Kit car shows

[Dpaz]

On our club forum the decline in kit car shows is being debated. A suggestion was made that clubs should unite to provide their own show/s. Would there be the enthusiasm? Any thoughts or comments?

[Mister Towed]

When I got interested in kit cars and specials back in the early eighties, kit car magazines and shows were really the only way to get information about the cars that were available for the home builder.

As such, the typical route into ownership was to see an article or ad in a magazine about a car that you found interesting, then check in a future mag if the company had a stand at a forthcoming kit car show before attending the show and hoping they hadn't gone bust in the meantime.

In my case, after reading about the Covin 356 Speedster I attended the Newark show, saw the demonstrator - a beautiful dark grey example with oxblood leather interior, spoke to the designer and fell in love with the car. I went home, started saving my pennies, bought a Type 3 VW Variant (WEL 9J where are you now?) as a donor and started stripping it down.

About six months later I'd saved enough to buy the body and spaceframe chassis - the Covin Speedster didn't use a cut down Beetle chassis - but by then, Covin were no more, having gone under or just wound up the business, I'm really not sure which.

So, the Variant got rebuilt and sold on and my self-build car fund got gambled away by my then partner while I was overseas on operations, which also led to us losing our house, divorce (cost me £99 as we had negative assets by then), marry somebody new, buy and renovate a cottage, change of career, have a family, etc., etc. and the whole self-build project got put on the back burner for about thirty years.

Fast forward to the twenty-first century and the route into kit car ownership is very different: The internet means that all the information you want about self-build cars is only a mouse click away. Emails or social media sites make communicating with the kit car companies easy and quick, while increasing prosperity - for those who choose to work for a living, anyway (please take note, Jeremy Corbyn) and cheap credit mean that everyone has access to masses of information 24-7, and even those enthusiasts who can't really afford to build a kit car can afford to build a kit car.

In my case, I was idly googling the word 'Spyder' on my netbook when an ebay listing for the Sammio Spyder popped up in my search engine with a hyperlink to the car's website (try saying that lot in 1982, McFly).

Once I'd read about the concept and seen some pictures on Gary J's website I was hooked and just knew I'd be building one.

Today, as in right now today, that would have been enough information.
I'd have contacted the company by email and/or phone, visited their premises to take a look around and placed an order, paying in full there and then with my credit card as an insurance policy against them going bust.

As it was way back in 2011 (ahh, nostalgia for the olden days when we still had polar icecaps, eh?), I was actually then still able to read about the car in a kit car magazine and view the demonstrator at a kit car show, but my point is, that's no longer essential.

The shows used to be an invaluable source of hard to find spare parts too, but guess what - the internet has a raft of sell-your-unwanted-crap sites that are a goldmine for those parts, and just about every scrapyard in the country also has its own website, or at least lists their phone number on t'internet somewhere.

So that's my view - just as the market for classic replicas seems to be booming, mostly down to how valuable and rare the real things have become (perhaps that's another discussion looming...), kit car sales appear to be on the up while kit car shows have dwindled away to pretty much nothing, a casualty of the age of information technology.

Thoughts anyone?

[Barber]

Mr Towed, your description is spot on. I can remember seeing NGs in the mags, and researching all the similar options by perusing back copies etc, as well as exploring some of the ones "on the way" though many of them never made it to production.

Next was a trip to Stoneleigh, and afterwards a trip to John Hoyle at Epsom. His 3ltr V8 TC with the boat tail was a hoot, and during the whole of the test drive he took me on, my left hand was gripping the side of the car so tight I had to pretty much unclasp it with my right hand at the end.

I went for a TF in the end, and the owners club, their newsletters etc were primary sources of the "how to" needed to complete or uprate existing cars. So different now. Having seen the Tribute 250 SWB in a magazine, quickly onto this site and more information than can easily be absorbed. Pretty much everything I needed to know, and easy interaction to get questions answered.

My interactions with Chris at Tribute were initially by email, and the couple of visits down there have been to nail down the specification of a new model build, as well as size each other up and decide if we were going to do this.

I don't know how things are working for other manufacturers, but in an industry where it is difficult to make enough to survive, the power of the internet is imperative. My recent query regarding the JCA Midge Mk2 on here has yielded no information regarding completed builds, which tells a story in itself. Despite a background in kit design and supply, the plan provider is only using the internet to tout the plans, and telephone for any follow up (may be a good reason). I'm not sure I will bother as there is no verification available. The world has moved on.

[Mitchelkitman]

Whilst I agree with a lot of what you are saying.... there's still no substitute for seeing the cars (as built by a fellow enthusiast) at a show, and for the small cost involved in attending a good time is had meeting fellow enthusiasts a getting a real feel (feedback) for how the particular car and company perform.

[Lucky@LeMans]

I spent a lot of time at the shows over the years up and down the country. The first one I attended was Stoneliegh back in the mid 1980's. I bought my first kit in 1989 when I had just finished my engineering apprenticeship. That was a BrightWheel Viper Cobra kit. At the time Pilgrim had the Sumo available but BrightWheel managed to supply a full body and chassis kit for £995. For me that was the deal clincher and my first kit was on the road for around £4k.
From that point on and many kits later I have seen the industry grow and shrink and get a whole lot more expensive. The rules and regs have changed and it has also become more of a challenge to get a kit on the road. I have seen the end of traditional apprenticeships as we knew it and the loss of a lot of engineering talent. The play station and mobile phone has taken over kids lives, they tend not to tinker around making go karts and customising their push bikes or make model planes, in fact they hardly go outdoors. Modern cars go on for ever so the kids tend to not get involved helping their fathers mend cars on the drive.
There's a whole lot to why the shows are dwindling but ultimately those of us with the skills, the inclination and the money to build a kit are becoming few and far between. Gone are the days of building a cheap entry level "7" style kit or Dutton. You can go down the Re Body route but that won't be an easy or cheap introduction anymore.
The availability of inexpensive, quality main stream sports cars will leave only a hand full of kit builders out there. Look what you can buy for £5k or less, a very good MX5 or BMW Z3 or Merc SLK, Alfa Spider etc etc .Then a whole host of high performance saloon cars . Then see what is available in the kit car arena for similar money, not a lot.