I am forever proud to say My Grandfather was an Engineer at the B,A,C, Filton.!

Came here from Jay Leno's Video about the Bristol 403. Leonard Setright exceeded all my expectations on a excentric british author and journalist.

@watsisbuttndo829

3 жыл бұрын

Same here! The image and the audio on Leonard are just not matching up at all, brilliant!

@gulfstream7235

3 жыл бұрын

@@watsisbuttndo829 Remember reading his column in Car magazine back in the late 80's, couldn't make head nor tails of it, alas, I was only 8yrs of age. Quite a character...

@flappospammo

3 жыл бұрын

Had his own Black Russian cigarettes specifically made for him

@borderlands6606

3 жыл бұрын

@@gulfstream7235 He wrote for Bike magazine in the 1970s. Pearls before swine given the demographic, I loved his column.

@deanstevenson6527

3 жыл бұрын

Australian....Setright was an Ocker!

Funny to see the production team all wearing ties. My Dad was in a coach building company in Switzerland during the Fifties. Pictures show that the entire team was wearing their ties. Nowadays it is hard to imagine a guy hammering and welding on a car with a tie on. That shows how proud and committed those workers were. An how much higher the quality of the exclusive cars was back in the day. I like the classy British cars of the old days. But I must admit I come from a family who drove mainly Italian cars: Alfa Romeos, Maseratis and such. In my region they had 4 different coach building companies. All of their former locacions can be reached in less than 20 minutes. A lot of the cars they built their bodies for were British: Alvis, AC, Bristols, Jaguars and more.

Gem of a video. As well as the cars and the people involved with the brand we get to hear LKJ Setright

Bristol made some true gems; once in a while hitting on a classicaly lovely body design to go with the mechanical parts.

Mr Crook, an uncommon gentleman. Bristol cars, a most uncommon marque!

Love their quirkiness and originality

@GaylordBuzzard

3 жыл бұрын

That also describes Setright.

I have only just come across this lovely film. What a lot of memories and interesting talks from so many people.

My dad had a Bristol and a Riley, I would love one

Always my dream cars since I was a kid.

A beautiful car, quintessentially British, built for people with deep pockets and a stiff upper lip. Their craving for perfection finally lead them to the liquidation in May of this year.

@mowbraybird

3 жыл бұрын

So sorry to hear this.

@harryeisermann2784

3 жыл бұрын

stolen technology after WW2 winners justice, and went bankrupt

@stanthology

3 жыл бұрын

@@harryeisermann2784 Correct.

@harryeisermann2784

3 жыл бұрын

nothing left of British car industry, now Brexit will kill the last incentive, zero left , all gone, only nostalgy left

@horatiohornblower868

3 жыл бұрын

harry eisermann Or just the opposite. Brexit could induce the incentive to build another of these genuine British cars, or motorbikes, or whatever vehicle fantasy can think of. Do not despair, every cloud has a silver lining!

The 403 was considered the most beautiful model Bristol ever built.

A small anecdote...a number of years ago, probably early 2000s, a local friend visited me at home in Surrey with his brother. His brother was a noted collector and the car they arrived in was SMT 259, one of only two Farina bodied Bristol 400 cabriolets...certainly one of the most desirable Bristols ever made. Unfortunately the car wouldn’t restart...I think they flooded it..remember that?...but it is a beautiful car. A bit of simple searching reveals that it came up for auction in 2016 at Sotheby’s in Monaco, but fell way short of the pre-auction estimate, only achieving €224,000. I think it remained with my friend’s brother at least for a time after that. Certainly the rarest and most desirable car I ever had on any driveway of mine.

Classy cars and gentlemen, great video

Very good... Excellent cars!

Glorious cars!

A different level of exclusivity.

They were lovely cars

An England altogether gone now. Very sadly.

@bighands69

3 жыл бұрын

Not completely gone if the people just had belief in them self all the craziness would go away very rapidly and there would be more tradition.

Had a soft spot since as a titch in the 1950s I got a Dinky Toys model of a Bristol (might have been a 450) Coupé Le Mans racer in BRG with a white spot on each door with a black number 20, the Grand Prix Cooper Bristol was soon added. although I have many models in my collection, those two sadly went astray over the years though I found a beaten up coupé on eBay which sits in the cabinet. I obviously didn’t understand that their saloon cars owed virtually so much to a German (also initially an aero engine maker) manufacturer being so young, as far as I knew it was just wonderful thing. And, ah, the Kensington showroom, many were the times as an adult I’ve had my nose against the window lusting at the cars just as I had as a kiddie at a toy shop hankering after those Dinky Toys. Great to see LJKS waxing lyrical about his favourite marque too, it’s yet another tragedy and symptomatic of the modern age that these marvellous specialist motor manufacturers have been lost, if there had been any justice Bristol, AC, Jensen and all of the others should be thriving, Bristol in particular. Roll on Euro millions, I’d be looking for one of each model iteration!

@mjh5437

2 жыл бұрын

Me too,I grew up in Addison Road in the 1960s-70s so I used to pass that Kensington showroom every day of my life and drooooool!!!!!

Does anyone know the connection between Bristol Cars and Bristol Commercial Vehicles? They certainly shared the same 'script' logo for a time.

The British were so refined

@AtheistOrphan

3 жыл бұрын

Some of us still are!🇬🇧

Very nice video. So much history. Wish these marques would be revived properly.

@tedzehnder961

3 ай бұрын

The Chinese ant farm will be making your car.

The late Dave Martin of Martin Audio loved these; at his workshops in Stanhope St, London, were a couple of non-runners. He offered me the 403 he had for £400 - owing to it having a Buick V8 instead of the original engine - but I had to pass on it after much consideration. I regret not taking the chance now, that was a couple of week's wages back then.

A unique marque an a unique man makes of this footage what to myself sums up as the Holy Grail of automotive media.

Love the 403's BMW based engines!

@harryeisermann2784

3 жыл бұрын

yes at least they didnt brake down English technology, what a joke?

They folded last year, very sad.

Interesting to see Long John Kickstart complete with comedy beard.

@johncheston5862

3 жыл бұрын

He was an Orthodox Jew.

@silvereith

3 жыл бұрын

@@johncheston5862 Thanks for that. I misjudged the man ..... I thought it was just for effect.

@rabbimarkg

3 жыл бұрын

I remember an article in Car in the early 80’s where LJK Setright in the photos was wearing his Cippah and Tzitzit proudly (ritual clothing of an observant Jew).

@RobertSmith-jl4yw

Жыл бұрын

@@johncheston5862 Also a fine clarinet player, and founded a well known orchestra - not so well known that I can remember the name offhand! Anything written by L.J.K. Setright is worth reading. He had very strong views on road wheels and steering wheels - he liked neither. If you have in you book collections any of the Automobile Club of Italy "World Cars" Volumes (by year), the commentary on the British car industry is written by him, and are perfect examples of his writing (he hated being called a Journalist).

@johncheston5862

Жыл бұрын

Was it the Philharmonia Chorus, which I believe he co-founded in 1957?

I`ve seen Noel Gallagher of Oasis cruising around North London in one of these.

@Kinematographer

2 жыл бұрын

That just devalued them drastically then:(

They missed out on the 603, from which the named cars were developed from? ..................................................................Did Mr Setright play guitar with ZZ Top?

@johncheston5862

3 жыл бұрын

No, the clarinet was his instrument of choice.

@mjh5437

2 жыл бұрын

@@johncheston5862 Or perhaps the pink oboe.😂

I wonder if they had a union that went on strike.

Jay Leno's car has a speedometer in KM/Hr and an odometer in KM. Jay did not address this quirk in his video, and I speculated that the car was bought by a European customer. Can anyone shed light on this?

Very interesting vid - shame about the audio. My hearis quite bad, but even using hi quality headphones, I understand only small bits of the commentary - shame.

i love the BMW looking ones

@beachcomber2008

3 жыл бұрын

Aesthetics was never very important. With the Grmans, it was. The more 'modern' they became, the more hideous they looked.

I sold my 401 (NWY609) a few years back. I would love to catch up with it if anyone has seen it?

Wish they had gone into the reasoning that led to the adoption of Chrysler V8 engine and automatic gearbox. It seems to me an excellent choice, smooth powerful and long lived, at a lower cost than the hand built engine and box it replaced. But it must have been a difficult decision at the time.

@oregongaper

3 жыл бұрын

They had expanded the six as far as was possible within the tooling for it, going from 2 to 3.8 litres. The 400 series cars were big and they needed more power, or really more torque. They started with a 318 and progressed fairly quickly to the big block 383 and I think you could get a 440 in the later series.

@mrdanforth3744

3 жыл бұрын

@@oregongaper The Chrysler engines with the excellent Torqueflite auto box were about the best choice at the time for that kind of car. Smooth, powerful, long lived, reliable, and economical for such a large powerful car. They must have cost a small fraction of what the hand built six cost. The big drawback was the greater bulk and weight of the large displacement V8.

Are there any Bristol clubs in the USA?

Don't pummel me, but their styling reminds me of Volvos of similar eras.

You know the phrase, He drives like he owns the road". If he's in a Bristol, he probably DOES own the road. Bristols are for people who regard Rolls Royces as cars for the hoi polloi.

@davekennedy6315

2 жыл бұрын

Ray BLOODY Purchase!

@raypurchase801

2 жыл бұрын

@@davekennedy6315 Is that you, Clem?

With some help from ZZ top

@banjopete

3 жыл бұрын

Johnny come latelys.

There was a Bristol in that Lesbian Vampire movie Starring that Ingrid Pitt woman.

3 cars a week? That's because the workers were getting paid, 14 pounds 10 shillings and 6 pence a week...

Less! Is More!

They look nice for sure, very British, very gentry, but the old Jaguars beat them when it comes to styling / design, as far as I'm concerned. Exclusivity alone is not a really strong argument. But no idea about the technical reliability of Bristol compared to Jaguar. Having said that, the Bristol Beaufighter "whispering death" plane was one of the coolest looking of the war. I loooove that design.

@ 0:47 - Arthur C Clarke at his computer?

How thoroughly British.

Notwithstanding the superb engineering, everything after the 407 was either bland or just plain ugly.

@SB-pf5rc

2 жыл бұрын

the Fighter would have a word with you

Looking back nostalgically, stuck in their ways, refusing to adapt, believing that the phrase 'handbuilt' is a good thing and ending in bankruptcy. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you British car manufacturing.

Bristol s weak story, stolen technology, BMW survived. Bristol Bankrupt. stands for British technology

Pug ugly, every one of them, ghastly ugly things. Sorry, (they sound good though).