I spent a wonderful day at Hampton’s Classics on the green yesterday, Sunday 3rd July, 2022. A nostalgic, sentimental and at times emotional journey. Feasting my eyes on classic cars from the ’30s to modern classic cars and motorcycles. I also got a possible glimpse of the future with hydrogen powered police cars. I enjoyed some lovely handmade paella, and wandered around the village green in awe. Taken back to the cars of my youth, the cars my family built, my father drove, owned and wanted. Plus what I would ideally like in a vehicle, a sustainable future for my family.

Best of show is always subjective. The fastest? Largest? Best restored? For many of us, the best in show will be a car they have a real attachment to. Perhaps the family car? Or perhaps, their dream car, say an AC 427 Shelby Cobra. Hold tight.

There is a very good reason that Lewis Hamilton has an AC Cobra. 

They are a driver’s car. 160mph doesn’t tell the whole story. Only 998 Shelby Cobras were produced. Apparently nothing equals the feeling of driving a Shelby Cobra 427. Its 360 BHP engine weighs 2,355 lbs, earning it a top speed of 164mph. A 4-speed manual transmission. AC Cars, were one of the oldest independent car makers founded in Britain.

In 1911 AC Cars moved to Ferry Road, Thames Ditton. Only a few miles away from Hampton Village. The AC Cobra, sold in the United States as the Shelby Cobra and AC Shelby Cobra, is a sports car manufactured by British company AC Cars, with a Ford V8

The AC 427 Cobra was my late father’s dream car. Though he loved chauffeuring in his Rolls-Royce Phantom, or Bentley. He owned a lovely vintage Ferguson tractor which really was his pride of joy. He loved cars and bikes. He’d whisk mum off to the Ace Cafe London on his BSA Bantam. He would have loved the show. There were some beautiful bikes there. I loved the ’58 Ducatti, which looked resplendent in rosso red. Dad said to me once, “you can do anything you like son, but don’t get a bike.” He was a wise man. I drove stupidly fast in my youth. I don’t think I would have survived a bike. iChauffeur co-founder, Andy Senior might have actually driven one of the Sunbeam’s on display. He used to drive cars while he worked at Rootes Group. Including the Sunbeam Tiger, which he said was his favourite of the Rootes’ cars. Though he did describe it “as a bit of a handful”.

This is one of the nicest AC Shelby Cobra’s I’ve ever seen. I think my dad would pick this beauty.

My grandad Frank, and uncle Ron both worked at Rootes Group as panel beaters. They worked on the bodies of Humber, Sunbeam, Singer, Hillman, Talbot, Commer and Karrier
. Panel beating was a dangerous, and noisy task. Lead poisoning was not uncommon, nor was hearing damage apparently. There was lots of lead used on these old bodies. Ron Doble explains, “They were hand assembled, so there was no real strict conforming, so when they came off the body with the doors the doors wouldn’t fit. The body was all weird. So it all had to be jacked out and messed about and then the joints were, were spot-welded, so that had to be covered with lead and I got the job of, amongst other guys, finishing lead so I did that and got lead poisoning.”
Ron’s last day of service for the RAF, coincidently was on the 3 July too, in 1947. Shortly after, Ron started an apprenticeship with Rootes Group.

So, I had a vested interest in all the Rootes cars on display. I used to play guitar with bands in Ginger Baker’s rehearsal studios, Worple Road, Acton. I once saw Sir Bob Geldof and Peter Green there too while we were rehearsing. Worple Road is significant to three generations of Seniors. Being a Rootes Group factory previously. There was a splendid pair of glorious red Sunbeam cars, the Rapier and the convertible Alpine. The owner told me some history of Rootes Group too. I also enjoyed chatting to the owner of the Humber Hawk.

 Sir Winston was a former Humber Hawk owner.

The problem, like electric is infrastructure. In 1897, the first luxury electric taxis were available to hire in London. After a couple of years the cabs rolled to a halt. Poor reliability, lack of range, plus the heavy weight made them very unreliable.

With the only emissions being water, hydrogen seemed like it was poised to replace petroleum vehicles. The biggest issue, though was the infrastructure. I didn’t see any electric cars apart from the Scalextric cars, on the cool track. iChauffeur didn’t have any cars on display. The private hire industry is suffering from approximately half of the drivers that we did in London pre-Covid. We were fortunate to retain many more than that, but sadly some of our great chauffeurs did decide to retire at this point. The classic car show is held on the first Saturday of July. This year coinciding with The Rolling Stones at Hyde Park, The F1 British Grand Prix at Silverstone as well as Wimbledon.

Contact us to learn more about our family-run chauffeur business in Hampton.