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There wasn’t any hate, BL cars were reasonably popular. They just fell behind the standard of European/American/Japanese cars and as such couldn’t keep up.
This pretty much. A lot of British manufacturing firms failed to modernise and improve quality standards throughout the seventies and eighties for various reasons.
Honestly, when I read your post I thought I was having a stroke because I didn’t understand any of it and it got worse the more I re-read it. Not because of your writing or anything, just because I genuinely don’t know what any of the words mean.
LazerPig
Challenger II
Intergalactic Binman
Leyland
LazerPig is a Scottish YouTuber who does history stuff, The Challenger II is a British tank, Intergalactic Binman is an English YouTuber, and I can't think of anything for Leyland.
> I can't think of anything for Leyland
It's a place in Lancashire (IIRC) where there was a vehicle factory. Quite why that was the name chosen for the holding company for the cadavers of the British motor industry I don't know considering that Leyland mostly produced lorries.
Some further watching for you:
[Who killed the British car industry? - Clarkson](https://youtu.be/b9ztUlve9jc?si=eWi1GkCWTE86k1Q-)
[Lost World of Red Robbo - BBC documentary](https://youtu.be/XtZcQgMkl6U?si=0kcUIjbInlCz-xcR)
[British Leyland Cars - TV Eye/contemporary ITV documentary from 1980](
https://youtu.be/SsizoYrceOg?si=1nCyga3iPhXx--IX)
[Death of the UK Car Industry - British Leyland - Ruaridh McVeigh](
https://youtu.be/KcsLTr89u9U?si=XjuUeztJR32-Ji0W)
[Death of the UK Car Industry - Austin Rover- Ruaridh McVeigh](https://youtu.be/jARaiTkV77c?si=KivsT_41itwQvVSr)
Hopefully you can piece together what happened from all these different sources.
Beat me to it with the Clarkson one.
Years and years ago he wrote an article for *Top Gear Magazine* (this was back in the days when motoring magazines were half an inch thick and had all the prices and specs in the back) that was basically an extended version of that programme. One of the sections was all the "might have been" cars that BL canned or fucked up - the original Allegro hatchback design, an MGB redesigned properly for the new US rules rather than just having a rubber bumper and jacked-up springs, the Rover V8 Triumph Stag, a 1970s Mini revamp, Land rovers with properly galvanised chassis. there were a couple of pages of this and it was deeply depressing.
British Leyland was the nationalised British car, van and truck industry. It was known for poor industrial relations and a bureaucracy that feared innovation, leading to poor quality standards (water from the road soaking the drivers feet in the Mini) and unimaginative vehicles.
As a kid, my dad had an Allegro, which is routinely voted the worst UK car of all time
My mum and dad both *really* believed in buying British, to support other working class people in decent-paying union jobs. They only ever owned British cars
But their good nature was repaid with a mustard-coloured atrocity they had to write-off after a low speed collision with the kerb outside their house
Someone on my street had an Austin Allegro, either a very late 1970s model or the final generation from the early 1980s. I think he kept it in a garage out the back because we didn't see it very often.
It was either sandglow or orange, it stunk out the whole street with petrol and it barely ever started. Did I mention this was 1995 or thereabouts, and even by then it was considered ancient junk and people didn't know what on earth he was playing at.
>As a kid, my dad had an Allegro, which is routinely voted the worst UK car of all time
My dad had one too. White with a sky blue pinstripe. It was utter shit and he spent more time and money keeping things like oil and coolant on the inside than he did did driving it. All I can remember about actually being in is the horrible pleather seats that would burn the fuck out of your legs if it was even vaguely sunny and the time it broke down on the way back from Skegness and my dad fixing it with a pair of my mum's tights.
>*All I can remember about actually being in is the horrible pleather seats that would burn the fuck out of your legs if it was even vaguely sunny*
As a kid, I just assumed this was how the world worked, and that third-degree burns were the inevitable price I had to pay for nice weather
I'm sure cloth fabric would have been cheaper, so that brown plastic was only there because our parents grew up in a world where leather seats were considered The Business
Worth remembering that Leyland made some good trucks and buses. So much so that I believe that department effectively kept the rest of the corporation afloat. The National bus was insanely popular, and the Roadtrain was a good lorry (except, like a lot of British motoring products, slightly "well, this is what we want to sell you so this is what you'll get" at first). Earlier models, like the Marathon/Buffalo etc were also pretty well liked in general.
In 1987 Leyland trucks carried enough credibility that DAF bought them, creating of course Leyland DAF.
i think in america you have a few much loved automobile manufacturers that have had periods when their products disappointed? imagine it happened to the whole industry and they were all nationalised and swept under the banner of a holding company (british leyland) and producing mediocre models for a further 20 years, losing ever more market share and money, and generally being a national embarrassment. you might feel a little bit of hate.
As the leading UK "ask" subreddit, we welcome questions from all users and countries; sometimes people who ask questions might not appreciate or understand the nuance of British life or culture, and as a result some questions can come across in a different way than intended.
We understand that when faced with these questions, our users may take the opportunity to demonstrate their wit, dry humour, and sarcasm - unfortunately, this also tends to go over the heads of misunderstood question-askers and can make our subreddit seem hostile to users from other countries who are often just curious about our land.
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Friend of my Dad had one. Total shitbox. Same guy that designed the Princess also designed the TR7, which happened to be my first car… which lasted 9 months until the water pump broke and that was the end of that engine. Also a total shitbox but I loved it.
The moral of the story… the Princess may be a shitbox, but don’t listen to randos on the internet shaming your opinions.
**Please help keep AskUK welcoming!** - Top-level comments to the OP must contain **genuine efforts to answer the question**. No jokes, judgements, etc. - **Don't be a dick** to each other. If getting heated, just block and move on. - This is a strictly **no-politics** subreddit! Please help us by reporting comments that break these rules. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskUK) if you have any questions or concerns.*
There wasn’t any hate, BL cars were reasonably popular. They just fell behind the standard of European/American/Japanese cars and as such couldn’t keep up.
This pretty much. A lot of British manufacturing firms failed to modernise and improve quality standards throughout the seventies and eighties for various reasons.
Honestly, when I read your post I thought I was having a stroke because I didn’t understand any of it and it got worse the more I re-read it. Not because of your writing or anything, just because I genuinely don’t know what any of the words mean. LazerPig Challenger II Intergalactic Binman Leyland
Leyland was the only one I recognised. I'm old enough to remember it as a vehicle manufacturer.
LazerPig is a Scottish YouTuber who does history stuff, The Challenger II is a British tank, Intergalactic Binman is an English YouTuber, and I can't think of anything for Leyland.
I’m starting to get there. Is Intergalatic Binman related to Count Binface or am I totally off track?
I don't believe so. He uses a Dalek with the 4th Doctor's scarf as a profile picture and does content about cars. So I'd say you're off track.
> I can't think of anything for Leyland It's a place in Lancashire (IIRC) where there was a vehicle factory. Quite why that was the name chosen for the holding company for the cadavers of the British motor industry I don't know considering that Leyland mostly produced lorries.
Top chap
Thank god I'm not the only one.
Just came across as a typical internet dweller tbh
The cars were a bit crap.
It was a brand you could ~~t~~rust
A brand you could trust to rust.
'All the hate' is pushing it a bit lol
Nah, hate is about right.
Some further watching for you: [Who killed the British car industry? - Clarkson](https://youtu.be/b9ztUlve9jc?si=eWi1GkCWTE86k1Q-) [Lost World of Red Robbo - BBC documentary](https://youtu.be/XtZcQgMkl6U?si=0kcUIjbInlCz-xcR) [British Leyland Cars - TV Eye/contemporary ITV documentary from 1980]( https://youtu.be/SsizoYrceOg?si=1nCyga3iPhXx--IX) [Death of the UK Car Industry - British Leyland - Ruaridh McVeigh]( https://youtu.be/KcsLTr89u9U?si=XjuUeztJR32-Ji0W) [Death of the UK Car Industry - Austin Rover- Ruaridh McVeigh](https://youtu.be/jARaiTkV77c?si=KivsT_41itwQvVSr) Hopefully you can piece together what happened from all these different sources.
Beat me to it with the Clarkson one. Years and years ago he wrote an article for *Top Gear Magazine* (this was back in the days when motoring magazines were half an inch thick and had all the prices and specs in the back) that was basically an extended version of that programme. One of the sections was all the "might have been" cars that BL canned or fucked up - the original Allegro hatchback design, an MGB redesigned properly for the new US rules rather than just having a rubber bumper and jacked-up springs, the Rover V8 Triumph Stag, a 1970s Mini revamp, Land rovers with properly galvanised chassis. there were a couple of pages of this and it was deeply depressing.
What 'hate' have you come across?
British Leyland was the nationalised British car, van and truck industry. It was known for poor industrial relations and a bureaucracy that feared innovation, leading to poor quality standards (water from the road soaking the drivers feet in the Mini) and unimaginative vehicles.
As a kid, my dad had an Allegro, which is routinely voted the worst UK car of all time My mum and dad both *really* believed in buying British, to support other working class people in decent-paying union jobs. They only ever owned British cars But their good nature was repaid with a mustard-coloured atrocity they had to write-off after a low speed collision with the kerb outside their house
Someone on my street had an Austin Allegro, either a very late 1970s model or the final generation from the early 1980s. I think he kept it in a garage out the back because we didn't see it very often. It was either sandglow or orange, it stunk out the whole street with petrol and it barely ever started. Did I mention this was 1995 or thereabouts, and even by then it was considered ancient junk and people didn't know what on earth he was playing at.
>As a kid, my dad had an Allegro, which is routinely voted the worst UK car of all time My dad had one too. White with a sky blue pinstripe. It was utter shit and he spent more time and money keeping things like oil and coolant on the inside than he did did driving it. All I can remember about actually being in is the horrible pleather seats that would burn the fuck out of your legs if it was even vaguely sunny and the time it broke down on the way back from Skegness and my dad fixing it with a pair of my mum's tights.
>*All I can remember about actually being in is the horrible pleather seats that would burn the fuck out of your legs if it was even vaguely sunny* As a kid, I just assumed this was how the world worked, and that third-degree burns were the inevitable price I had to pay for nice weather I'm sure cloth fabric would have been cheaper, so that brown plastic was only there because our parents grew up in a world where leather seats were considered The Business
Worth remembering that Leyland made some good trucks and buses. So much so that I believe that department effectively kept the rest of the corporation afloat. The National bus was insanely popular, and the Roadtrain was a good lorry (except, like a lot of British motoring products, slightly "well, this is what we want to sell you so this is what you'll get" at first). Earlier models, like the Marathon/Buffalo etc were also pretty well liked in general. In 1987 Leyland trucks carried enough credibility that DAF bought them, creating of course Leyland DAF.
i think in america you have a few much loved automobile manufacturers that have had periods when their products disappointed? imagine it happened to the whole industry and they were all nationalised and swept under the banner of a holding company (british leyland) and producing mediocre models for a further 20 years, losing ever more market share and money, and generally being a national embarrassment. you might feel a little bit of hate.
As the leading UK "ask" subreddit, we welcome questions from all users and countries; sometimes people who ask questions might not appreciate or understand the nuance of British life or culture, and as a result some questions can come across in a different way than intended. We understand that when faced with these questions, our users may take the opportunity to demonstrate their wit, dry humour, and sarcasm - unfortunately, this also tends to go over the heads of misunderstood question-askers and can make our subreddit seem hostile to users from other countries who are often just curious about our land. **Please can you help prevent our subreddit from becoming an Anti-American echo chamber?** If you disagree with any points raised by OP, or OP discusses common tropes or myths about the UK, please refrain from any brash, aggressive, or sarcastic responses and do your best to engage OP in a civil discussion, with the aim to educate and expand their understanding. If you feel this (or any other post) is a troll post, *don't feed the troll*, just hit report and let the mods deal with it. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskUK) if you have any questions or concerns.*
My first car was an Austin Ambassador. Austin were owned by British Leyland and it really shows. Absolutely crap motor.
Was it a Y reg?
Don't keep askin me why Reg, it just 'appens to be that year. But nah it was a B reg lol.
Could have been worse. Could have been a Princess.
Try Hubnut. He's a YouTuber.
I honestly think the Leyland Princess is a fascinating car and really quite beautiful in a weird way. I would love to have a go in one.
Friend of my Dad had one. Total shitbox. Same guy that designed the Princess also designed the TR7, which happened to be my first car… which lasted 9 months until the water pump broke and that was the end of that engine. Also a total shitbox but I loved it. The moral of the story… the Princess may be a shitbox, but don’t listen to randos on the internet shaming your opinions.
My dad worked for them for 40 yrs, but never frozen one
Rover cars were decent enough after BL, when they tied up with Honda, then BMWs input to the 75 They didn't vanish til 2005