Car Trivia

[Alan Chatterton]

That didn't take long!

Thank you, Mark! A regular mine of useless information, aren't I?...

OK, and to continue on the naming theme…

‘Our’ cars were not the first to bear the ‘Triumph 2000’ name – two went before. What were they?

Triumph 2000 Roadster (Bergerac style) is one............ as for the other?????

[Alec]

Hello Jonathan,

Not a car, but Colchester made a Triumph 2000 lathe.

Alec

[Jonathan Lewis]

‘Our’ cars were not the first to bear the ‘Triumph 2000’ name – two went before. What were they?

Triumph 2000 Roadster (Bergerac style) is one............ as for the other?????

The 'Bergerac' Roadster is certainly one - but there is another too! (and even, arguably, a third if you take ultra-literally my comment about bearing the name... )

Not a car, but Colchester made a Triumph 2000 lathe

Indeed so, Alec - I seem to remember an item in Six Appeal about this a few years back. I wonder what made them pick the 'Triumph 2000' tag? It did also occur to me that the Triumph motorcycle company might have made a model under that name, having used both TR5 and TR6, but apparently not...

[David Withers]

Jonathan - The Colchester Lathe company were ahead of S-T in using the "Triumph 2000" tag. "Triumph" was their long-established brand name and they appended it with the top speed of the lathe in rev/min.

I can find no other Triumph 2000 car apart from the 1948-49 Roadster. There was a Triumph car company in Chicago from 1906 - c1910... did they name one of their cars as a "2000"?

I thought there may have been a Japanese or Indian car so named, but cannot find any.

What a good question you have set!

[Jonathan Lewis]

The Colchester Lathe company were ahead of S-T in using the "Triumph 2000" tag. "Triumph" was their long-established brand name and they appended it with the top speed of the lathe in rev/min.

Ah, that explains it (and also why there would have been no arguments between Colchester and S-T over trademark infringements) - I hadn't realised that Colchester had a long-standing claim to the "Triumph" name on machine tools.

There was a Triumph car company in Chicago from 1906 - c1910... did they name one of their cars as a "2000"?

Not so far as I know...

I thought there may have been a Japanese or Indian car so named, but cannot find any.

I think that most Indian S-T products were sold as Standards, not Triumphs (e.g. the modified version of the Triumph Herald sold as the Standard Gazel, and later the ill-fated Vanguard-engined Rover SD1 sold as the Standard 2000). Triumph's non-car assets (spun-out between the wars) stayed with motorcycles; Triumph Engineering in Coventry (eventually part of BSA and later Norton-Villiers-Triumph) and Triumph-Adler/TWN in Germany, though the latter has long since ceased making bikes in favour of concentrating on its other business - typewriters and office equipment...

The answer is there, I promise you, and much closer to home...

Regards,

[David Withers]

Would it be the Triumph 2000 Razoredge Saloon, the Roadster's not-so-attractive sister?

[Jonathan Lewis]

Would it be the Triumph 2000 Razoredge Saloon, the Roadster's not-so-attractive sister?

It would, though some (myself included) would argue that the 'Razoredge' was perhaps more attractive than the Roadster...

As far as I am aware, S-T used the 'Triumph 2000' appellation twice before the public announcement of 'Barb' in 1963. The cars concerned were:

- The Triumph Roadster as built between 1948 and 1949, using the chassis and body of the original 1800 Roadster but updated with the Standard Vanguard engine and driveline in place of the obsolescent pre-war Flying Standard/SS-Jaguar units used hitherto - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triumph_Roadster
- The intermediate version of the ‘Razoredge’ Triumph saloon (model TDA) as built for a period of about six months in 1948 (i.e. after receiving the Vanguard engine but before being re-engineered around that car's chassis elements and renamed Renown) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triumph_Renown

There was a third example which bore the 'Triumph 2000' name in at least some incarnations, but which was never an official S-T project (though apparently receiving factory support, at least in its earlier days). This was the Triumph Italia, a limited production special built by S-T’s Italian distributor between 1959 and 1963, based on the Triumph TR3a chassis but using a Michelotti-styled but Vignale-built body. A bit sneaky, this one (!) as the proper title was indeed ‘Triumph Italia’ (later ‘Italia 2000’ after S-T withdrew its formal backing for the project), but at least some were badged on the bootlid as a ‘Triumph 2000’ - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triumph_Italia.

Credit to both Alan and David, but I think that David wins by a nose for making the connection to the short-lived TDA version of the 'Razoredge'. Well done, Sir - over to you!

[David Withers]

I must be careful this time not to be too obscure. Here's what should be a fairly straightforward one:

Two small but fast sports cars shared their model name with a small but slow Triumph. What were they?

[TedTaylor]

The small but slow Triumph could be the Tina motor scooter.
Then could it be 'Tina' as in TVR Tina which was I believe Imp based?

As for the other I will need to do a bit more digging around but could it be 'Turner' as in Tina Turner ........

Ted

[Jonathan Lewis]

I must be careful this time not to be too obscure. Here's what should be a fairly straightforward one:

Two small but fast sports cars shared their model name with a small but slow Triumph. What were they?

!!!!! AC Acclaim? TVR Toledo???

The only link I can think of is between the pre-war Triumph Scorpion and the Imp-based Scorpion sportscar of the 1970s. As for the other? Well, Abarth had a scorpion on their badge, and their Fiat-based specials were certainly small and fast, but I don't know whether they ever used 'Scorpion' as a model name...

Regards,