Lot Ended
Description
Just four owners from new; the first for 55 years; in regular use and
well-maintained; featured on Channel 4 in 1999; pleasingly original with a nice
'shabby chic' patina
Incredibly
strong, smooth and comfortable, the Rover P4 is one of the best-made cars ever
to be mass produced on these shores. In production from 1949 until 1964, it came
in a bewildering number of versions but all were excellent cars, furnished to a
very high standard with plenty of wood and leather, and proved enormously
popular with the middle class motorist they were aimed at.
Introduced alongside the four-cylinder Rover 60 in 1953, the P4 90
had a more-powerful 2.6-litre six-cylinder engine that produced a respectable
90bhp and drove through a four-speed manual gearbox with synchromesh on the top
three gears, giving it a top speed of 90mph. The doors, boot and bonnet were in
aluminium with the rest of the body in steel.
The cars had a separate chassis with independent suspension by coil
springs at the front and a live axle with half-elliptic leaf springs at the
rear. Brakes were fully hydraulic drums all round. It was replaced by the P4 100
in 1959, by which time 35,903 had been sold.
Supplied new by Frederick
Restall of Birmingham in March 1955 (their plaque is still on the dash), this
Rover 90 was built specifically as a RHD export model (as denoted by the the
5436 chassis number prefix) and was perhaps a demonstrator before it got
exported because it originally had the registration number RWD 75.
Very early in its life it was sent to Kenya where it was acquired by
a Colonial official, Mr George Rattray, who brought the car back to the UK when
he left Africa in 1959 and was to keep it right up until
2010.
In 1999 this very car was
featured in Episode One of Channel 4’s ‘Classic British Cars’ series, narrated
by John Peel, when Mr Rattray explains just why he loved his Rover 90 so much
and kept it so long. You can view him talking about the car if you copy this
link into your browser:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpZEWKhA124
It then had
two further owners, the first keeping it for 8 years and the second for 5 years
before our vendor acquired it in September 2023 by which time it had been
re-registered as 582 XWG.
A competent mechanic who
enjoys tinkering with old cars, our vendor has kept a log of all the work done
to the car during his ownership. This includes a full service with new plugs;
points; condenser; HT leads; fan belt; fresh engine and diff oil; tappets
adjusted; fresh coolant etc. He has also fitted a new brake master cylinder and
rear brake slave cylinders; new ARB bushes and a modern electric fuel
pump.
Although it no longer needs
one, it passed an MOT in March 2024 with no advisories recorded and then again
in August this year with just a couple of advisories for slightly perished rear
tyres and a slight oil leak.
The MOT history online shows
that it has only covered some 4,500 miles in the last 20 years, including around
1,100 miles in the current ownership, the odometer now showing 83,589
miles.
We are told that it drives
very well and it has certainly been starting promptly and running sweetly as we
have moved it around on site, just like a good P4
should.
As you can see in the photos,
it looks pleasingly solid and original with a nice ‘shabby chic’ patina, and is
on offer here at no reserve so the best bid takes it
home.
Consigned by James
Dennison – 07970 309907 – [email protected]