New V6 Owner

[Athboy501]

Hi I'm Matt and I've just purchased my first V6 (in fact I think it's my first French car). I've loved the little V6 since my time working at Arrows Grand Prix on a placement at University. At the time TWR were finishing assembly of the first few Phase 1 press cars at their Leafield Headquarters, and I used to pop across at lunch time to chat with the technicians and see how the little car was going together. Being a self-proclaimed car enthusiast I thought it was about time I got a V6 to join my small collection.

The car I've bought is YG55 ROP. It's all black (including the side intakes), and was bought from Targa Florio cars with a mileage of 32,200 (being picked up in a few days - i'll post the build number up then). Apparently the previous owner was a car enthusiast owning a couple of TVRs alongside the Vee. If anyone has any info on the car I'd be more than interested to hear about it (perhaps the previous owner was a member here? - I think a previous registration was V6 GUM).

I intend to keep the car as it is, but will be changing it back to the original fit tyres as soon as possible (Are they're Michelin Pilot Sport?), as I'm a great believer in first sampling the car as it was designed. I've bought it to use it (albeit on dry days) so if you are in the Warwick area keep an eye out.

Can't wait to start driving it!

Matt

 

[Brembov6]

Welcome Matt sounds like you know the car well.

I would like to hear more stories from when you seen the Ph1 being built thats pretty cool

 

[Duncan]

Welcome Matt and congrats on your purchase, the car is known to us as a couple of its owners have been club members.

It was advertised for sale on our site by the previous owner so you can read up a bit here LINK

It looks like a very nice car which has been cared for, it was taken during a break in a dealers a few years back, but was returned pronto along with most of the other cars so dont panic when you start reading any comments on its history.


Nice to hear your tale of your university placement & glad to hear you ended up with one!

The standard tyres are indeed Michelin Pilot Sports.

Enjoy it!

Duncan

 

[Matt]

Welcome Matt and congrats on the purchase.

 

[Athboy501]

Thanks for that information!

That was a real help! I wasn't aware that it had been stolen/recovered, but as long as it wasn't harmed I'm not too worried about that. Lots of talk about it being Cat D, hence the lower price.... I can happily say this isn't the case and the HPI register is completely clean apart from a couple of registration changes.
It was also interesting to read the service history... a lot more detail than the Dealer had given.

I certainly agree that the colour scheme is a bit 'marmite'. Fortunately for me in this case I quite like it, it certainly adds a little bit of individuality to it as well.

They were certainly interesting days at TWR. From memory, the cars were finished one by one in a race bay behind the Arrows R&D lab (Arrows kept a couple of F1 show cars in the adjacent bays) . I can only remember seeing silver cars being built, but there may have been others. There were only ever a couple of guys working on them at any one time (the majority of the time I can only remember one). I think the body work required a fair bit of fettling originally to get the gaps correct and suitable for press viewing.
I can remember the first time we went round the back of the bays to get some tools and saw the little car sitting there half clothed. Being nosy we went over for a chat and to see what was going on, and couldn't believe our eyes when we saw a Clio sitting there with what looked like an enormous engine in the back... when the technician told us that they were for a production build our eyes widened and my interest began!

 

[ravydavy]

Howdy. :salut:

Nice story about TWR.

 

[Williams]

Welcome to v6Clio.net Matt..!

What a fantastic story about the early days of the cars build and development. :approve: Would be great to know more, if there's more to tell lol

Duncan has already given you a great, to the point run down of what we know of the car.. Last time I saw it, it looked spot on, that was under the ownership of a much previous owner, who used the forum name Tyson

Not alot left for me to say except I hope you enjoy the car as much as we enjoy ours! :race:

 

[scudRS]

:welcome:

I know you will enjoy your time with the Vee.

 

[RUSSO]

:welcome: to the forum Matt
Guessing the early TWR development cars made a big impact on you only to buy one all these years later.
Congratulations on the purchase :approve:

 

[V6 2HOT]

Fascinating story!! Any pics from those early days?

 

[Lankan]

Welcome Matt.

Your association with TWR was an interesting read. Would love to hear more, and see any pics, if you have any......

Enjoy!

 

[Athboy501]

Hi Chaps, I'm afraid I don't have any photographs. As you can probably imagine, carrying around a camera phone (or indeed a camera) at an F1 team could become career limiting!... saying that they weren't the hottest at security at TWR!

 

[Don1]

Hello! I was the previous owner, who consigned it to Targa F cars on SOR. You have a real gem of a car there, and I will be happy to pass over any extra paperwork I have on it to help build up the history.

Don

 

[Adrian]

:welcome: Matt!

 

[Athboy501]

Hi Don, thank you very much for that I really appreciate it. It looks like a great little car, and the more I read about it the happier I become. It sounds (and looks) like you took really good care of it! I will try and PM you and give you m details.

 

[Athboy501]

And here it is #284- finally at it's new home. A thoroughly enjoyable 140 miles on my first 'official' day of ownership.

I'm a bit new to this forum lark so lets hope the photo comes out!

 

[Samwilde681]

Nice one matt! Is that your m3 too?

 

[Matt]

Love the old m3s - more pics please

 

[Samwilde681]

Massive fan too, this may be the wrong forum for this :rofl: but let's see that m3!!! Lol

 

[ColinG]

I'd like to see the m3 too pretty please! :race: