First ever TR8?

[Bobbieslandy]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/TRIUMPH-TR8-GENUI ... 20b0c594db

More money, more time and more space and i'd have this!


Rob.

[John Wood]

It's not the first. Nice to see "sprint" decals on it. I am going to have a bid on this.

1975 FHC
KDU483N

[Beans]

Good luck, it's worth saving [;)]
No time and money for another project.
When the DHC is ready I'll start on the Sprint ...

<center>
<font color="blue"><i>1980 TR7 DHC (my first car, currently being restored)
1981 TR7 FHC Sprint (better known as 't Kreng)</font id="blue">
<b>[url="http://www.tr7beans.blogspot.com/"]<u><b><font size="2"><font color="red">My Weblog</font id="red"></font id="size2"></b></u>[/url]</b></i></center>

[RUDDY]

Tempted by this also, does anyone know more on the car ?

Cheers, Paul

[TR Tony]

The car is a genuine ACN series, I don't have a build date but must be early in the series - Feb/March 77?

It was built as LHD, Federal US spec, non A/C, carbs & manual transmission. Retained by BL presumably for development work.

Originally had cats & air injection but this equipment was removed before it was sold off by BL as a TR8 on 6.5.81 through British Car Auctions (note this car was sold off BEFORE the main TR8 sell off in August 81), at which time it was listed "no body damage, paint & trim in moderate condition". Mileage at disposal was 31,678.

The decals are interesting as BMH hold photos of a TR7V8 coupe with exactly the same decals - unfortunately the photos are B&W so the vehicle colour is not certain, but the BMH car is a dark colour & thus could be this example. Even more tantalisingly the BMH photos are the same as used on the TR8 FIA Homologation papers - was it this car?

That's all I have been able to find out. I think quite a few of us would like this car!

Tony

<font size="1">1981 2L FHC Cavalry Blue
1980 3.5L V8 DHC Jaguar Regency Red - sadly sold!
TR8 FHC EFI Factory development car Inca Yellow</font id="size1">

[V8Wedgehead]

This could end up being a special preproduction TR8 coupe. The normal bonnet decal for the 1978 model year for the engine information is orange.....this one is black? Also the sprint decals make it even more of a puzzle. The build date on the car will help out but the glove box tire information decal might say TR7V8 or Bullet.....I like this car it is very interesting to bad it stayed on the other side of the pond. I think this could be a renumber car from earlier production! I have one of those TR8 coupes that was renumbered from TCN15 to TCN16 series.

Michael
1980 TR8 FHCs; Rally Conversion #0020 & Stock #0058

"If it is broken then fix it....if it is not then make it faster!"

[Steve-LPS-Thomas]

I (and others I think) were contacted last year and offered this car.. although no price was mentioned to me at the time. There was mention that there were holes drilled in the quarterlights where wiring for test equipment had entered the car.

HP in the number plate is common for a car registered by the factory for development purposes. About 110 ACN V8's were built basically as development TR8's and for homologation of the V8 into the rally cars.

About 5 or 6 we retained by BL in the UK for development purposes, the rest were sent to USA dealers who used the cars to show the public what BL were going to do next. A TR8 brochure was created using ACN 00003. Quite a few of these ACN series still exist in the USA inc. ACN00003 and possibly even 00001 and 00002 as well. The cars were sold off by the US dealers without warranty and were offered first to persons with TR racing history so several cars have illustrious owners/history.

It seems that "the experts" agree that these were "pilot production TR8's" rather than prototypes. Excepting that the UK retained cars were used by BL for development so therefore these were prototypes in a way.. My car WAC275S is one such ACN Series car.

There are people out there with much more knowledge than I so I will let them fill in the blanks.

Should anyone on here buy the car I notice that the unique battery box is missing. I might still have the one from my car.

Regards Steve

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<b><font color="blue">croydebay@aol.com</b></font id="blue">

[Chris Turner]

This cars main claim to fame is that it was thought to be the first genuine TR8(then called TR7V8) registered in the UK(number was issued in January 1977). Most of the other UK based ACN cars were registered on "S" plates. The Sprint decal on the front panel is the one now used on most of the genuine TR7 Sprints.
The renumbering of the TCN cars in 1980 was to make the 1979 cars look factory fresh as some areas of the US did not allow previous model year cars to be sold "as new". There was no need for this to happen in the UK so this cars chassis number wont have been changed. ACN1, ACN2 are owned by Ted Schumacher and still exist ACN3 is also in the US, I have ACN6.
The main sell off of BL cars including the UK spec TR8s started well before August, the cars were put in several auctions so as not to overload the sales with too many of the same sort of car. I know of a few that were sold at the same May sale.

www.triumphtrs.co.uk
THE Coca Cola car
TR7 Premium
TR7 Sprint
TR7V8 rally car

[ColoradoTR8]

I beleive that Ted Schumacher of TSImported Automotive in Ohio has ACN00001 and ACN00002.

<b><i>Shawn</i></b>

[PeterTR7V8]

We have a pre-production V8 car here in NZ that was imported privately from the UK. I've seen the original bill of sale & it was sold ex-factory in June 77. The motor is from a Range Rover production line but has the boxy TR8 air filters.

[V8Wedgehead]

ACN0008 and Astral Blue Automatic with red/black check is still around too. It is a 1/77 build car. Cars 001,002 & 003 alos are here in the US. 001 and possibly 002 were used for the TR8 coupe broschure. 001 was red and 002 astral blue. There is a picture of the green & black with automatic interior which if they used the first few cars would have been 003 which was the "first automatic" TR8.

Michael
1980 TR8 FHCs; Rally Conversion #0020 & Stock #0058

"If it is broken then fix it....if it is not then make it faster!"

[Steve-LPS-Thomas]

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Century Gothic, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally had cats & air injection but this equipment was removed before it was sold off by BL as a TR8 on 6.5.81 through British Car Auctions (note this car was sold off BEFORE the main TR8 sell off in August 81), at which time it was listed "no body damage, paint & trim in moderate condition". Mileage at disposal was 31,678.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></font id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Just wondering where you got this info Tony?

Regards Steve

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<b><font color="blue">croydebay@aol.com</b></font id="blue">

[TR Tony]

Steve, Dave Pearson at Canley Classics holds a lot of the original Triumph factory records, including much of the TR7/8 development & experimental vehicle information that survived.

He has found info for me on my own ACN01080, & the info I quoted about this car ACN00012 has come from him also.

I should have made it clear to forum members that this was the source - sorry about that.

WAC was a factory development car, wasn't it Steve? Might be worth asking Dave if he has anything in his records.

Tony

<font size="1">1981 2L FHC Cavalry Blue
1980 3.5L V8 DHC Jaguar Regency Red - sadly sold!
TR8 FHC EFI Factory development car Inca Yellow</font id="size1">

[Steve-LPS-Thomas]

Thanks for that Tony. My car is ACN1091UCF just 11 away from yours. I have complete history (and many servicing records) from the time it was bought by Borough Garage from BCA in 1981. It's history of 3/4 years with BL as a development car is however blank excepting that I have heard that it was used for electrical development and was seen in the early eighties with extra holes in the dash.. not been able to verify this.

I have a list somewhere of all known surviving ACN cars compiled about 8 years ago by Jim McDonald in Canada but was asked to keep it to myself for fear of "clones".











Regards Steve


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[tr8]

Hi Steve

Paul MacDonald, I have the list. It was not for fear of clones, that is mostly a UK fear. I just don't want people's personal information posted on the internet (everyone has a different definition). It could affect the openess that I have met for information gathering purposes.

By the way, the list is now up to 190 ACN and TCN cars.