Words in the July 2011 issue of Motor Sport

[Ronald G. Stephenson]

When it comes to cars, there are so many opinions going around that one wonders why people even bother to take on a brand and do their damnedest to stick with it. In Ameria, the names of cars that have come and gone number in the thousands. When automobiles were new to the scene, it seems that everyone with an idea and a little financing tried their hand at building cars. And, just a quickly as a 'new' name appeared on the scene, a few others bit the dust. Like Aston, Bristol was fortunate for a few years to find a patron or two to keep the marque alive. When the money ran out the game was over. I think most of us could name the many different brands that were some of the best that could be offered at the time. For various reasons, they died away.....

[Thor]

For a marque to have a strong following and therfore a chance of survival it must have a reputation for something special. The following are one-phrase answers, but they are intended as illustrations, not debating points(!), with qualities from 1950s : Austin - good value, Alfa-Romeo - good handling, Jaguar - styling, Rolls-Royce - luxury and quietness, BMW - good engines, Rover - solid reliability, up-dating to the present, and marques are meant to have all of these things. Bristol, had they ever gained a large following, would have done so because of the engineering excellence of their approach, leading to far better ride/handling/grip compromise than was available anywhere else. The 2.0 engines were good too, but were inadequate against larger competition, they might have carried on if Bristol had launched a smaller, lighter 'sports' model in the 1960s, alongside the luxury cars. These excellent chassis characteristics are too esoteric to build a brand following on, unfortunately, so the growth to a larger company never happened.

It is a sad fact that in many ways all the modern chassis technology has achieved so very little. Tyres have improved enormously, but all that has happened to car design is that cars have tended to get wider and lower. Wider and lower will improve the ride/grip compromise, but it is not very technical. I would contend that for its width, the Bristol chassis made better mechanical use of the tyres than anything else, but the way cars were marketed and compared in those days presumably didn't get this across well enough.

A Blenheim is still a good car, but for all sorts of difficult-to-market reasons. Its qualities are good but not outstanding, but then almost all modern cars are like that. The type of people who have the money to buy one don't want to work so hard at understanding why they are choosing a car, most just want to buy a brand.