Some of the history behind the need for a new club

[Bristolian]

Hi fellow Bristol owners

It is with great reluctance that I enter into the political scoring that has been going on behind the scenes now for many months. So I would, for my part, like to put the record straight and to explain why I have been active in forming Bristol Owners & Drivers Association (BODA) especially as, like Bob Weafer, I am one of the longest standing BOC members, joining in 1976.

I am in 3 other car clubs (sad is it not) and BOC is, by far, the least active in assisting the membership in keeping their cars on the road. To this end, in late 2008, David Allen pointed out that one of the BOC committee members had two roles ie Events Co-ordinator and Spares/Service Co-ordinator. David, knowing my background, suggested I offer to take on the role of Spares/Service Co-ordinator. To clarify my background, I worked for 37 years for a major car manufacturer in numerous engineering roles encompassing vehicle design, durability testing and manufacturing techniques. The last 20 years I was involved worldwide in the procurement of short run prototype and pre-production components covering the entire spectrum from an engine to a windscreen. I sent an email on 6 March 2009 offering my interest in supporting the BOC as Spares/Service Co-ordinator I received a swift reply thanking me for my offer and that the current post holder would be notified of it. I have never received a formal response. To expand this further, in November 2008 at our monthly meeting, it was suggested that I construct a website concentrating on spares and servicing information. So Bob Weafer and I constructed the now current BODA website.

Having constructed this site with the bulk of the work being done by Bob Weafer over many months, I sent an email to the Chairman in February offering the website to BOC for free use by all members and Bristol Cars Services Ltd for a maintenance fee of £200 p.a. (please find attached email).

To date, I have never even received a response. In early April, I telephoned the Chairman who stated that this was a particularly difficult issue as the payment of any monies must be seen to benefit the entire membership so would only benefit those who have a computer.

Accepting this as a valid reason, the question I would like answered is this. Can the committee explain how the subsidising of the Chairman’s Dinner at RAC Pall Mall, meets this criteria?

How I see this issue is that, in round figures, the RAC event attracts around 100 attendees. I conservatively estimate that a maximum of 65 of these are actual members, the others are spouses, friends. So how does the subsidising (over some years) of thousands of pounds (this last year £500) “benefit the entire membership”?

I have absolutely no problem with those members who wish to attend these types of expensive events and wish them all a super time. However, it is morally unacceptable to those members who genuinely cannot afford this type of event for it to be subsidised.

So I will be joining the new club BODA and have volunteered initially to become Spares and Technical Support officer. I am already in regular contact with Bristol Cars Services Ltd helping Brian Marelli find parts and using my contacts to enable Brian Marelli to procure newly manufactured parts. I would respectfully ask you to view our website (Bristol Owners & Drivers Association Ltd.) and look to see if it is of use to you and would request any shortcomings and improvements you see that you email Bob Weafer with them.

Please do not see BODA as a split in the BOC. Our intentions are to provide services that are not available within the BOC.

John Lawley
BOC Member

Bristol car spares data website
Saturday, 13 February, 2010 23:17
From:
"John Lawley" <lawleyjr@yahoo.co.uk>
Add sender to Contacts
To:
chairman@boc.net
Geoffrey
I understand that you and the Club Committee, in general, were enthusiastic about the new website raised by Bob Weafer and myself.
Originally, we were going to run this site and fund it ourselves. This would be a website independent from the Bristol Owners Club. We have reflected on this somewhat and would like to suggest the following:-
The Bristol Owners Club pays £200 per annum to fund the website. We will issue a password, changed annually, for all BOC members to gain access. Bob Weafer and I will retain the ownership and expand and maintain the site. We have, over the last 12 months, collected a great deal of data which has still to be added. Anyone outside of the Club will be charged a fee (yet to be determined), thus encouraging membership of BOC. We will, of course, list Bristol Cars Ltd on the front pages of the site and they will have free access. For any commercial links listed within the site, eg chrome platers, upholsterers, etc., we will try to negotiate a club member discount. They will only be eligible if they have a proven track record indicated by satisfied BOC members or other reliable car enthusiasts.
We feel it would be better to have the Committee’s support in this initiative; therefore, an early response is desirable so that we can launch the site.
Regards
John

[Kevin H]

Originally Posted by Bristolian

Hi fellow Bristol owners

Please do not see BODA as a split in the BOC. Our intentions are to provide services that are not available within the BOC.

John Lawley
BOC Member

John, your statement above is a little at odds with the text on the home page of the BODA site, which says;

"We will be providing and organising the full range of club services, including Technical Assistance, Spares Information, a Magazine/Newsletter, various functions/meetings and of course an annual Concours."

On the surface, one of the main differences between BODA and BOC appears to be BODA’s willingness to commission manufacture of parts, but given who your Secretary is I find this rather surprising.

Early in 2001, I was looking at manufacturing some parts which were either no longer available from Bristol. I also had some discussions with Bristol about the possibility of manufacturing specific parts in Australia which they were currently having manufactured in the UK at a very high price. Initially we were looking at stainless steel wheel nuts which would fit the Avon Safety wheels and the Blenheim wheels. I could get these made considerably cheaper in Australia, to the specs supplied to me by Bristol, however I couldn’t get enough commitment from Bristol Cars (they wanted samples) or Bristol owners to warrant going into production.

Despite this particular project not getting off the ground I had some discussions with Clyde Lennon and a few other BOC members in the UK about parts manufacture with a view to getting the BOC involved, with Bristol’s blessing. As far as I am aware Clyde had discussions with some of the BOC committee and Toby Silverton.

Then in the Summer 2001 issue of the BOC Bulletin a lengthy sermon appeared from the Secretary (Michael Barton), which was clearly designed to kill off once and for all, the idea of the BOC getting involved in parts manufacture.

Here are a few excerpts from Mr Barton’s article;

“when I’ve spoken to Brian Marelli of Bristol Cars and asked “How many of your customer cars are off the road for lack of parts”. I get a simple answer “None”. “

“We are in the most fortunate position that Bristol Cars continues to survive and thrive and has a stated policy of continuing to support owners by the manufacture and supply of parts wherever possible even for the oldest cars.”

He went on to list the reasons why the BOC should NOT become involved in any type of parts manufacture – I will précis for brevity;

• Lack of finance
• Bristol owns the rights to designs etc
• Lack of storage facilities or funds to procure such
• Product liability
• Quality issues (no testing facilities)
• BOC run by volunteers
• No requirement.

Have these issues all disappeared now?

PS. I did get exhaust manifold "barrel nuts" made to Chrysler specs for the 411 S4, S5 and 412 S1. I still have some for sale if anyone is interested

[Bobbyweaf]

Kevin,

if things never changed then we would still have men with red flags walking in front of cars - the mind boggles! Any Secretary is bound to issue the views of his committee and Michael is the only one who can really answer this. As far as I'm aware this is still the view if the BOC.

As for the rest of us, we have no problems with the non-competitive spares Manufacture e.g. Bristols don't have any and neither does anyone else, then making the odd small batch from which Bristols also gain is not a problem as we see it. However, Michael did raise some important legal and liability issues in his article.