Capital Enterprises Ltd., said that about 3,000 Minis had been sold in Japan. This compares with 123,000 Japanese vehicles exported to Britain last year. The statement added that distributors here were now considering selling Renault cars in place of Minis. Japanese dealers handling British cars said that Britain had been extremely critical of Japan's new exhaust emission controls, which it regarded as a non-tariff trade barrier. The Transport Ministry here said that only one European car, the West German Volkswagen 1200 LS model, had so far passed the anti-pollution tests. It said it had tentatively decided to allow continued imports of foreign cars failing the tests if they were manufactured before April this year Japanese car makers, fearing retaliatory measures against their exports, have urged the Government to give special treatment to imported cars when applying the new controls."
Ironically it would be the Japanese market that would later prolong the life of the Mini.
There was more news from Milan in April: workers at Innocenti, voted to end a 132-day sit-in at the company's factory there. More than 4000 workers had occupied the factory when British Leyland decided to wind up the company. The plant was to be taken over by the Argentine-born industrialist Alessandro De Tomaso in partnership with the state intervention board GEPI The vote allowed British Leyland to sell some 8000 cars blocked in the factory. After the sell off, Innocenti managed to assemble some more round nosed Minis from old stock, bringing the total of Minis assembled by the company between 1965 to 1976 to around 450,000. Innocenti then concentrated on manufacturing the hatchback 90/120 model, which although based on the same floorpan and using Mini mechanicals, was no longer considered to be a British Leyland car.
Under the agreement reached between British Leyland, the Italian government and trade unions, a new company Nuova Innocenti, was set up by Alessandro de Tomaso and GEPI to assemble the Minis under licence from British Leyland International, while another company, Innocenti Commerciale, would market the vehicles. Of course what needs to be asked is how Innocenti found itself in a financial mess ? It had been a successful company before BLMC bought it out and became a successful company again after its purchase by De Tomaso. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but one can't help feeling that British Leyland panicked in disposing of Innocenti, with its ready made next generation Mini. The demise of Authi and then Innocenti, not only resulted in a major cutback in Mini production volume, it also signalled the end of British Leyland as a major international player, as for political reasons the British government, as the companies owner, had no interest in protecting overseas jobs.
British Leyland's inability to supply the market was costing it market share and the Mini was one of the cars in short supply. In May 1976 it received a major update: the interior gained some fittings from the Allegro and Princess and the suspension was modified, with softer rear springs and damper settings, plus new subframe mounts. In June 1976, BL was discussing ambitious plans with shop stewards to make the ADO88 at Longbridge at a rate of 6000 to 7000 a week to make it profitable. The plan was to make Longbridge a one model plant by switching Allegro assembly to Seneffe in Belgium. It was laughably optimistic plan in the light of events to come. By October, Leyland Cars were talking of an annual production target of 250,000 for the ADO88.
The ADO20 bodies were, in 1976, produced in a very inefficient way. Some were assembled at Longbridge from panel pressings brought by lorry from Castle Bromwich, Swindon and Rubery Owen at Darlaston. Others were brought to the 'Body In White' stage, at Castle Bromwich (ready for final painting) while still more were fully painted and trimmed at the same plant. At the time the car was thought to be only marginally profitable. However in an Autocar interview, Leyland Cars boss Derek Whittaker stated that the Mini was 'never better than break even.'
In October, the National Enterprise Board approved the planned £100m programme to develop ADO88, with a 1979 launch target. With its apparent demise on the horizon, one can perhaps understand why British Leyland was reluctant to update the Mini. By December a sense of urgency seemed to have gripped those in government circles to get ADO88 out as soon as possible. The Mini's UK market share had slumped to 6.5%, although strikes and the inability to supply the market may have been a factor. It was later claimed that in 1976 Longbridge was free of disputes for only 8% of working hours.
Also the Ford Fiesta was due to be launched in the UK and Dagenham was already producing 200 a day. British Leyland's Mini output was not helped by a never ending series of strikes at component suppliers Rubery Owen at Darlaston, who made Mini front subframes and wheels among other things. Despite all the problems, Mini production in 1976 rose slightly to 203,575, with around 160,000 coming from Longbridge. And 1976 was the year in which the four millionth Mini was built.
1977: focus on ADO88
By January 1977, Seneffe was reported to be producing 2000 Allegros and Minis a week, with probably the smaller car in the majority, after all continental buyers seemed to prefer the Volkswagen Golf to the Allegro. Seneffe began producing the Mini Special for sale on the continent from 1977 to the end of production in 1981. This was a round nosed Mini fitted with a 1098cc engine and production amounted to 73,753 cars. This model was produced in response to continental dealers pleas that the Mini Clubman saloon was not popular among European buyers.
Unfortunately strikes by key workers at the Castle Bromwich body plant brought the Mini lines and British Leyland to a standstill, and by the middle of February 1977 25,000 workers were laid off. Other disputes broke out, including Mini engine assemblers and then the tool-makers struck. By the middle of March the number of workers laid off had reached 46,000. The disputes, which had cost British Leyland £12m a day in lost production of all models, was over by March 21st 1977, but its effect had been catastrophic. So how was the Mini faring in the marketplace in the spring of 1977?
The then 18-year Mini was still capable of taking 6 to 7% of the United Kingdom market when it was freely available, a position dealers had not enjoyed for some time because of strikes. Despite the month long tool-makers' dispute which savagely interrupted production of most Leyland Cars models, the Mini still managed to outsell the new Ford Fiesta in March 1977. Mr Peter Green, chairman of PJ Evans, Leyland Cars biggest distributors in the Midlands, said at the time: 'We can still sell all the Minis we can get. We must have something in the future to enable us to continue to meet this strong demand.'
Incredible as it seems today, the Mini was quite an unloved little car by the late 1970s, thanks to thearrival of smart superminis, such as the Renault 5 and Ford Fiesta. This 1977 cartoon sums up the moodof the moment perfectly...
Dealers insisted that the Mini underpinned the whole Leyland Cars range by bringing in first-time buyers who frequently stayed loyal to Leyland Cars when they progressed to larger cars. It also enabled two- and three-car families to purchase, and service their cars through a single dealership. Dealers were also anxious to cater for the significant Buy British brigade. The paradox of all this it that British Leyland had divested itself of production facilities at Innocenti and Authi and now couldn't produce enough Minis to satisfy demand from all over Europe. In early 1977, Leyland Cars finance director Colin Daniels instigated new accounting methods, and it was found that in Britain the Mini was actually making a modest profit; but losing money on exports - and overall the car was a loss maker.
The virtual shutdown of Leyland Cars in the spring of 1977, due to strikes, resulted in a rethink about the company's future. However, the alternative of liquidating Leyland Cars, was too horrific to contemplate to the Labour government. The April sales figures did not make good reading for Leyland Cars: Ford occupied the first four places, with the Fiesta in third place with 4942 sales. The Mini was in eighth place with 3524; even the Capri outsold the Mini that month. Things had got so bad that the NEB tried to persuade George Turnbull, now a highly paid international automotive executive, to return to Britain. In the first six months of 1977, there had been 304 disputes in Leyland Cars which had led to the loss of 9,086,000 man hours and a vehicle production loss of 117,394.
In July 1977 Leyland Cars responded to the threat posed by the Ford Fiesta by giving the Mini 850 and 1000 a matt black grille. Then an eleven-week strike at components manufacturer Lucas caused more havoc. The dream of a vibrant British owned motor industry was evaporating, everybody could see that the abyss had been reached, but no-one knew what to do and dared not contemplate a future without a domestic automotive industry. Further disaster engulfed British Leyland in October 1977, when a recording of chairman Sir Richard Dobson, allegedly making racist remarks at a private function, surfaced in the media. A media furore followed, and he promptly resigned. In fact, the NEB had already lined up Michael Edwardes to replace him - He started work as chairman on the 1st November.
1978: reorganization
By the following January, Michael Edwardes had decided to produce two versions of the Mini, side by side at Longbridge; the old ADO20, and a larger version of its proposed replacement, the ADO88, which would later become the Austin Metro. It represented a victory for the considerable body of opinion within Leyland Cars which had long advocated the two model approach. It argued that the new generation small cars, the Fiat 127, Renault 5, VW Polo and Ford Fiesta, were so much alike that they had given a new lease of life to the then 18-year-old Mini. All were some 18in longer than the existing Mini, and so similar in appearance, that the Mini was gaining a certain cachet as something different. Certainly, it had outsold. the new Fiesta by two to one, taking 5% of the British market in 1977, despite all the restrictions on production.
Opponents, now supported by Michael Edwardes, insisted that it would fall between two stools and lose its image. This view was vindicated by the results of a clinic, a secret viewing of the prototype ADO88 displayed alongside its rivals; Motorists were critical of several aspects including appearance and size. The decision to go for the larger LC8 version meant a complete re-skin, which would delay the car until 1980. Much of the existing research and development work on engines, gear boxes, transmissions and suspension, however could be carried forward to the new model.
However, Alex Park and Derek Whittaker were unhappy with the way things were going, and promptly resigned - shortly to be followed by Keith Hopkins. Edwardes decided to rename Leyland Cars as BL Ltd, which was in effect an umbrella organization in control of three subsidiaries: Austin Morris Ltd, Jaguar-Rover-Triumph and BL Components. The Mini fell under Austin Morris Ltd, and its new managing director, Ray Horrocks.
In January 1978, journalist Anne Hope visited BL's Seneffe plant near Mons in Belgium for the Guardian and provided an insight into one of the last remaining outposts of the BL empire. She interviewed Mr Roger Van Driessche, managing director of the plant, which made Minis for the European market. He told her: 'It looks as though we'll never stop expanding. A year ago it was decided to increase our production from 2000 to 3000 cars a week. We're on target, too — assembling 2350 cars weekly, which represents a fair share of the production of Leyland. We assembled 82,000 cars last year and should be assembling even more this year.'
Seneffe built what were described as special cars. For Mr Van Driessche had decided that buyers in mainland Europe wanted cars 'more in line with Continental taste,' which meant vinyl roofs, different dashboards , plusher upholstery, racier hubcaps, and stripes.
'The accent must also be on quality,' he insisted. Quite apart from assembling cars , Seneffe was used to store cars and also to prepare them for sale. Cars from the Belgian plant were exported to Finland, Norway, Denmark , Sweden , France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland , Czechoslovakia, Italy, and Greece.
By the spring of 1978, economic conditions had improved and new car sales were booming. On 13 May 1978 British Leyland revealed it was preparing to follow its rivals, Ford, Chrysler and Vauxhall, and import more cars from the Continent to meet the demands of the best home market for five years. News of plans to bring in about 10,000 Minis from its assembly plant at Seneffe, Belgium, had already brought protests from some shop stewards at Longbridge.
Management countered by saying that the alternative was to sit on the sidelines, while the competition took full advantage of the boom. It had emphasized that Ford, by importing one in three of all its UK sales from plants in Germany, Belgium and Spain, took 30% of the market the previous month compared with BL's Shop stewards' concern stemmed from the fact that BL only recently closed one of the three Mini assembly lines at Longbridge, a move intended to increase productivity and reduce costs. Production on the remaining two was not yet reaching the target quota of 3000 cars per week, in fact management claimed the actual figure was half that, largely because some workers resented the recent closure and re-manning assignments. Shop stewards were assured that if Longbridge production improved quickly, Seneffe imports would be reduced. But BL had to act quickly if it was not to miss the summer selling season. And with the Mini still among BL's best-selling models, it had to be available.
A spokesman for BL Cars said: 'We are optimistic that employees at Longbridge will accept that our objective is not to "do" them out of jobs but to take full advantage of the very high sales expected. Our American, European and Japanese rivals are building stocks almost daily by bringing in imports. We are only proposing to bring in cars, 75% of which are manufactured in our United Kingdom factories.'
On the 25 August, BL announced it was to close its truck assembly plant in Melbourne, Australia, and stop Mini production in Australia, due to declining sales. Only that month Leyland Australia had announced the Mini 1275 LS and it would become a very rare car. The closure of the plant at Enfield, New South Wales in October 1978, would make 120 workers redundant - the Australian plant had ultimately produced 176,284 Minis.
In September 1978 Austin Morris and Italian car producer, Nuova Innocenti, revealed it had extended the arrangement under which Nuova made the 90/120 hatchback Mini. Under the old agreement due to expire at the end of 1979, the Italian company had been making around 40,000 90/120 Minis a year. This was followed by an announcement on 15 November 1978 that output of Minis at Seneffe was being reduced by 30%. Also in 1978 Charles Griffin retired, to be replaced by Ray Bates, an ex-Triumph man.
1979: Mini hits 20 not out...
Dealers insisted that the Mini underpinned the whole Leyland Cars range by bringing in first-time buyers who frequently stayed loyal to Leyland Cars when they progressed to larger cars. It also enabled two- and three-car families to purchase, and service their cars through a single dealership. Dealers were also anxious to cater for the significant Buy British brigade. The paradox of all this it that British Leyland had divested itself of production facilities at Innocenti and Authi and now couldn't produce enough Minis to satisfy demand from all over Europe. In early 1977, Leyland Cars finance director Colin Daniels instigated new accounting methods, and it was found that in Britain the Mini was actually making a modest profit; but losing money on exports - and overall the car was a loss maker.
The virtual shutdown of Leyland Cars in the spring of 1977, due to strikes, resulted in a rethink about the company's future. However, the alternative of liquidating Leyland Cars, was too horrific to contemplate to the Labour government. The April sales figures did not make good reading for Leyland Cars: Ford occupied the first four places, with the Fiesta in third place with 4942 sales. The Mini was in eighth place with 3524; even the Capri outsold the Mini that month. Things had got so bad that the NEB tried to persuade George Turnbull, now a highly paid international automotive executive, to return to Britain. In the first six months of 1977, there had been 304 disputes in Leyland Cars which had led to the loss of 9,086,000 man hours and a vehicle production loss of 117,394.
In July 1977 Leyland Cars responded to the threat posed by the Ford Fiesta by giving the Mini 850 and 1000 a matt black grille. Then an eleven-week strike at components manufacturer Lucas caused more havoc. The dream of a vibrant British owned motor industry was evaporating, everybody could see that the abyss had been reached, but no-one knew what to do and dared not contemplate a future without a domestic automotive industry. Further disaster engulfed British Leyland in October 1977, when a recording of chairman Sir Richard Dobson, allegedly making racist remarks at a private function, surfaced in the media. A media furore followed, and he promptly resigned. In fact, the NEB had already lined up Michael Edwardes to replace him - He started work as chairman on the 1st November.
1978: reorganization
By the following January, Michael Edwardes had decided to produce two versions of the Mini, side by side at Longbridge; the old ADO20, and a larger version of its proposed replacement, the ADO88, which would later become the Austin Metro. It represented a victory for the considerable body of opinion within Leyland Cars which had long advocated the two model approach. It argued that the new generation small cars, the Fiat 127, Renault 5, VW Polo and Ford Fiesta, were so much alike that they had given a new lease of life to the then 18-year-old Mini. All were some 18in longer than the existing Mini, and so similar in appearance, that the Mini was gaining a certain cachet as something different. Certainly, it had outsold. the new Fiesta by two to one, taking 5% of the British market in 1977, despite all the restrictions on production.
Opponents, now supported by Michael Edwardes, insisted that it would fall between two stools and lose its image. This view was vindicated by the results of a clinic, a secret viewing of the prototype ADO88 displayed alongside its rivals; Motorists were critical of several aspects including appearance and size. The decision to go for the larger LC8 version meant a complete re-skin, which would delay the car until 1980. Much of the existing research and development work on engines, gear boxes, transmissions and suspension, however could be carried forward to the new model.
However, Alex Park and Derek Whittaker were unhappy with the way things were going, and promptly resigned - shortly to be followed by Keith Hopkins. Edwardes decided to rename Leyland Cars as BL Ltd, which was in effect an umbrella organization in control of three subsidiaries: Austin Morris Ltd, Jaguar-Rover-Triumph and BL Components. The Mini fell under Austin Morris Ltd, and its new managing director, Ray Horrocks.
In January 1978, journalist Anne Hope visited BL's Seneffe plant near Mons in Belgium for the Guardian and provided an insight into one of the last remaining outposts of the BL empire. She interviewed Mr Roger Van Driessche, managing director of the plant, which made Minis for the European market. He told her: 'It looks as though we'll never stop expanding. A year ago it was decided to increase our production from 2000 to 3000 cars a week. We're on target, too — assembling 2350 cars weekly, which represents a fair share of the production of Leyland. We assembled 82,000 cars last year and should be assembling even more this year.'
Seneffe built what were described as special cars. For Mr Van Driessche had decided that buyers in mainland Europe wanted cars 'more in line with Continental taste,' which meant vinyl roofs, different dashboards , plusher upholstery, racier hubcaps, and stripes.
'The accent must also be on quality,' he insisted. Quite apart from assembling cars , Seneffe was used to store cars and also to prepare them for sale. Cars from the Belgian plant were exported to Finland, Norway, Denmark , Sweden , France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland , Czechoslovakia, Italy, and Greece.
By the spring of 1978, economic conditions had improved and new car sales were booming. On 13 May 1978 British Leyland revealed it was preparing to follow its rivals, Ford, Chrysler and Vauxhall, and import more cars from the Continent to meet the demands of the best home market for five years. News of plans to bring in about 10,000 Minis from its assembly plant at Seneffe, Belgium, had already brought protests from some shop stewards at Longbridge.
Management countered by saying that the alternative was to sit on the sidelines, while the competition took full advantage of the boom. It had emphasized that Ford, by importing one in three of all its UK sales from plants in Germany, Belgium and Spain, took 30% of the market the previous month compared with BL's Shop stewards' concern stemmed from the fact that BL only recently closed one of the three Mini assembly lines at Longbridge, a move intended to increase productivity and reduce costs. Production on the remaining two was not yet reaching the target quota of 3000 cars per week, in fact management claimed the actual figure was half that, largely because some workers resented the recent closure and re-manning assignments. Shop stewards were assured that if Longbridge production improved quickly, Seneffe imports would be reduced. But BL had to act quickly if it was not to miss the summer selling season. And with the Mini still among BL's best-selling models, it had to be available.
A spokesman for BL Cars said: 'We are optimistic that employees at Longbridge will accept that our objective is not to "do" them out of jobs but to take full advantage of the very high sales expected. Our American, European and Japanese rivals are building stocks almost daily by bringing in imports. We are only proposing to bring in cars, 75% of which are manufactured in our United Kingdom factories.'
On the 25 August, BL announced it was to close its truck assembly plant in Melbourne, Australia, and stop Mini production in Australia, due to declining sales. Only that month Leyland Australia had announced the Mini 1275 LS and it would become a very rare car. The closure of the plant at Enfield, New South Wales in October 1978, would make 120 workers redundant - the Australian plant had ultimately produced 176,284 Minis.
In September 1978 Austin Morris and Italian car producer, Nuova Innocenti, revealed it had extended the arrangement under which Nuova made the 90/120 hatchback Mini. Under the old agreement due to expire at the end of 1979, the Italian company had been making around 40,000 90/120 Minis a year. This was followed by an announcement on 15 November 1978 that output of Minis at Seneffe was being reduced by 30%. Also in 1978 Charles Griffin retired, to be replaced by Ray Bates, an ex-Triumph man.
1979: Mini hits 20 not out...
In a sense, the Mini story for at least the first two decades of its life reflected the fortunes of its parent company and British industry in general. 1979 was no exception. The winter of 1978/79 saw a series of pay strikes throughout Britain, which was christened by the media as 'the winter of discontent'. British Leyland escaped this trauma, which in effect marked the death throes of James Callaghan's Labour government until February 1979, when a dispute over bonus payments threatened to close all 34 of the companies plants.
British Leyland had achieved a 25 percent market share in January and prospects were looking good for 1979. The most vocal advocate of strike action was the Longbridge plant's senior convener and head of the combined British Leyland shop stewards committee, Derek Robinson, who because of his open Communist party membership, was branded "Red Robbo" by some elements of the popular press. The combined British Leyland shop stewards committee, formed in May 1968 and not recognised by both management and trade union leaders, had fought a long drawn out rearguard action against management attempts to reform BL working practices.
At Longbridge Derek Robinson called for a walk-out over the bonus row, 'to bring pressure on the company in the only language they know—the language of force. We cannot rely on them. We cannot trust them.'
Longbridge jumped the gun and there was a walk out by its 19,000 workforce. At the time it was reported that the plant produced 3000 Minis and 1500 Allegros per week. The threat of an all out strike quickly collapsed and soon normal working was resumed, except by Longbridge which held out an extra four days. Eventually Derek Robinson recommended a return to work, but stated: 'We can continue in isolation and it will be inevitable that we will slowly sink to destruction. We have had a magnificent strike and we don't want it to end in utter defeat.' Such statements made Derek Robinson a marked man in the eyes of British Leyland management.
The root cause of the dispute, bonus payments, was an attempt by British Leyland to motivate its workforce and boost productivity at its plants. Put simply, the move from piecework to measured day work had resulted in a slump in productivity. Nick Boulter, himself an ex-Longbridge worker, wrote in the Guardian in November 1979: 'Longbridge was built on piecework. Austin saw workers as animals with "Pavlovian" instincts responding to the money incentive only. The method produced good levels of productivity. But the cost lay in a loss of control by management over wage and hence unit costs. Against the wishes of the workers, the company — by then British Leyland — introduced Measured Day Work (tn the early 1970s).
'This has led to a great drop in productivity. Piecework on the track was tough, a jungle, and required that a man was physically fit in order to cope. The idea of the men was basically to get the maximum output with the least number of men and so bid up the rates. If in a gang of six men, four reckoned they could handle the job, then two were ''squeezed" out. It was a dog-eat-dog environment, and few workers would want to go back to it. But it engendered pride and application. One man told me, "when the tracks stopped, you were shouting at them (the foreman) to get it going because you were losing money. Under piecework, it was the men who really ran the track."
'Eddie who has been at Longbridge for 12 years also told me: "There isn't the pride in the job that there used to be under piecework. Then, when a man did a job, he knew that it was his job, and if he didn't do it right he was called to the front to do it again , and the whole gang suffered. Whereas today, a bloke does a job, and he doesn't care if it's right or wrong. It gets left for a rectifier."
'Under piecework cash is the stick and carrot. Measured day work is supposed to be based on a more scientific approach. Time and motion men — now called industrial engineers — measure the number of men needed to man a track at a given speed. The onus to run the track passes from the self interest of the men to foremen and management. At Longbridge and other BL plants, there are a number of reasons why measured day work (MDW) does not work — in many areas production is down by a quarter on piecework days. Under-investment in plant and machinery is one reason. And the inability of management and supervision to run and organise the tracks is another. These must be important reasons — after all, Ford's has always run successfully on MDW. But the men themselves put it down, plainly, to a lack of incentive to work. Instead of being paid on output, payment under MDW is made for being present for a 40-hour week.
'One man summed up the attitude that has developed: "...there's no incentive to work. Why not take as long a teabreak as you can? If you had the choice of sitting down and being paid at the end of the week, or working and being paid the same amount, which would you do? Its only human nature."
'It is arguable that Longbridge workers have taken piecework attitudes to MDW. Under piecework, shopfloor bargaining was used to bid up the rate for the job, partly through shedding labour. But now the same process of shopfloor bargaining is used to bid up the numbers in each gang. In order to make the job easier. The men again saw this as "human nature." (The work is, after all, tedious). They readily admitted that there was surplus labour on the tracks. But universally they shared the view that the company was "top-heavy with non-producers. Too many penguins walking around, taking money out of the company and putting nothing in."
'Their attitude — right or wrong — was that they were not in control of the company, but if that was the way things were developing, then they would get their oar in. But many did this with resentment. One worker, "celebrating" his 49th year at Longbridge said: "Well, I would like to say, that for the people who have been here and have seen the place as it was, profitable, it was a pleasure to come here. You had a pride in your job, you knew that you were doing a good day's work for a good day's pay. But we have gradually seen it deteriorate. It's a crying shame the way its been let run-down to the extent it is. The worst thing they ever did was to bring in MDW".'
The above may go a long way to explaining British Leyland's infamous quality problems...
In April British Leyland experienced a second toolmakers strike which collapsed after two weeks and in May 1979, Margaret Thatcher's Conservative party won the general election, and they were openly hostile to loss making nationalised industries, of which British Leyland was perhaps the worst of all.
1979 was the 20th anniversary of the Mini, and Sir Alec Issigonis briefly returned to the limelight. To celebrate, Austin-Morris unveiled the Longbridge-built limited edition Mini 1100 Special; a round nosed Mini fitted with the 1098cc engine, wide 10in Exacton alloys and plastic wheelarch extensions. In July that year, the Mini 850 was rebranded the Mini City.
Motor used the occasion of the Mini's 20th anniversary to quiz Austin Morris's Director of Product Development, Mark Snowdon, on the continuing viability of the Mini. 'Working out model line profitability is not a straightforward question,' he said 'It depends how you allocate a proportion of the company’s overheads to that model.
'If you just look at the direct costs of producing the vehicle, compared to its selling price, then the Mini is substantially profitable, making several hundred pounds per unit. By any normal commercial method of working it out, the Mini is profitable, but if you penalise it with a proportion of overheads related to its volume, then the profitability is very low. If you work out what the profitability of the company would be with and without the Mini, allowing for the facilities you could get rid of by not having it, then on that basis the Mini is profitable.'
In August and September, BL became embroiled in a national engineering union pay dispute. On 10 September 1979, the newly knighted chairman of BL Ltd, as it was now called, Sir Michael Edwardes announced a massive retrenchment plan for the company. On top of the 18,000 jobs already lost he forecast 25,000 to be axed in the next two years and 13 plants facing total or partial shutdown.
He said: 'We must streamline parts and slim down the number of people we employ — including staff levels which have grown over the past 10 years out of proportion to the volume actually achieved. If ever there has been a company that has projected 'jam tomorrow' it has been this one. This time round we cannot afford to back losers in the hope that they will turn out to be winners... Any plants which are not modern or being modernised or perform badly will be phased out.'
Only the previous month, BL's UK market share had dropped to a disastrous 19.3%. By November, senior union leaders and a ballot of the workforce had backed the Edwardes plan. However the combined British Leyland shop stewards committee refused to accept defeat and on 10 November 1979 published a booklet, A Trade Union Response to the Edwardes Plan attacking the proposed cutbacks and advocating active opposition. The scene was set for confrontation. On 19 November, BL Ltd fired Derek Robinson, the Longbridge convener and head of the combined British Leyland shop stewards committee.
Longbridge was soon strikebound and other plants struck in support, if only briefly. The trade unions demanded Robinson's reinstatement and pondered over whether to make the strike official. Sir Michael Edwardes and other senior executives threatened to resign if the dispute was given official backing. For a few days the future of BL hung in the balance until a fudge was found in which an inquiry was launched into Derek Robinson's dismissal and the workforce went back. Robinson's dismissal was finally confirmed the following year. In reflection the whole Robinson affair was strangely reminiscent of the dismissal of Frank Horsman at Cowley on the eve of the Mini's launch in 1959.
Was Robinson the bogeyman that management and the media made him out to be? Certainly there are many former Longbridge workers who will testify in his favour even today or was is sacking an attempt to decapitate the combined British Leyland shop stewards committee? Whatever the reason, the traumas at Longbridge in 1979, played out in the full glare of the media probably cost BL around 5% of the UK car market, and it never recovered that.
In fact, 1979 was a very good year for the Mini, if not for Longbridge. During the whole of 1978, the Mini averaged 5% of the UK car market, but the publicity resulting from the cars 20th anniversary had pushed this up to 6.5% by early September 1979 resulting in an embarrassing shortage of cars at dealerships. BL was importing about 1000 cars a month from its plant at Seneffe in Belgium, but the 2800 workers there were not able to increase output to meet demand in UK.
This was partly because of a boom in sales of the Mini in Europe — including huge demand from France and Italy, where there was also a shortage to meet demand. The booming sales of the fuel economic Mini was put down chiefly to the first real signs of reaction to the second energy crisis and the then high cost of petrol. BL admitted that this was beginning to bite, and that the economy end of their range was benefiting. By November BL had managed to obtain several thousand more Minis from Seneffe to import into Britain in an attempt to fill what it believed was a 4% gap between demand in the home market and its supply potential from the company's Longbridge factory.
Dealers around the country had informed BL that they could boost the company's share by at least 4% if they had the stock available. BL's stock levels were now at a record low on the Mini and the company said that it could not satisfy the demand for Minis even if the Longbridge factory was to go flat out. Total Mini production for 1979 was 165,502 which was more than the combined Allegro/Mini output of 127,687 from Longbridge. By number crunching one can calculate that in 1979 Seneffe and perhaps BL's South African plant built 99,230 cars, the majority of them Minis. UK Mini sales amounted to 82,938, the best since 1975.
So ended the 1970s, which in spite of all the industrial misery, economic and political turmoil and lack of development was the Mini's most successful decade, with 2,438,187 manufactured.
Into the 1980s
As Edwardes and his team successfully reduced the number of stoppages, the Mini and the company that made it became less newsworthy. In late March 1980 there was a two-day strike by 30 trim shop workers who complained that new sound-deadening material being fitted to the roof of the Mini was causing skin rashes. The management promised further safety checks. This was part of a new sound deadening pack for the Mini announced in May 1980.
Also in March 1980, Jaguar took control of the Castle Bromwich body pressing plant, which meant future Mini bodyshells would now come from the former Pressed Steel plant at Stratton St Margaret, Swindon. Jaguar technical director Bob Knight had claimed that only 40% of bodyshells for the Coventry concern were satisfactory and had to be rectified in-house. In that case, what was the quality of Mini bodyshells like and did Longbridge do anything about below par examples?
By June 1980, BL's UK market share was down to 13%; a dreadful figure revealing that the company's brand values were at rock bottom. In August 1980, in preparation for the launch of the Metro, Austin-Morris began to thin out the Mini range: the Clubman saloon and 1275GT were phased out; the Clubman Estate carried on, now with a 998cc engine and renamed Mini 1000 HL Estate; also ceasing production that month was the Mini City/850, which was replaced by a new Mini City with a 998cc A-Plus engine, as would be found in the Metro.
On 8 October 1980, the miniMetro was launched to a media blitz. All of a sudden, the Mini became yesterday's car, like the Austin A35 in 1959. Yet, the Mini had fought a magnificent rearguard action against the newer generation of superminis, remaining ahead of the Fiesta right through until until 1980. The Metro is credited with saving BL, but if Mini sales had not held up so well, the knockout blow would have been delivered long before its launch. The brand values of the Issigonis baby had sustained sales, while those of more modern BL cars had gone into meltdown.
Britain soon contracted Metro-mania, and the new hatchback was at 8% of the UK car market, and Mini production at Longbridge was down to 1150 per week. The Mini's future seemed to be as a budget car, competing with equally venerable cars like the Citroen 2CV, Renault 4 and Fiat 126. Moke production began in Portugal that year using CKD kits imported from Australia. By By the end of 1980, total Mini production had reached 4,749,816. Total Mini production for 1980 was 150,067.
British Leyland had achieved a 25 percent market share in January and prospects were looking good for 1979. The most vocal advocate of strike action was the Longbridge plant's senior convener and head of the combined British Leyland shop stewards committee, Derek Robinson, who because of his open Communist party membership, was branded "Red Robbo" by some elements of the popular press. The combined British Leyland shop stewards committee, formed in May 1968 and not recognised by both management and trade union leaders, had fought a long drawn out rearguard action against management attempts to reform BL working practices.
At Longbridge Derek Robinson called for a walk-out over the bonus row, 'to bring pressure on the company in the only language they know—the language of force. We cannot rely on them. We cannot trust them.'
Longbridge jumped the gun and there was a walk out by its 19,000 workforce. At the time it was reported that the plant produced 3000 Minis and 1500 Allegros per week. The threat of an all out strike quickly collapsed and soon normal working was resumed, except by Longbridge which held out an extra four days. Eventually Derek Robinson recommended a return to work, but stated: 'We can continue in isolation and it will be inevitable that we will slowly sink to destruction. We have had a magnificent strike and we don't want it to end in utter defeat.' Such statements made Derek Robinson a marked man in the eyes of British Leyland management.
The root cause of the dispute, bonus payments, was an attempt by British Leyland to motivate its workforce and boost productivity at its plants. Put simply, the move from piecework to measured day work had resulted in a slump in productivity. Nick Boulter, himself an ex-Longbridge worker, wrote in the Guardian in November 1979: 'Longbridge was built on piecework. Austin saw workers as animals with "Pavlovian" instincts responding to the money incentive only. The method produced good levels of productivity. But the cost lay in a loss of control by management over wage and hence unit costs. Against the wishes of the workers, the company — by then British Leyland — introduced Measured Day Work (tn the early 1970s).
'This has led to a great drop in productivity. Piecework on the track was tough, a jungle, and required that a man was physically fit in order to cope. The idea of the men was basically to get the maximum output with the least number of men and so bid up the rates. If in a gang of six men, four reckoned they could handle the job, then two were ''squeezed" out. It was a dog-eat-dog environment, and few workers would want to go back to it. But it engendered pride and application. One man told me, "when the tracks stopped, you were shouting at them (the foreman) to get it going because you were losing money. Under piecework, it was the men who really ran the track."
'Eddie who has been at Longbridge for 12 years also told me: "There isn't the pride in the job that there used to be under piecework. Then, when a man did a job, he knew that it was his job, and if he didn't do it right he was called to the front to do it again , and the whole gang suffered. Whereas today, a bloke does a job, and he doesn't care if it's right or wrong. It gets left for a rectifier."
'Under piecework cash is the stick and carrot. Measured day work is supposed to be based on a more scientific approach. Time and motion men — now called industrial engineers — measure the number of men needed to man a track at a given speed. The onus to run the track passes from the self interest of the men to foremen and management. At Longbridge and other BL plants, there are a number of reasons why measured day work (MDW) does not work — in many areas production is down by a quarter on piecework days. Under-investment in plant and machinery is one reason. And the inability of management and supervision to run and organise the tracks is another. These must be important reasons — after all, Ford's has always run successfully on MDW. But the men themselves put it down, plainly, to a lack of incentive to work. Instead of being paid on output, payment under MDW is made for being present for a 40-hour week.
'One man summed up the attitude that has developed: "...there's no incentive to work. Why not take as long a teabreak as you can? If you had the choice of sitting down and being paid at the end of the week, or working and being paid the same amount, which would you do? Its only human nature."
'It is arguable that Longbridge workers have taken piecework attitudes to MDW. Under piecework, shopfloor bargaining was used to bid up the rate for the job, partly through shedding labour. But now the same process of shopfloor bargaining is used to bid up the numbers in each gang. In order to make the job easier. The men again saw this as "human nature." (The work is, after all, tedious). They readily admitted that there was surplus labour on the tracks. But universally they shared the view that the company was "top-heavy with non-producers. Too many penguins walking around, taking money out of the company and putting nothing in."
'Their attitude — right or wrong — was that they were not in control of the company, but if that was the way things were developing, then they would get their oar in. But many did this with resentment. One worker, "celebrating" his 49th year at Longbridge said: "Well, I would like to say, that for the people who have been here and have seen the place as it was, profitable, it was a pleasure to come here. You had a pride in your job, you knew that you were doing a good day's work for a good day's pay. But we have gradually seen it deteriorate. It's a crying shame the way its been let run-down to the extent it is. The worst thing they ever did was to bring in MDW".'
The above may go a long way to explaining British Leyland's infamous quality problems...
In April British Leyland experienced a second toolmakers strike which collapsed after two weeks and in May 1979, Margaret Thatcher's Conservative party won the general election, and they were openly hostile to loss making nationalised industries, of which British Leyland was perhaps the worst of all.
1979 was the 20th anniversary of the Mini, and Sir Alec Issigonis briefly returned to the limelight. To celebrate, Austin-Morris unveiled the Longbridge-built limited edition Mini 1100 Special; a round nosed Mini fitted with the 1098cc engine, wide 10in Exacton alloys and plastic wheelarch extensions. In July that year, the Mini 850 was rebranded the Mini City.
Motor used the occasion of the Mini's 20th anniversary to quiz Austin Morris's Director of Product Development, Mark Snowdon, on the continuing viability of the Mini. 'Working out model line profitability is not a straightforward question,' he said 'It depends how you allocate a proportion of the company’s overheads to that model.
'If you just look at the direct costs of producing the vehicle, compared to its selling price, then the Mini is substantially profitable, making several hundred pounds per unit. By any normal commercial method of working it out, the Mini is profitable, but if you penalise it with a proportion of overheads related to its volume, then the profitability is very low. If you work out what the profitability of the company would be with and without the Mini, allowing for the facilities you could get rid of by not having it, then on that basis the Mini is profitable.'
In August and September, BL became embroiled in a national engineering union pay dispute. On 10 September 1979, the newly knighted chairman of BL Ltd, as it was now called, Sir Michael Edwardes announced a massive retrenchment plan for the company. On top of the 18,000 jobs already lost he forecast 25,000 to be axed in the next two years and 13 plants facing total or partial shutdown.
He said: 'We must streamline parts and slim down the number of people we employ — including staff levels which have grown over the past 10 years out of proportion to the volume actually achieved. If ever there has been a company that has projected 'jam tomorrow' it has been this one. This time round we cannot afford to back losers in the hope that they will turn out to be winners... Any plants which are not modern or being modernised or perform badly will be phased out.'
Only the previous month, BL's UK market share had dropped to a disastrous 19.3%. By November, senior union leaders and a ballot of the workforce had backed the Edwardes plan. However the combined British Leyland shop stewards committee refused to accept defeat and on 10 November 1979 published a booklet, A Trade Union Response to the Edwardes Plan attacking the proposed cutbacks and advocating active opposition. The scene was set for confrontation. On 19 November, BL Ltd fired Derek Robinson, the Longbridge convener and head of the combined British Leyland shop stewards committee.
Longbridge was soon strikebound and other plants struck in support, if only briefly. The trade unions demanded Robinson's reinstatement and pondered over whether to make the strike official. Sir Michael Edwardes and other senior executives threatened to resign if the dispute was given official backing. For a few days the future of BL hung in the balance until a fudge was found in which an inquiry was launched into Derek Robinson's dismissal and the workforce went back. Robinson's dismissal was finally confirmed the following year. In reflection the whole Robinson affair was strangely reminiscent of the dismissal of Frank Horsman at Cowley on the eve of the Mini's launch in 1959.
Was Robinson the bogeyman that management and the media made him out to be? Certainly there are many former Longbridge workers who will testify in his favour even today or was is sacking an attempt to decapitate the combined British Leyland shop stewards committee? Whatever the reason, the traumas at Longbridge in 1979, played out in the full glare of the media probably cost BL around 5% of the UK car market, and it never recovered that.
In fact, 1979 was a very good year for the Mini, if not for Longbridge. During the whole of 1978, the Mini averaged 5% of the UK car market, but the publicity resulting from the cars 20th anniversary had pushed this up to 6.5% by early September 1979 resulting in an embarrassing shortage of cars at dealerships. BL was importing about 1000 cars a month from its plant at Seneffe in Belgium, but the 2800 workers there were not able to increase output to meet demand in UK.
This was partly because of a boom in sales of the Mini in Europe — including huge demand from France and Italy, where there was also a shortage to meet demand. The booming sales of the fuel economic Mini was put down chiefly to the first real signs of reaction to the second energy crisis and the then high cost of petrol. BL admitted that this was beginning to bite, and that the economy end of their range was benefiting. By November BL had managed to obtain several thousand more Minis from Seneffe to import into Britain in an attempt to fill what it believed was a 4% gap between demand in the home market and its supply potential from the company's Longbridge factory.
Dealers around the country had informed BL that they could boost the company's share by at least 4% if they had the stock available. BL's stock levels were now at a record low on the Mini and the company said that it could not satisfy the demand for Minis even if the Longbridge factory was to go flat out. Total Mini production for 1979 was 165,502 which was more than the combined Allegro/Mini output of 127,687 from Longbridge. By number crunching one can calculate that in 1979 Seneffe and perhaps BL's South African plant built 99,230 cars, the majority of them Minis. UK Mini sales amounted to 82,938, the best since 1975.
So ended the 1970s, which in spite of all the industrial misery, economic and political turmoil and lack of development was the Mini's most successful decade, with 2,438,187 manufactured.
Into the 1980s
As Edwardes and his team successfully reduced the number of stoppages, the Mini and the company that made it became less newsworthy. In late March 1980 there was a two-day strike by 30 trim shop workers who complained that new sound-deadening material being fitted to the roof of the Mini was causing skin rashes. The management promised further safety checks. This was part of a new sound deadening pack for the Mini announced in May 1980.
Also in March 1980, Jaguar took control of the Castle Bromwich body pressing plant, which meant future Mini bodyshells would now come from the former Pressed Steel plant at Stratton St Margaret, Swindon. Jaguar technical director Bob Knight had claimed that only 40% of bodyshells for the Coventry concern were satisfactory and had to be rectified in-house. In that case, what was the quality of Mini bodyshells like and did Longbridge do anything about below par examples?
By June 1980, BL's UK market share was down to 13%; a dreadful figure revealing that the company's brand values were at rock bottom. In August 1980, in preparation for the launch of the Metro, Austin-Morris began to thin out the Mini range: the Clubman saloon and 1275GT were phased out; the Clubman Estate carried on, now with a 998cc engine and renamed Mini 1000 HL Estate; also ceasing production that month was the Mini City/850, which was replaced by a new Mini City with a 998cc A-Plus engine, as would be found in the Metro.
On 8 October 1980, the miniMetro was launched to a media blitz. All of a sudden, the Mini became yesterday's car, like the Austin A35 in 1959. Yet, the Mini had fought a magnificent rearguard action against the newer generation of superminis, remaining ahead of the Fiesta right through until until 1980. The Metro is credited with saving BL, but if Mini sales had not held up so well, the knockout blow would have been delivered long before its launch. The brand values of the Issigonis baby had sustained sales, while those of more modern BL cars had gone into meltdown.
Britain soon contracted Metro-mania, and the new hatchback was at 8% of the UK car market, and Mini production at Longbridge was down to 1150 per week. The Mini's future seemed to be as a budget car, competing with equally venerable cars like the Citroen 2CV, Renault 4 and Fiat 126. Moke production began in Portugal that year using CKD kits imported from Australia. By By the end of 1980, total Mini production had reached 4,749,816. Total Mini production for 1980 was 150,067.
The long goodbye
Seneffe: the final showdown
There was one more big drama left in the Mini story. On 28 January 1981, BL confirmed that it was closing Seneffe with the loss of 2200 jobs. A further 225 workers at Cowley, near Oxford, who packed kits for the Belgian plant were also to be made redundant. There was considerable bitterness in Belgium over the Seneffe closure, and anti-British feeling was running high among the workers there; some of whom had occupied the plant. The Seneffe closure in March, had been under consideration for months, as the BL board formulated its plan for further retrenchment, and the concentration of car assembly in the Britain.
The Belgian plant was said to have made a loss of 55m francs (£688,000) in 1978, and 132m francs (£1.65m) in 1979. Losses for 1980 were expected to be considerably higher. The decision to close Seneffe caused friction between Britain and Belgium at the highest level. Sir Peter Wakefield, the British ambassador to Belgium, was summoned to the Belgian Prime Minister's office that morning and asked to deliver a message to Margaret Thatcher. This was understood to state that it would be 'desirable' if the closure decision could be delayed for at least a month. Mr Wilfred Martens's message stressed the Seneffe plant's good productivity record, its strike-free labour relations over 17 years, and the drastic impact the closure would have on an already depressed region, where up to a third of the work force were without jobs.
Over 2000 workers at Seneffe continued to occupy the factory, and voted to block the departure of completed vehicles and parts from the works and from BL's adjoining European distribution centre. Their aim was to impound the 3500 new cars in the centre as a bargaining counter to obtain maximum redundancy payments. Angry union leaders accused BL of foul play over its decision to close the plant, and there was no mistaking the bitterness felt towards BL's management, Mrs Thatcher's Government, and all things British. One can't help but feel sorry for the Seneffe workforce. They had performed magnificently and had supplied Europe with Minis when strikebound UK factories couldn't and their reward was redundancy. For them, the closure represented a betrayal. In the 17-year history of the plant, productivity had risen steadily and there had never been a strike. And all this was going on while BL was locked in yet another battle with the Longbridge shop stewards.
Also in 1981 BL had to find alternate suppliers of front subframes and wheels for the Mini when Rubery Owen closed their Darlaston factory. Fortunately supplies of rear subframes were unaffected as they were supplied by GKN-Sankey.
Over at Nuova Innocenti, and as a consequence of Alessandro de Tomaso's conclusion of an agreement with Daihatsu, the Japanese company would supply Innocenti with 2000 three-cylinder engines per month, starting at the end of 1981. The original Innocenti 90 and 120 had been joined by the 74bhp 1275cc engined Mini De Tomaso, as the top of the range model - and Innocenti had managed to sell 220,000 of these cars.
Signor de Tomaso told a Milan newspaper: 'As for the possibility which has been ventilated of not renewing the British Leyland-Innocenti agreement, I can declare that it is a case of pure invention, based on not knowing the facts. It is enough to consider that, of the 103,000 Minis sold in Europe, 42,000 are built by Innocenti. How can a manufacturer give up 42% of his sales with an easy heart? Certainly, the Innocenti-Daihatsu agreement has annoyed Leyland, also because I kept it secret up to the last.' The Daihatsu engined Mini 3 arrived in April 1982 and lasted in production until 1993. 1981 was the last year the Mini appeared in the top ten list of the UK's best selling cars.
In February 1982, the last Mini estate HL bodyshell was produced; although the model would not officially be withdrawn from sale until September 1982. In April 1982 the Mini was given higher gearing to make it more economical, but this did nothing for acceleration, and the car lost a little of its buzzbox characteristics. The fact that the ancient A-Series engine could cope with up-gearing was a tribute to its remarkable torque characteristics, even in its tamest form.
And that brings us to the subject of why the A-Series engine was never radically re-engineered to modern standards. Was it a matter of cost or were there other reasons?
Back in the 1970s BL had embarked on projects to develop overhead camshaft versions of both the A- and B-Series engines. The reason for this was that MG used both engines and as they exported to the USA where stringent anti-emissions legislation was in force, it was paramount that BL's existing engines were made more efficient to enable them to remain both legal and competitive by using the more efficient emissions friendly overhead cam layout.
In the end the OHC B-Series evolved into the O-Series engine first seen in 1978, while converting the A-Series to the overhead cam layout proved to be a technical cul-de-sac. The immediate problem of continuing to sell the MG Midget in the USA was solved by replacing the 1275cc A-Series engine with the 1493cc Triumph engine also used in the rival Spitfire. But an OHC A-Series could be used in the ADO88 and other BL cars. In the event eleven prototype overhead cam A-Series engines were built in 1975 using Cooper S blocks in capacities of 970cc, 1097cc and 1275cc. The engines used aluminium cylinder heads.
The engineers obtained the following performance figures for OHC Minis:
970cc: OHC 59bhp @ 6750rpm, 51lb ft @ 5250rpm1097cc: OHC 72bhp @ 6500rpm, 64lb ft @ 5000rpm1275cc: OHC 84bhp @ 6750rpm, 80lb ft @ 4500rpm
The above figures look very impressive, and a bluff-fronted Mini Clubman fitted with the OHC 1275cc engine and twin HS6 SU carburettors could reach 100mph. It would be easy to accuse BL of another missed opportunity. But a look at the comparative figures for the existing overhead valve engines reveal another story. For a direct comparison first we will use the three Cooper S engines and then the standard tune single carburettor engines seen in the mainstream production Minis.
Standard OHC Mini engines:
97cc: OHV 65bhp @ 6500rpm, 55lb ft @ 3500rpm1071cc: OHV 70bhp @ 6000rpm, 62lb ft @ 4500rpm1275cc: OHV 76bhp @ 5800rpm, 80lb ft @ 3000rpm 998cc: OHV 38bhp @ 5250rpm, 52lb ft @ 2700rpm1098cc: OHV 45bhp @ 5250rpm, 56lb ft @ 2700rpm 1275cc: OHV 54bhp @ 5250rpm, 67lb ft @ 2500rpm
Converting the A-Series engine to overhead camshaft simply pushed the peak torque further up the rev range and actually caused more problems than it solved. One of the great virtues of driving a Mini is its remarkable ability to pull top gear at low revs, something that was exploited by Austin Rover and later Rover when the car was up geared.
An overhead cam A-Series engine would have been torque shy where it mattered in everyday driving and that was indeed the case with the 100mph OHC Mini Clubman. The modern solution for the lack of torque where it matters would be to add more gear ratios, but BL's engineers decided that a reliable revised transmission in sump gearbox was not feasible. Therefore the decision was taken to opt for the A+ programme. BL had already burnt its fingers with the OHC E-Series engine. The E-Series had been intended to supplant the B-Series, but its lack of torque resulted in the old B-Series going into the Marina and Princess, and even the O-Series was a disappointment. BL would not make the same mistake again.
The Mini returns to Japan
Then, in May 1982 after a gap of 16 years, BL relaunched the Mini in Japan; where the car had recently been enjoying a revival of interest on the second hand market. The car was equipped with what BL described as cosmetic refinements, such as head restraints and flared wheel arches. The 998cc Minis carried a price tag 10-15% higher than in Britain, where prices ranged from £2999 to £3363. In 1981, BL sold about 1000 cars in Japan. Minis were first exported to Japan in the early 1970s, but BL withdrew them from the market as Japanese legal requirements on imported vehicles became more stringent. The Japanese promised to make their markets more accessible, following increasing pressure particularly from Europe, and the Mini now had a greater chance of success. The Japanese Minis were prepared by Carbodies, and were fitted with catalytic exhaust converters to conform with Japanese emission rules. This was the start of a new market for the Mini, as a fun car and fashion accessory.
Also, there were more corporate changes as Austin-Morris morphed into the Austin Rover Group, under Harold Musgrove. In September, the Mini Mayfair was launched as the upmarket model in the range complete with Rashelle cloth trim. The owner was well advised to go for the optional Exacton alloy wheels and wheelarch extensions, for they suited the appearance of the car. The Mayfair proved a success, and in November 1982, weekly Mini production rose from 940 to 1050. Although Mini production would decline, the trick for BL was to try and sell as many of the higher priced models such as the Mayfair as it could.
On 5 November, Sir Michael Edwardes left BL, having drastically cut back on plants and jobs, faced down the shop stewards and won in many confrontations. He was replaced by Sir Austin Bide.
There was one more big drama left in the Mini story. On 28 January 1981, BL confirmed that it was closing Seneffe with the loss of 2200 jobs. A further 225 workers at Cowley, near Oxford, who packed kits for the Belgian plant were also to be made redundant. There was considerable bitterness in Belgium over the Seneffe closure, and anti-British feeling was running high among the workers there; some of whom had occupied the plant. The Seneffe closure in March, had been under consideration for months, as the BL board formulated its plan for further retrenchment, and the concentration of car assembly in the Britain.
The Belgian plant was said to have made a loss of 55m francs (£688,000) in 1978, and 132m francs (£1.65m) in 1979. Losses for 1980 were expected to be considerably higher. The decision to close Seneffe caused friction between Britain and Belgium at the highest level. Sir Peter Wakefield, the British ambassador to Belgium, was summoned to the Belgian Prime Minister's office that morning and asked to deliver a message to Margaret Thatcher. This was understood to state that it would be 'desirable' if the closure decision could be delayed for at least a month. Mr Wilfred Martens's message stressed the Seneffe plant's good productivity record, its strike-free labour relations over 17 years, and the drastic impact the closure would have on an already depressed region, where up to a third of the work force were without jobs.
Over 2000 workers at Seneffe continued to occupy the factory, and voted to block the departure of completed vehicles and parts from the works and from BL's adjoining European distribution centre. Their aim was to impound the 3500 new cars in the centre as a bargaining counter to obtain maximum redundancy payments. Angry union leaders accused BL of foul play over its decision to close the plant, and there was no mistaking the bitterness felt towards BL's management, Mrs Thatcher's Government, and all things British. One can't help but feel sorry for the Seneffe workforce. They had performed magnificently and had supplied Europe with Minis when strikebound UK factories couldn't and their reward was redundancy. For them, the closure represented a betrayal. In the 17-year history of the plant, productivity had risen steadily and there had never been a strike. And all this was going on while BL was locked in yet another battle with the Longbridge shop stewards.
Also in 1981 BL had to find alternate suppliers of front subframes and wheels for the Mini when Rubery Owen closed their Darlaston factory. Fortunately supplies of rear subframes were unaffected as they were supplied by GKN-Sankey.
Over at Nuova Innocenti, and as a consequence of Alessandro de Tomaso's conclusion of an agreement with Daihatsu, the Japanese company would supply Innocenti with 2000 three-cylinder engines per month, starting at the end of 1981. The original Innocenti 90 and 120 had been joined by the 74bhp 1275cc engined Mini De Tomaso, as the top of the range model - and Innocenti had managed to sell 220,000 of these cars.
Signor de Tomaso told a Milan newspaper: 'As for the possibility which has been ventilated of not renewing the British Leyland-Innocenti agreement, I can declare that it is a case of pure invention, based on not knowing the facts. It is enough to consider that, of the 103,000 Minis sold in Europe, 42,000 are built by Innocenti. How can a manufacturer give up 42% of his sales with an easy heart? Certainly, the Innocenti-Daihatsu agreement has annoyed Leyland, also because I kept it secret up to the last.' The Daihatsu engined Mini 3 arrived in April 1982 and lasted in production until 1993. 1981 was the last year the Mini appeared in the top ten list of the UK's best selling cars.
In February 1982, the last Mini estate HL bodyshell was produced; although the model would not officially be withdrawn from sale until September 1982. In April 1982 the Mini was given higher gearing to make it more economical, but this did nothing for acceleration, and the car lost a little of its buzzbox characteristics. The fact that the ancient A-Series engine could cope with up-gearing was a tribute to its remarkable torque characteristics, even in its tamest form.
And that brings us to the subject of why the A-Series engine was never radically re-engineered to modern standards. Was it a matter of cost or were there other reasons?
Back in the 1970s BL had embarked on projects to develop overhead camshaft versions of both the A- and B-Series engines. The reason for this was that MG used both engines and as they exported to the USA where stringent anti-emissions legislation was in force, it was paramount that BL's existing engines were made more efficient to enable them to remain both legal and competitive by using the more efficient emissions friendly overhead cam layout.
In the end the OHC B-Series evolved into the O-Series engine first seen in 1978, while converting the A-Series to the overhead cam layout proved to be a technical cul-de-sac. The immediate problem of continuing to sell the MG Midget in the USA was solved by replacing the 1275cc A-Series engine with the 1493cc Triumph engine also used in the rival Spitfire. But an OHC A-Series could be used in the ADO88 and other BL cars. In the event eleven prototype overhead cam A-Series engines were built in 1975 using Cooper S blocks in capacities of 970cc, 1097cc and 1275cc. The engines used aluminium cylinder heads.
The engineers obtained the following performance figures for OHC Minis:
970cc: OHC 59bhp @ 6750rpm, 51lb ft @ 5250rpm1097cc: OHC 72bhp @ 6500rpm, 64lb ft @ 5000rpm1275cc: OHC 84bhp @ 6750rpm, 80lb ft @ 4500rpm
The above figures look very impressive, and a bluff-fronted Mini Clubman fitted with the OHC 1275cc engine and twin HS6 SU carburettors could reach 100mph. It would be easy to accuse BL of another missed opportunity. But a look at the comparative figures for the existing overhead valve engines reveal another story. For a direct comparison first we will use the three Cooper S engines and then the standard tune single carburettor engines seen in the mainstream production Minis.
Standard OHC Mini engines:
97cc: OHV 65bhp @ 6500rpm, 55lb ft @ 3500rpm1071cc: OHV 70bhp @ 6000rpm, 62lb ft @ 4500rpm1275cc: OHV 76bhp @ 5800rpm, 80lb ft @ 3000rpm 998cc: OHV 38bhp @ 5250rpm, 52lb ft @ 2700rpm1098cc: OHV 45bhp @ 5250rpm, 56lb ft @ 2700rpm 1275cc: OHV 54bhp @ 5250rpm, 67lb ft @ 2500rpm
Converting the A-Series engine to overhead camshaft simply pushed the peak torque further up the rev range and actually caused more problems than it solved. One of the great virtues of driving a Mini is its remarkable ability to pull top gear at low revs, something that was exploited by Austin Rover and later Rover when the car was up geared.
An overhead cam A-Series engine would have been torque shy where it mattered in everyday driving and that was indeed the case with the 100mph OHC Mini Clubman. The modern solution for the lack of torque where it matters would be to add more gear ratios, but BL's engineers decided that a reliable revised transmission in sump gearbox was not feasible. Therefore the decision was taken to opt for the A+ programme. BL had already burnt its fingers with the OHC E-Series engine. The E-Series had been intended to supplant the B-Series, but its lack of torque resulted in the old B-Series going into the Marina and Princess, and even the O-Series was a disappointment. BL would not make the same mistake again.
The Mini returns to Japan
Then, in May 1982 after a gap of 16 years, BL relaunched the Mini in Japan; where the car had recently been enjoying a revival of interest on the second hand market. The car was equipped with what BL described as cosmetic refinements, such as head restraints and flared wheel arches. The 998cc Minis carried a price tag 10-15% higher than in Britain, where prices ranged from £2999 to £3363. In 1981, BL sold about 1000 cars in Japan. Minis were first exported to Japan in the early 1970s, but BL withdrew them from the market as Japanese legal requirements on imported vehicles became more stringent. The Japanese promised to make their markets more accessible, following increasing pressure particularly from Europe, and the Mini now had a greater chance of success. The Japanese Minis were prepared by Carbodies, and were fitted with catalytic exhaust converters to conform with Japanese emission rules. This was the start of a new market for the Mini, as a fun car and fashion accessory.
Also, there were more corporate changes as Austin-Morris morphed into the Austin Rover Group, under Harold Musgrove. In September, the Mini Mayfair was launched as the upmarket model in the range complete with Rashelle cloth trim. The owner was well advised to go for the optional Exacton alloy wheels and wheelarch extensions, for they suited the appearance of the car. The Mayfair proved a success, and in November 1982, weekly Mini production rose from 940 to 1050. Although Mini production would decline, the trick for BL was to try and sell as many of the higher priced models such as the Mayfair as it could.
On 5 November, Sir Michael Edwardes left BL, having drastically cut back on plants and jobs, faced down the shop stewards and won in many confrontations. He was replaced by Sir Austin Bide.
Mini Van and Pick Up production ceased in May 1983, after 579,673 examples. Some historians have argued that the decision to axe the Mini Van was a big mistake and that the void was filled by the Japanese forward control vans. In preparation for the Mini's 25th anniversary that August, Austin Rover unveiled the Mini 25. This had robbed the BL parts bin and saw the return of the 1275GT's 8.4in front disc brakes and 12in wheels. Shortly afterwards, this became standard fitment for mainstream Minis, over a decade after BL had first realised that this was cheaper than fitting 10in wheels.
Trying and failing to replace the Mini
There were two very real opportunities to replace the Mini during its life, the first being in 1968. Alec Issigonis, working in semi-retirement, had readied the 9X to replace the Mini, a car that was smaller than his original, but was easier and cheaper to build, arguably more stylish and, amazingly, was more commodious, also incorporating a hatchback rear door. The company never seriously investigated the feasibility of producing this car – by 1968 BMH were deeply embroiled in the merger saga with Leyland Motors and the question of what to do with the poor-selling mid-range cars was far more urgent than the matter of replacing the Mini. In fact, replacing the Mini was seen as a distraction, rather than an essential task to be undertaken. It was easy to point to the Mini and note that it still sold in large numbers at the time, but its non-development also showed a lack of forward planning by the new company’s management.
The non-appearance of the 9X is definitely the saddest of all the missed opportunities in this whole story: had it appeared on the market sometime around 1971-72, it would not only have refined – and redefined – the Mini, but would also have challenged the idea that the supermini should be quite as large as it ended up being by the mid-'70s. In addition, it may well have ultimately had a wider market appeal, but it is certain that the 9X would have been more profitable for the company, as it was cheaper to build. What makes this whole episode all the sadder was that this car was fully engineered by Issigonis and production-ready, all development having been completed.
ADO74 and ADO88 notwithstanding, the other real opportunity to replace the Mini came in 1974 and would have potentially been a very inexpensive and effective operation. During the '60s, one successful deal that BMC concluded was with the Innocenti company in Italy, who agreed terms to build the Mini and ADO16 for European consumption and become a subsidiary of the expanding British car maker. The Innocenti agreement was highly effective and made a fair amount of money for BMC, but by the early '70s, the Italian management approached Bertone to restyle the car in response to the threat from the new wave of hatchbacks, such as the Fiat 127. The Innocenti Mini 90/120 were the result; a smart and pert small range of hatchbacks, the success of which led to the Argentinean industrialist and supercar producer Alejandro de Tomaso buying the company from British Leyland when they were at a particularly low ebb in the mid-1970s.
It is not inconceivable that BL could have also arranged terms with Bertone to use this body in the UK themselves, building it on a much larger scale and thereby producing a stylish (and cheap) supermini for the '70s. In fact, British Leyland did consider producing a version of the Innocenti Mini themselves, because it was modern and at 10ft 3ins was only marginally longer than the original Mini. Harris Mann has since stated that this idea was quickly rejected because Charles Griffin had made it quite clear in 1974 that any replacement for the Mini should be larger inside, and the Bertone design clearly was not. Initial planning had also shown that the Innocenti Mini would prove costly to manufacture – even a run of 5000 a year would not have made financial sense – although these problems could possibly have been overcome. Archives show that Harry Webster was thinking very much along these lines, with his re-bodied Mini styled by Michelotti.
Good times, and bad...
Of course, it must noted that back in the late 1960s and early '70s, the Mini was not regarded with quite the same fondness as it would be in later years, so the time would have been right to make the change and move the original concept forwards. Of course, the company was in a perpetual state of crisis between 1968 and 1980 and as such, did not seriously have the inclination to replace a car that was selling in large numbers. The major crises lay in the mid-range with cars such as the Maxi and Allegro and so, as time passed and the Mini remained in production unaltered, it ceased to be simply an old and inadequate car, and ended up becoming a lovable anachronism that was cherished by people of all ages.
In fact, the Mini’s best year for sales was 1971 (12 years into its life, remember) when 318,475 were built and amazingly, in 1973 it became British Leyland’s best selling car – and would remain so until the launch of the Metro in 1980. The only BL car that could rival the Mini for sales was the Morris Marina, but as that car was designed to compete in the unique to Britain fleet market, unlike the Mini it had little appeal to export markets.
This probably says more about the weakness of the cars in the company’s mid-range line-up than it does about the strength of the Mini, but ironically, as the '70s rolled on, the need to replace the Mini became less and less pressing, as it continued to bolster the sales of the company as a whole. The situation was compounded by the fact that as British Leyland worked on its ADO74 Mini replacement, grappling blindly with the task of replacing the elderly car, the money ran out and the project was scrapped so that it could concentrate on the ADO88.
Enter the Metro... and the Mini's revival
Funnily enough, the emergence of the Metro in 1980 as the new de facto supermini for the company also safeguarded the future of the Mini. Production volumes for the Mini took a fall as people took to the Metro as the new, small BL car, but as Longbridge had been pretty much gutted in a massive modernisation programme in preparation for Metro production, the Mini was also a beneficiary. The Mini continued to roll off the same production line as its bigger brother and benefited from the economies of scale afforded by the new facilities. The 1980 launch of the Metro also marked the point in time when the Mini actually started making real money for the company with its fresh, new A-Plus engine and rationalised range.
Life was quiet for the Mini during the Musgrove years at BL, and as the company became known as Austin-Rover and new cars came on stream such as the, Maestro, Montego and Rover 200, the Mini tended to be quietly forgotten. Harold Musgrove intended for the Mini to finish in 1986-87. According to Simon Weakley, a marketing trainee at Austin Rover between 1982 and 1986, the Austin AR6 would be the reason. He said: 'The AR6 was to be the only car to carry the Austin name, with the Mini set to be discontinued at its launch.'
Business reasoning went completely against the Mini as well, meaning that there should have been no rational reason for continuing its production. One insider put Austin Rover’s dilemma in context: 'it should be realised that there were lots of reasons why Engineers and Manufacturing people wanted to axe it - it was a 1950s design, lots of difficulties with modern legislation, a pig to manufacture - it was responsible for dragging down the productivity figures of Longbridge, and so on. Musgrove always took the view that it was taking volume away from Metro, too.'
The Metro quite clearly impacted on UK sales of the Mini, and annual production of the car was now down some 100,000 units, despite claims to the contrary by Austin Rover. Sadly, a long hard look at the statistics suggest that most UK Metro sales were not conquests from rival manufacturers but to former Mini owners. This may have aided Austin Rover's finances as the Metro was more profitable, but it did nothing for the groups market share and the need to wean buyers away from rival small car brands, in particular the Mk2 Ford Fiesta which in 1984 overhauled the Metro to become Britain's best selling small car. Back in 1978 when the decision was taken to build both the LC8 Metro and retain the ADO20, did BL management really expect Mini sales to collapse as much as they did? In August 1985 Austin Rover was forced to cut back Metro production as a result of the harsh trading conditions then existing in the now overcrowded small car market.
It was during the mid-1980s that a face from the Mini's past, John Cooper, approached Austin Rover with a proposal to resurrect the Mini Cooper by fitting the MG Metro engine. He was rebuffed by Harold Musgrove, who probably saw such a concept as likely to harm sales of the more profitable MG Metro. However, John Cooper was not to be defeated and began selling tuning kits for 998cc Minis that were exported to Japan.
1986 Was to be a year of trauma for Austin Rover although the Mini was now only a bit player in the ensuing drama. 1985 Had been the first full year when all the new generation cars funded by the taxpayer, courtesy of the Ryder Report had been on sale, and they had fared badly against Ford and Vauxhall opposition in the all important fleet market. This was revealed in January 1986 when the overall UK sales figures for 1985 were published. The Maestro and Montego had failed to excite the fleet buyers, and were now being produced at half the intended rate, while the Metro was ageing and fading fast.
If Austin Rover thought they could challenge Ford and their conservative engineering with a complete family of front wheel drive cars, then they had another thing coming. General Motors and their UK arm Vauxhall had heavily invested in front wheel drive technology with a new generation of engines and transmissions, and it was they, not Alec Issigonis's successors who carried the torch for front wheel drive family cars in the UK, while Volkswagen had a second generation Golf to appeal to continental buyers. The Conservative government under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher decided they were not prepared to fork out millions more in taxpayers money to fund yet another generation of cars that the public might or might not buy, and opened negotiations with Ford to sell them the Austin Rover division of BL.
On 3 February 1986, news of the talks was leaked to the media, possibly by an Austin Rover insider. The government was accused of being unpatriotic and of sabotaging Britain's industrial base and by 6th February, the talks with Ford were broken off. With all the furore over the proposed sell off of Austin Rover to Ford, the landmark event of the production of the five millionth Mini tended to creep under the radar. The date was the 19 February 1986, and the star guest Austin Rover had in attendance was Noel Edmonds...
An Austin Rover spokesman said of the Mini: 'We will continue making them as long as the public wants to buy them.The car was right from the start and no one can really improve on it.' Sir Alec Issigonis, now no longer in the best of health was quoted as saying: 'Don't expect me to be modest about the Mini. I'm very proud that it has run for so many years without a major mechanical change and it still looks like the car we designed. Five million people have bought my Mini and it just goes to show that they have a lot of common sense.'
Rebranding the legend
On 1 May, the Government's frustration with events resulted in the firing of Sir Austin Bide and Ray Horrocks and in their place was appointed Canadian businessman Graham Day as chairman of BL Ltd. In early July, BL Ltd officially changed its name to Rover Group Ltd, and the Anglo-Japanese Rover 800 was launched.
By September Austin Rover was reporting half year losses of £60m. Graham Day decided to take action and sacked senior executives Harold Musgrove and Mark Snowdon and personally took control of running the volume cars division, soon itself to be renamed Rover. Day's model policy was to go further down the road of co-operation with Honda, and that meant the demise of the AR6 Mini/Metro replacement as a cost saving option. It would be easy to condemn the Thatcher government's decision to refuse to back the Austin AR6 as a form of industrial sabotage, for small cars were a Longbridge forte, but it could be argued that one of the consequences of the Maestro/Montego debacle was to severely dent the new management's, and indeed the government's, confidence in Austin Rover's technical ability to alone develop a car the public would want to buy in large numbers.
And with the cost of bringing AR6 to production estimated at a prohibitive £400m, the decision to cancel AR6 was not a hard one to make. The AR6 might have propelled Austin Rover back to the forefront of small car design, but as related earlier, small cars meant small profit margins, and the AR6 would have required huge volume to pay for itself in an overcrowded and ultra competitive sector of the market. As related earlier, back in 1976 BL had hoped to produce 250,000 ADO88s a year to make it viable. In the event LC8 Metro production peaked at 180,763 in 1983 which combined with Mini production of 49,986 produced a total of 230,749, still short of target and using two models, one of which was difficult to build due to the age of its design.
So much ground had been lost by BL/Rover over the previous two decades, that persuading buyers that had defected to rival small car manufacturers to return to the BL/Rover fold and buy the AR6 would have proven extremely difficult. BL's management could be likened to first world war generals- they had continually promised more than they could deliver and eventually exhausted the governments patience. With AR6 cancelled the decision was taken to re-engineer the Metro to take the under development K-Series engine and retain the Mini.
During 1985 and into 1986, Harold Musgrove’s marketing department had spent a great deal of time and money on a massive market research programme into the car-buying public’s perception of the company and its products. When the research was concluded, Graham Day and his canny band of marketing experts seized upon the results with great vigour and found that the wider public held the mistaken belief that the Mini was not in production any more. Those who did know that it was still a production model regarded the Mini with great fondness and warmth. These new findings directly affected Graham Day’s model policy and meant that the humble Mini was granted a stay of execution until at least 1991.
The Metro had now lost its sales appeal which resulted in reduced production and the ability to compete on price with rival superminis. To try and fill the void, the ARG marketing machine would turn to the Mini and exploit its niche brand values and use it to appeal to buyers who would rather have something more individual on their driveway than the latest bland, bottom of the range Eurobox.
What happened next in the story of the Mini was quite remarkable. For the first time since 1980, adverts actually started appearing in the press for the car, headed by the saccharin-coated, 'Minis Have Feelings Too' Christmas campaign at the end of 1986, resulting in a rally in sales. Barry Devney in the 5th February 1987 edition of The Daily Express wrote: 'The Mini has won a reprieve — due to the abiding love of women drivers. It was due to be scrapped next month after 27 years. But market research has shown that women are still clamouring for the snappy little vehicle. So much so, that Minis will roll off the production line until at least 1991 and weekly output will rise from 650 a week to 750.
'Rover Group chairman Graham Day, said research showed that seven out of 10 Mini buyers are city-dwelling women aged 20 to 39. "Women treat their Mini cars with affection and have pet, names for them," said Mr Day. At Christmas , the Rover Group ran the TV advertising campaign, and sales for January jumped to 1200 - 21% up on last year.'
The resultant publicity resulted in Rover Group consultant Sir Alec Issigonis writing to Graham Day with his views on the company's small car programme on 24 February. Although Sir Alec's failing health now meant he was very much detached from modern life and motor industry trends in general, the company's response was harsh to say the least. Issigonis was notified via his solicitor that his consultancy was to be terminated, which subsequently put the great man in straitened financial circumstances as his health worsened and he needed more and more full time care.
Although the Rover publicity machine had only recently publicised the renewed marketing impetus behind the Mini, the termination of Issigonis's consultancy escaped the media spotlight. It has to be said that this was not Graham Day's finest hour, and the treatment Issigonis received was shameful, especially as Rover were to further actively celebrate his iconic creation. But BL/Rover had a history of getting rid of consultants who had done wonders for the Mini, Downton and John Cooper come to mind, and now Sir Alec Issigonis himself joined the list.
After this, many and varied special editions, such as the Mary Quant 'Designer' model and the 'Italian Job' versions – available in red, white and blue – started to appear, no doubt capitalising on the car’s '60s appeal. John Cooper was invited back on board, and from May 1989 his performance kit was available as an optional extra on 998cc Minis.
By now Austin Rover had become Rover Cars as part of Graham Day's upmarket aspirations, and the group had been privatised through its sale to British Aerospace. Graham Day had promoted George Simpson, a Scottish accountant who had joined BLMC back in 1969, as managing director of Rover Cars. The Mini was now officially a Rover.
Sadly on 2 October 1988, Sir Alec Issigonis died. He was 81 years old. Then in July 1989 Moke production in Portugal was halted by Rover cars, although it was to be temporary.
A sign of the renewed marketing impetus being put behind the Mini was the campaign to mark the 30th anniversary of the car in 1989. A 40-second TV commercial was aired, directed by photographer David Bailey and featuring model/actress Twiggy which shamelessly harked back to the cars sixties heyday using monochrome film clips and Thunderclap Newman's 1969 hit Something In The Air as its musical soundtrack. It was all marvellously nostalgic and used to sell the anniversary limited edition Mini 30, which only appeared on a poster in the commercial, with the tag line, 'You never forget your first Mini'. This seemed to mark the end of the era of marketing the Mini as a budget car, and now the emphasis would be on nostalgia, for the Mini was now a classic car still in production.
The 1990s: Cooper comeback
Trying and failing to replace the Mini
There were two very real opportunities to replace the Mini during its life, the first being in 1968. Alec Issigonis, working in semi-retirement, had readied the 9X to replace the Mini, a car that was smaller than his original, but was easier and cheaper to build, arguably more stylish and, amazingly, was more commodious, also incorporating a hatchback rear door. The company never seriously investigated the feasibility of producing this car – by 1968 BMH were deeply embroiled in the merger saga with Leyland Motors and the question of what to do with the poor-selling mid-range cars was far more urgent than the matter of replacing the Mini. In fact, replacing the Mini was seen as a distraction, rather than an essential task to be undertaken. It was easy to point to the Mini and note that it still sold in large numbers at the time, but its non-development also showed a lack of forward planning by the new company’s management.
The non-appearance of the 9X is definitely the saddest of all the missed opportunities in this whole story: had it appeared on the market sometime around 1971-72, it would not only have refined – and redefined – the Mini, but would also have challenged the idea that the supermini should be quite as large as it ended up being by the mid-'70s. In addition, it may well have ultimately had a wider market appeal, but it is certain that the 9X would have been more profitable for the company, as it was cheaper to build. What makes this whole episode all the sadder was that this car was fully engineered by Issigonis and production-ready, all development having been completed.
ADO74 and ADO88 notwithstanding, the other real opportunity to replace the Mini came in 1974 and would have potentially been a very inexpensive and effective operation. During the '60s, one successful deal that BMC concluded was with the Innocenti company in Italy, who agreed terms to build the Mini and ADO16 for European consumption and become a subsidiary of the expanding British car maker. The Innocenti agreement was highly effective and made a fair amount of money for BMC, but by the early '70s, the Italian management approached Bertone to restyle the car in response to the threat from the new wave of hatchbacks, such as the Fiat 127. The Innocenti Mini 90/120 were the result; a smart and pert small range of hatchbacks, the success of which led to the Argentinean industrialist and supercar producer Alejandro de Tomaso buying the company from British Leyland when they were at a particularly low ebb in the mid-1970s.
It is not inconceivable that BL could have also arranged terms with Bertone to use this body in the UK themselves, building it on a much larger scale and thereby producing a stylish (and cheap) supermini for the '70s. In fact, British Leyland did consider producing a version of the Innocenti Mini themselves, because it was modern and at 10ft 3ins was only marginally longer than the original Mini. Harris Mann has since stated that this idea was quickly rejected because Charles Griffin had made it quite clear in 1974 that any replacement for the Mini should be larger inside, and the Bertone design clearly was not. Initial planning had also shown that the Innocenti Mini would prove costly to manufacture – even a run of 5000 a year would not have made financial sense – although these problems could possibly have been overcome. Archives show that Harry Webster was thinking very much along these lines, with his re-bodied Mini styled by Michelotti.
Good times, and bad...
Of course, it must noted that back in the late 1960s and early '70s, the Mini was not regarded with quite the same fondness as it would be in later years, so the time would have been right to make the change and move the original concept forwards. Of course, the company was in a perpetual state of crisis between 1968 and 1980 and as such, did not seriously have the inclination to replace a car that was selling in large numbers. The major crises lay in the mid-range with cars such as the Maxi and Allegro and so, as time passed and the Mini remained in production unaltered, it ceased to be simply an old and inadequate car, and ended up becoming a lovable anachronism that was cherished by people of all ages.
In fact, the Mini’s best year for sales was 1971 (12 years into its life, remember) when 318,475 were built and amazingly, in 1973 it became British Leyland’s best selling car – and would remain so until the launch of the Metro in 1980. The only BL car that could rival the Mini for sales was the Morris Marina, but as that car was designed to compete in the unique to Britain fleet market, unlike the Mini it had little appeal to export markets.
This probably says more about the weakness of the cars in the company’s mid-range line-up than it does about the strength of the Mini, but ironically, as the '70s rolled on, the need to replace the Mini became less and less pressing, as it continued to bolster the sales of the company as a whole. The situation was compounded by the fact that as British Leyland worked on its ADO74 Mini replacement, grappling blindly with the task of replacing the elderly car, the money ran out and the project was scrapped so that it could concentrate on the ADO88.
Enter the Metro... and the Mini's revival
Funnily enough, the emergence of the Metro in 1980 as the new de facto supermini for the company also safeguarded the future of the Mini. Production volumes for the Mini took a fall as people took to the Metro as the new, small BL car, but as Longbridge had been pretty much gutted in a massive modernisation programme in preparation for Metro production, the Mini was also a beneficiary. The Mini continued to roll off the same production line as its bigger brother and benefited from the economies of scale afforded by the new facilities. The 1980 launch of the Metro also marked the point in time when the Mini actually started making real money for the company with its fresh, new A-Plus engine and rationalised range.
Life was quiet for the Mini during the Musgrove years at BL, and as the company became known as Austin-Rover and new cars came on stream such as the, Maestro, Montego and Rover 200, the Mini tended to be quietly forgotten. Harold Musgrove intended for the Mini to finish in 1986-87. According to Simon Weakley, a marketing trainee at Austin Rover between 1982 and 1986, the Austin AR6 would be the reason. He said: 'The AR6 was to be the only car to carry the Austin name, with the Mini set to be discontinued at its launch.'
Business reasoning went completely against the Mini as well, meaning that there should have been no rational reason for continuing its production. One insider put Austin Rover’s dilemma in context: 'it should be realised that there were lots of reasons why Engineers and Manufacturing people wanted to axe it - it was a 1950s design, lots of difficulties with modern legislation, a pig to manufacture - it was responsible for dragging down the productivity figures of Longbridge, and so on. Musgrove always took the view that it was taking volume away from Metro, too.'
The Metro quite clearly impacted on UK sales of the Mini, and annual production of the car was now down some 100,000 units, despite claims to the contrary by Austin Rover. Sadly, a long hard look at the statistics suggest that most UK Metro sales were not conquests from rival manufacturers but to former Mini owners. This may have aided Austin Rover's finances as the Metro was more profitable, but it did nothing for the groups market share and the need to wean buyers away from rival small car brands, in particular the Mk2 Ford Fiesta which in 1984 overhauled the Metro to become Britain's best selling small car. Back in 1978 when the decision was taken to build both the LC8 Metro and retain the ADO20, did BL management really expect Mini sales to collapse as much as they did? In August 1985 Austin Rover was forced to cut back Metro production as a result of the harsh trading conditions then existing in the now overcrowded small car market.
It was during the mid-1980s that a face from the Mini's past, John Cooper, approached Austin Rover with a proposal to resurrect the Mini Cooper by fitting the MG Metro engine. He was rebuffed by Harold Musgrove, who probably saw such a concept as likely to harm sales of the more profitable MG Metro. However, John Cooper was not to be defeated and began selling tuning kits for 998cc Minis that were exported to Japan.
1986 Was to be a year of trauma for Austin Rover although the Mini was now only a bit player in the ensuing drama. 1985 Had been the first full year when all the new generation cars funded by the taxpayer, courtesy of the Ryder Report had been on sale, and they had fared badly against Ford and Vauxhall opposition in the all important fleet market. This was revealed in January 1986 when the overall UK sales figures for 1985 were published. The Maestro and Montego had failed to excite the fleet buyers, and were now being produced at half the intended rate, while the Metro was ageing and fading fast.
If Austin Rover thought they could challenge Ford and their conservative engineering with a complete family of front wheel drive cars, then they had another thing coming. General Motors and their UK arm Vauxhall had heavily invested in front wheel drive technology with a new generation of engines and transmissions, and it was they, not Alec Issigonis's successors who carried the torch for front wheel drive family cars in the UK, while Volkswagen had a second generation Golf to appeal to continental buyers. The Conservative government under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher decided they were not prepared to fork out millions more in taxpayers money to fund yet another generation of cars that the public might or might not buy, and opened negotiations with Ford to sell them the Austin Rover division of BL.
On 3 February 1986, news of the talks was leaked to the media, possibly by an Austin Rover insider. The government was accused of being unpatriotic and of sabotaging Britain's industrial base and by 6th February, the talks with Ford were broken off. With all the furore over the proposed sell off of Austin Rover to Ford, the landmark event of the production of the five millionth Mini tended to creep under the radar. The date was the 19 February 1986, and the star guest Austin Rover had in attendance was Noel Edmonds...
An Austin Rover spokesman said of the Mini: 'We will continue making them as long as the public wants to buy them.The car was right from the start and no one can really improve on it.' Sir Alec Issigonis, now no longer in the best of health was quoted as saying: 'Don't expect me to be modest about the Mini. I'm very proud that it has run for so many years without a major mechanical change and it still looks like the car we designed. Five million people have bought my Mini and it just goes to show that they have a lot of common sense.'
Rebranding the legend
On 1 May, the Government's frustration with events resulted in the firing of Sir Austin Bide and Ray Horrocks and in their place was appointed Canadian businessman Graham Day as chairman of BL Ltd. In early July, BL Ltd officially changed its name to Rover Group Ltd, and the Anglo-Japanese Rover 800 was launched.
By September Austin Rover was reporting half year losses of £60m. Graham Day decided to take action and sacked senior executives Harold Musgrove and Mark Snowdon and personally took control of running the volume cars division, soon itself to be renamed Rover. Day's model policy was to go further down the road of co-operation with Honda, and that meant the demise of the AR6 Mini/Metro replacement as a cost saving option. It would be easy to condemn the Thatcher government's decision to refuse to back the Austin AR6 as a form of industrial sabotage, for small cars were a Longbridge forte, but it could be argued that one of the consequences of the Maestro/Montego debacle was to severely dent the new management's, and indeed the government's, confidence in Austin Rover's technical ability to alone develop a car the public would want to buy in large numbers.
And with the cost of bringing AR6 to production estimated at a prohibitive £400m, the decision to cancel AR6 was not a hard one to make. The AR6 might have propelled Austin Rover back to the forefront of small car design, but as related earlier, small cars meant small profit margins, and the AR6 would have required huge volume to pay for itself in an overcrowded and ultra competitive sector of the market. As related earlier, back in 1976 BL had hoped to produce 250,000 ADO88s a year to make it viable. In the event LC8 Metro production peaked at 180,763 in 1983 which combined with Mini production of 49,986 produced a total of 230,749, still short of target and using two models, one of which was difficult to build due to the age of its design.
So much ground had been lost by BL/Rover over the previous two decades, that persuading buyers that had defected to rival small car manufacturers to return to the BL/Rover fold and buy the AR6 would have proven extremely difficult. BL's management could be likened to first world war generals- they had continually promised more than they could deliver and eventually exhausted the governments patience. With AR6 cancelled the decision was taken to re-engineer the Metro to take the under development K-Series engine and retain the Mini.
During 1985 and into 1986, Harold Musgrove’s marketing department had spent a great deal of time and money on a massive market research programme into the car-buying public’s perception of the company and its products. When the research was concluded, Graham Day and his canny band of marketing experts seized upon the results with great vigour and found that the wider public held the mistaken belief that the Mini was not in production any more. Those who did know that it was still a production model regarded the Mini with great fondness and warmth. These new findings directly affected Graham Day’s model policy and meant that the humble Mini was granted a stay of execution until at least 1991.
The Metro had now lost its sales appeal which resulted in reduced production and the ability to compete on price with rival superminis. To try and fill the void, the ARG marketing machine would turn to the Mini and exploit its niche brand values and use it to appeal to buyers who would rather have something more individual on their driveway than the latest bland, bottom of the range Eurobox.
What happened next in the story of the Mini was quite remarkable. For the first time since 1980, adverts actually started appearing in the press for the car, headed by the saccharin-coated, 'Minis Have Feelings Too' Christmas campaign at the end of 1986, resulting in a rally in sales. Barry Devney in the 5th February 1987 edition of The Daily Express wrote: 'The Mini has won a reprieve — due to the abiding love of women drivers. It was due to be scrapped next month after 27 years. But market research has shown that women are still clamouring for the snappy little vehicle. So much so, that Minis will roll off the production line until at least 1991 and weekly output will rise from 650 a week to 750.
'Rover Group chairman Graham Day, said research showed that seven out of 10 Mini buyers are city-dwelling women aged 20 to 39. "Women treat their Mini cars with affection and have pet, names for them," said Mr Day. At Christmas , the Rover Group ran the TV advertising campaign, and sales for January jumped to 1200 - 21% up on last year.'
The resultant publicity resulted in Rover Group consultant Sir Alec Issigonis writing to Graham Day with his views on the company's small car programme on 24 February. Although Sir Alec's failing health now meant he was very much detached from modern life and motor industry trends in general, the company's response was harsh to say the least. Issigonis was notified via his solicitor that his consultancy was to be terminated, which subsequently put the great man in straitened financial circumstances as his health worsened and he needed more and more full time care.
Although the Rover publicity machine had only recently publicised the renewed marketing impetus behind the Mini, the termination of Issigonis's consultancy escaped the media spotlight. It has to be said that this was not Graham Day's finest hour, and the treatment Issigonis received was shameful, especially as Rover were to further actively celebrate his iconic creation. But BL/Rover had a history of getting rid of consultants who had done wonders for the Mini, Downton and John Cooper come to mind, and now Sir Alec Issigonis himself joined the list.
After this, many and varied special editions, such as the Mary Quant 'Designer' model and the 'Italian Job' versions – available in red, white and blue – started to appear, no doubt capitalising on the car’s '60s appeal. John Cooper was invited back on board, and from May 1989 his performance kit was available as an optional extra on 998cc Minis.
By now Austin Rover had become Rover Cars as part of Graham Day's upmarket aspirations, and the group had been privatised through its sale to British Aerospace. Graham Day had promoted George Simpson, a Scottish accountant who had joined BLMC back in 1969, as managing director of Rover Cars. The Mini was now officially a Rover.
Sadly on 2 October 1988, Sir Alec Issigonis died. He was 81 years old. Then in July 1989 Moke production in Portugal was halted by Rover cars, although it was to be temporary.
A sign of the renewed marketing impetus being put behind the Mini was the campaign to mark the 30th anniversary of the car in 1989. A 40-second TV commercial was aired, directed by photographer David Bailey and featuring model/actress Twiggy which shamelessly harked back to the cars sixties heyday using monochrome film clips and Thunderclap Newman's 1969 hit Something In The Air as its musical soundtrack. It was all marvellously nostalgic and used to sell the anniversary limited edition Mini 30, which only appeared on a poster in the commercial, with the tag line, 'You never forget your first Mini'. This seemed to mark the end of the era of marketing the Mini as a budget car, and now the emphasis would be on nostalgia, for the Mini was now a classic car still in production.
The 1990s: Cooper comeback
1991 Mini Cooper S poses alongside a replica of the '60s Cooper S rally car. Rover boosted Mini salessignificantly by resurrecting the Cooper name and before too long, the Cooper was outselling the standardversion. It is not an exaggeration to say that the decision by management to re-create the Mini Cooper was an inspired move and helped to ensure the survival of the Mini into the twenty-first century. The Mini revival also led to the investment of huge amounts of BMW money into the creation of a replacement for the car – though whether MINI version 2001 is in the spirit of the original is debatable.
In July 1990, the Mini Cooper limited edition was launched. The authorisation for the new generation sporty Mini was given in January 1990, and the limited edition RSP (Rover Special Products) Cooper was a last minute addition to the marketing plan. Mechanical development was farmed out to ERA at Dunstable and the first of the 1990s Mini Coopers was built between 27 April to 3 May 1990. At this time, Rover was on a roll, with the acclaimed R8 second generation 200, and working flat out to satisfy demand. Graham Day's vision of turning Rover into a niche manufacturer seemed to be coming true, and the new Mini Cooper was part of that strategy. Featuring a catalysed 1275cc MG Metro engine, the limited run quickly sold out and a mainstream Mini Cooper was introduced the following September. It made a reappearance in a response to the sales of Cooper kits in Japan and also the management’s knowledge that the Mini was now a very real asset to the range which would sell in big numbers, especially overseas.
In 1990 Longbridge produced 46,045 Minis, of which only 10,067 were sold in the UK. Japan took 12,087, France 8977, Germany 4790 and Italy 2680. Even after the original enthusiasm for the Cooper had waned, Japan still took 8508 Minis in 1993. These were major car markets and the Mini could be used to generate showroom traffic for the new generation of Rover cars. Also in 1990, the original A-Series Metro ceased production to be replaced by the K-Series powered R6 Metro/100. The base 1.3-litre Maestro was now the only other Rover to use the A-Series engine, and there were major differences between them. Rover had now moved on at last from powertrains designed in the BMC era.
Aside from the changes to the Mini Cooper range, which are dealt with in that car's development story, the major change to the standard Mini was the phasing out of the 998cc version in May 1992. A detuned 1275cc engine provided the car's motive power from now on. The base model was now called a Sprite, in honour of another past BMC car, while the Mayfair continued as the higher spec model.
During the 1990s, Mini enthusiasts started to get together to form clubs for social activities involving their favourite car. This thriving scene became worldwide, with Germany, home of so many outstandingly successful cars, including BMW, emerging as one of the most enthusiastic nations in their devotion to the Mini. The Mini became a symbol of Britain, a Britain that perhaps no longer exists, or never existed? And at the same time it has managed to have an international appeal. In April 1991, Portuguese Moke manufacture resumed after the rights had been sold to Italian firm Cagiva. However production halted again in late 1993 and the rights for the Moke now reside in China where bodyshell manufacture has now resumed.
Enter BMW
This re-emergence of the Mini continued unabated and when BMW took the reins of the company in 1994, some very real money was thrown at the Mini in order to maintain its compliance with toughening European noise and emission laws. The idea was that the company could keep the Mini in production as long as they needed to because one of the first decisions about future model plans made by BMW boss Bernd Pischetsrieder, who was in fact a relative of Sir Alec Issigonis, was to produce a replacement for the Mini. Mini along with Land Rover was one of the few brands that survived the British Leyland abyss untarnished.
By this time, marques had become 'brands' in marketing speak. Car buyers had been offered a succession of mass-market cars. Consumers, so the marketing men claimed, trusted any car badged with the name of a successful car, even if the new car was completely unrelated to the outgoing model. BMW was shocked by what it saw as BL/Rover's neglect of their most trusted brand, Mini. Millions of drivers had owned a Mini all over the world and enjoyed the experience, and while they had moved on to more sophisticated cars, the basic Mini had remained in a timewarp of around 1969/70 when wind up windows had arrived. The 9X, Innocenti 90/120, ADO88 and AR6 had all come and gone, but now BMW was in charge and had both the money and the will to develop a new Mini.
If BMW could develop a new Mini with the characteristics that appealed to drivers of the Issigonis car, then they could have a winner on their hands in a growing sector of the market. By this time annual Mini production had slumped to around 20,000 and continued to decline. The nostalgia appeal of the car that had boosted sales in 1989/90 had clearly subsided. When BMW took over Rover, it was being run by John Towers, who left in 1996, a year when Mini production declined further to 15,638. Clearly post 1994 the Mini was living on borrowed time and was kept in production by BMW who wanted a seamless transition from the classic Mini to their new MINI. The car was now bought by diehard enthusiasts who accepted the cars faults from the outset. Being a 1959 design it could not compete with more modern designs in areas such as resistance to corrosion and reliability.
In October 1996, the final version of the Mini emerged, known as the Mk7 - with a front mounted radiator, airbag, even higher gearing, a long option list and optional 13in wheels. All the Minis now had identical tune 63bhp twin point injection engines. Between then and the end of production the Rover Group went through yet another series of traumas culminating in the sale by BMW to Phoenix Venture Holdings in spring 2000, and John Towers returned as boss. The reasons for Rover's decline are myriad, and the media cited the strength of sterling as the prime cause, but rumours circulating in the motor trade that the K-Series engine was less than robust cannot have helped sale to fleet buyers. Engines like the Rover V8 and the A-Series may have been old fashioned, but at least they were bulletproof.
Ironically the Mini outlasted the car originally intended to replace it, the Metro, now named the Rover 100, which ceased production on 23 December 1997. In 1997 Metro/100 production amounted to 40,199 cars, while that of the Mini was 16,938. Although BMW had hiked up the Mini's price, one can't see how they were making money from the car with such low volumes.
By this time BMW's vision of the new MINI had crystallised. The German company had learned from the aborted Mini replacements of the past. Its new car would not be a budget supermini like the Metro and AR6, competing in a cut-throat market with pacific rim superminis and established brands like the Volkswagen Polo, Ford Fiesta and Nissan Micra. BMW's MINI would be a premium priced car that would major on style, build quality and drivability to sell - and history shows the Germans got it right.
The end for the Mini finally came on 4 October 2000. The media and various personalities gathered at Longbridge to see the end of the road for Issigonis's baby. Also attending were surviving members of Alec Issigonis's team. To the Quincy Jones composed soundtrack of the film The Italian Job, the final Mini was driven off the production line in CAB1 by production line supervisor Geoff Powell with singer Lulu in the passenger seat after a production run of 41 years.
The end of Mini production effectively meant the end of CAB1, for despite all the hopes expressed for the future of Longbridge in 2000, the hoped for demand for MG Rover cars failed to materialise, and the building remained empty. The last of 5,378,776 Minis now resides at the British Motor Heritage museum at Gaydon.
In conclusion
So why was the Mini so successful? What was it about the car that enabled it to survive 41 years in production? Why is there such a thriving enthusiasm for a crude and archaic car? Perhaps the answer lies behind the wheel of the car. To put it simply, the Mini is fun to drive and it offers sports car handling in a budget car, and not everybody can afford a supercar.
In terms of the motor industry, the Mini had absolutely enormous repercussions. For the first time in history here was a revolutionary car that BMC could produce, that owed nothing to the designs and ideas of others. In fact, the idea was copied far and wide by all companies that had an interest in producing small, economical cars. The first company to adopt the idea was FIAT, who in 1964 launched the Autobianchi Primula. Like the Mini, the Primula was front-wheel-drive and transverse-engined, but differed from it in one very important respect: the gearbox was attached to the end of the engine, not unlike the experimental Morris Minor replacement that Issigonis was working on in 1952. Dante Giacosa chose this transmission package because he viewed BMC’s gearbox-in-sump arrangement as being unnecessarily complex and expensive to produce. It should, however, be noted that the Autobianchi Primula was somewhat larger than the Mini.
Subsequently, all small cars (with the exception of some Peugeots) have followed the FIAT formula of the transverse-engined, end-on gearbox package, but this does not devalue the genius of Alec Issigonis and his team: in simple terms, Leonard Lord and Alec Issigonis redefined the small car package as they wished it to be, and in doing so, altered the fundamental design of the compact car in much the same way as Henry Ford or Ferry Porsche had altered the concept of car manufacture.
In July 1990, the Mini Cooper limited edition was launched. The authorisation for the new generation sporty Mini was given in January 1990, and the limited edition RSP (Rover Special Products) Cooper was a last minute addition to the marketing plan. Mechanical development was farmed out to ERA at Dunstable and the first of the 1990s Mini Coopers was built between 27 April to 3 May 1990. At this time, Rover was on a roll, with the acclaimed R8 second generation 200, and working flat out to satisfy demand. Graham Day's vision of turning Rover into a niche manufacturer seemed to be coming true, and the new Mini Cooper was part of that strategy. Featuring a catalysed 1275cc MG Metro engine, the limited run quickly sold out and a mainstream Mini Cooper was introduced the following September. It made a reappearance in a response to the sales of Cooper kits in Japan and also the management’s knowledge that the Mini was now a very real asset to the range which would sell in big numbers, especially overseas.
In 1990 Longbridge produced 46,045 Minis, of which only 10,067 were sold in the UK. Japan took 12,087, France 8977, Germany 4790 and Italy 2680. Even after the original enthusiasm for the Cooper had waned, Japan still took 8508 Minis in 1993. These were major car markets and the Mini could be used to generate showroom traffic for the new generation of Rover cars. Also in 1990, the original A-Series Metro ceased production to be replaced by the K-Series powered R6 Metro/100. The base 1.3-litre Maestro was now the only other Rover to use the A-Series engine, and there were major differences between them. Rover had now moved on at last from powertrains designed in the BMC era.
Aside from the changes to the Mini Cooper range, which are dealt with in that car's development story, the major change to the standard Mini was the phasing out of the 998cc version in May 1992. A detuned 1275cc engine provided the car's motive power from now on. The base model was now called a Sprite, in honour of another past BMC car, while the Mayfair continued as the higher spec model.
During the 1990s, Mini enthusiasts started to get together to form clubs for social activities involving their favourite car. This thriving scene became worldwide, with Germany, home of so many outstandingly successful cars, including BMW, emerging as one of the most enthusiastic nations in their devotion to the Mini. The Mini became a symbol of Britain, a Britain that perhaps no longer exists, or never existed? And at the same time it has managed to have an international appeal. In April 1991, Portuguese Moke manufacture resumed after the rights had been sold to Italian firm Cagiva. However production halted again in late 1993 and the rights for the Moke now reside in China where bodyshell manufacture has now resumed.
Enter BMW
This re-emergence of the Mini continued unabated and when BMW took the reins of the company in 1994, some very real money was thrown at the Mini in order to maintain its compliance with toughening European noise and emission laws. The idea was that the company could keep the Mini in production as long as they needed to because one of the first decisions about future model plans made by BMW boss Bernd Pischetsrieder, who was in fact a relative of Sir Alec Issigonis, was to produce a replacement for the Mini. Mini along with Land Rover was one of the few brands that survived the British Leyland abyss untarnished.
By this time, marques had become 'brands' in marketing speak. Car buyers had been offered a succession of mass-market cars. Consumers, so the marketing men claimed, trusted any car badged with the name of a successful car, even if the new car was completely unrelated to the outgoing model. BMW was shocked by what it saw as BL/Rover's neglect of their most trusted brand, Mini. Millions of drivers had owned a Mini all over the world and enjoyed the experience, and while they had moved on to more sophisticated cars, the basic Mini had remained in a timewarp of around 1969/70 when wind up windows had arrived. The 9X, Innocenti 90/120, ADO88 and AR6 had all come and gone, but now BMW was in charge and had both the money and the will to develop a new Mini.
If BMW could develop a new Mini with the characteristics that appealed to drivers of the Issigonis car, then they could have a winner on their hands in a growing sector of the market. By this time annual Mini production had slumped to around 20,000 and continued to decline. The nostalgia appeal of the car that had boosted sales in 1989/90 had clearly subsided. When BMW took over Rover, it was being run by John Towers, who left in 1996, a year when Mini production declined further to 15,638. Clearly post 1994 the Mini was living on borrowed time and was kept in production by BMW who wanted a seamless transition from the classic Mini to their new MINI. The car was now bought by diehard enthusiasts who accepted the cars faults from the outset. Being a 1959 design it could not compete with more modern designs in areas such as resistance to corrosion and reliability.
In October 1996, the final version of the Mini emerged, known as the Mk7 - with a front mounted radiator, airbag, even higher gearing, a long option list and optional 13in wheels. All the Minis now had identical tune 63bhp twin point injection engines. Between then and the end of production the Rover Group went through yet another series of traumas culminating in the sale by BMW to Phoenix Venture Holdings in spring 2000, and John Towers returned as boss. The reasons for Rover's decline are myriad, and the media cited the strength of sterling as the prime cause, but rumours circulating in the motor trade that the K-Series engine was less than robust cannot have helped sale to fleet buyers. Engines like the Rover V8 and the A-Series may have been old fashioned, but at least they were bulletproof.
Ironically the Mini outlasted the car originally intended to replace it, the Metro, now named the Rover 100, which ceased production on 23 December 1997. In 1997 Metro/100 production amounted to 40,199 cars, while that of the Mini was 16,938. Although BMW had hiked up the Mini's price, one can't see how they were making money from the car with such low volumes.
By this time BMW's vision of the new MINI had crystallised. The German company had learned from the aborted Mini replacements of the past. Its new car would not be a budget supermini like the Metro and AR6, competing in a cut-throat market with pacific rim superminis and established brands like the Volkswagen Polo, Ford Fiesta and Nissan Micra. BMW's MINI would be a premium priced car that would major on style, build quality and drivability to sell - and history shows the Germans got it right.
The end for the Mini finally came on 4 October 2000. The media and various personalities gathered at Longbridge to see the end of the road for Issigonis's baby. Also attending were surviving members of Alec Issigonis's team. To the Quincy Jones composed soundtrack of the film The Italian Job, the final Mini was driven off the production line in CAB1 by production line supervisor Geoff Powell with singer Lulu in the passenger seat after a production run of 41 years.
The end of Mini production effectively meant the end of CAB1, for despite all the hopes expressed for the future of Longbridge in 2000, the hoped for demand for MG Rover cars failed to materialise, and the building remained empty. The last of 5,378,776 Minis now resides at the British Motor Heritage museum at Gaydon.
In conclusion
So why was the Mini so successful? What was it about the car that enabled it to survive 41 years in production? Why is there such a thriving enthusiasm for a crude and archaic car? Perhaps the answer lies behind the wheel of the car. To put it simply, the Mini is fun to drive and it offers sports car handling in a budget car, and not everybody can afford a supercar.
In terms of the motor industry, the Mini had absolutely enormous repercussions. For the first time in history here was a revolutionary car that BMC could produce, that owed nothing to the designs and ideas of others. In fact, the idea was copied far and wide by all companies that had an interest in producing small, economical cars. The first company to adopt the idea was FIAT, who in 1964 launched the Autobianchi Primula. Like the Mini, the Primula was front-wheel-drive and transverse-engined, but differed from it in one very important respect: the gearbox was attached to the end of the engine, not unlike the experimental Morris Minor replacement that Issigonis was working on in 1952. Dante Giacosa chose this transmission package because he viewed BMC’s gearbox-in-sump arrangement as being unnecessarily complex and expensive to produce. It should, however, be noted that the Autobianchi Primula was somewhat larger than the Mini.
Subsequently, all small cars (with the exception of some Peugeots) have followed the FIAT formula of the transverse-engined, end-on gearbox package, but this does not devalue the genius of Alec Issigonis and his team: in simple terms, Leonard Lord and Alec Issigonis redefined the small car package as they wished it to be, and in doing so, altered the fundamental design of the compact car in much the same way as Henry Ford or Ferry Porsche had altered the concept of car manufacture.
A case of limited development
Park a Mini of 1959 next to a Mini of 1999 and you would not see a radically different car, but you would see one that had been the subject of significant and ongoing development:
1960
Range expanded to incorporate estate versions.
1961
The first Mini-Coopers appeared.Riley and Wolseley booted versions introduced.introduction of Porsche Baulk ring Synchro.
1964
Hydrolastic suspension incorporated, and then dropped in 1969.
1966
Wind-up side windows incorporated on Riley/Wolseley models.
1968
Synchromesh replaced and gear-change improved by having synchro on first gear.
1969
Clubman version added, incorporating Maxi-like front-end styling.Wind-up windows incorporated on the rest of the range.
1971
1275GT Clubman-based model now the only sporting version after the Cooper S is discontinued.
1973
Dynamo replaced by alternator for the electrical system.
1976
Rubber mounting for the front subframe, to improve driveline “snatchiness”.
1980
A-Plus engine added, cars now built on Metro production line, Clubmans dropped.
1984
Wheel diameter increased to 12" in order to accommodate larger brakes.
1987
Special editions start to appear thick and fast.
1990
Cooper re-introduced.
1992
Lamm convertible version launched, Longbridge versions appear in '93.
2000
Production halted.
2001
MINI launched, but is it the car the British would have produced?
estratto da: http://austin-rover.co.uk/index.htm?ado15indexf.htm
Park a Mini of 1959 next to a Mini of 1999 and you would not see a radically different car, but you would see one that had been the subject of significant and ongoing development:
1960
Range expanded to incorporate estate versions.
1961
The first Mini-Coopers appeared.Riley and Wolseley booted versions introduced.introduction of Porsche Baulk ring Synchro.
1964
Hydrolastic suspension incorporated, and then dropped in 1969.
1966
Wind-up side windows incorporated on Riley/Wolseley models.
1968
Synchromesh replaced and gear-change improved by having synchro on first gear.
1969
Clubman version added, incorporating Maxi-like front-end styling.Wind-up windows incorporated on the rest of the range.
1971
1275GT Clubman-based model now the only sporting version after the Cooper S is discontinued.
1973
Dynamo replaced by alternator for the electrical system.
1976
Rubber mounting for the front subframe, to improve driveline “snatchiness”.
1980
A-Plus engine added, cars now built on Metro production line, Clubmans dropped.
1984
Wheel diameter increased to 12" in order to accommodate larger brakes.
1987
Special editions start to appear thick and fast.
1990
Cooper re-introduced.
1992
Lamm convertible version launched, Longbridge versions appear in '93.
2000
Production halted.
2001
MINI launched, but is it the car the British would have produced?
estratto da: http://austin-rover.co.uk/index.htm?ado15indexf.htm
Post
Nessun commento:
Posta un commento