Roll over to preview

While searching for a few ‘not essential but would be nice to have’ bits for my newly-acquired P5 last week, I came across the website of one of the best-known suppliers of parts for these cars; it’s not appropriate to name names here as what I’m about to say could apply equally to any of the quite literally thousands of specialists supporting our hobby. I will though say that the company concerned is based in a former nail factory in the Black Country; an area which was once the centre of making holloware (pots, pans, buckets, dustbins, etc.) and which still retains many traditional manufacturing and engineering skills. What immediately struck me was not just the range of stuff that’s available for P5s, but the efforts that the company concerned goes to in order to source items that are no longer available. For example, replacement P5 D-post sections – the rot-prone area between the rear door and rear wheelarch – have recently been introduced, and these are pressed using proper press-tooling rather than being hand-made. What’s more, they’ve been redesigned slightly – in a way that’s completely invisible – to eliminate the rust-trap that caused most of the rot problems in the first place! Now I don’t know for sure what tooling that up cost, but it has to have been several thousands of pounds, to say nothing of the design skill needed to improve upon the original. To get that back from the sale of panels is going to take many years – after all, there aren’t that many P5/P5B Rovers left, and only a tiny proportion of owners of those cars will need to buy these parts. Realistically, it could take as many as ten years to recoup an investment. That’s just one part – the firm in question caters for P4, P5 and P6 Rovers – and other projects in hand include P5/P5B scuttle repair sections and P4 rear quarter valances for the Cyclops model.