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Today’s review falls into that trap: you either think this is a classic car or you think it’s a load of rubbish which deserves to be used, scrapped and forgotten about.
Personally, it’s a bit modern for me, but with it being such a rare car, I decided it deserved a spot on IDRIVEACLASSIC.
Now before we kick off talking about the car, let’s discuss what Talbot was all about. Talbot was launched in 1903 as Clement Talbot but after a year pumped for just Talbot, which were a company in London assembling the components of the French Clement-Bayard cars. It existed until 1934 when it had a financial collapse at which point it was bought out by Rootes and then it was sold onto Simca, who were bought by Chrysler Europe in 1970.
It was then all packaged up by Chrysler when their marques were sold onto PSA Peugeot Citroen in 1978 - which then put the name into use for any car formerly badged Chrysler in the UK for any car sold after 1st August 1979.
This meant the last of the Avengers got badged as Talbot until 1981.
And then with that, The Talbot Solara was launched in 1980 in the UK, but if you’re watching from France, you probably know this as a Simca 1510. It was essentially brought to market to fight for space in the UK fleet and travelling salesman marketplace, hence why it’s a bit sensible and a saloon to boot. It was also drafted in to replace the, in my opinion, more stylish Hillman Avenger.
The Solara came about from a jazz up of the Chrysler Alpine of the 70s which had been sold with the 1.3, 1.4 and 1.6 engine types and a fastback/coupe styling.
The facelift saw the Solara launched as a 4 door saloon alongside the facelift Talbot Alpine. If you’d wanted any other body shape, the Chrysler team would’ve expected you to pick the newly facelift Alpine.
It’s worth mentioning that the designer of the Alpine which then of course influenced the Solara is none other than Roy Axe who started at Chrysler working on things like the Sunbeam Rapier and Hillman Hunter, but moved over to Rover in the 80s and designed both the Rover 800 and the Rover 200 and 400 series and was jointly involved in the design of the Montego.
As we aren’t able to take the car for a drive today, I thought I’d share some specs with you. These cars were only available in the UK market on a 1.3 and 1.6 petrol engine and on your 1.3 you’d expect 0-60 in around 14.6 seconds and a top speed of 96mph - with your 1.6 performing above this - but I sadly couldn’t find a reference for precise figures.
Talbot wasn’t a dominant market name and the salesmen and buying public already had a firm idea of which car manufacturers they liked, which meant that although the Solara was pretty successful, the Cavalier and Cortina really held their market share and that’s without mentioning both Ford and GM offered far more choice for the discerning buyer than just two engine options. Realistically, massive opportunities were missed for the Solara by deciding not to go for a 2 litre engine.
Which leads me nicely on to explain the Solara Rapier. As the 80s marched on and the team over at Chrysler realised that the Solara was being thrashed by the competition, including the Sierra which had launched in 1982, they decided to come up with a few special editions to try and revive some interest.
This led to the introduction of the Solara Minx, Rapier and Spectre. The naming conventions were simply down to trim level and Rapier was the top trim level available.
Now sadly, despite healthy early sales of the Talbot marques when the name was launched in the UK in 1979, it just didn’t make it. The name was quietly shelved in the mid 80s and stopped being used in 1987 on new cars when the production of the Horizon finished. However it’s worth noting the Talbot Express vans continued being made until 1994 - which is officially when the marque ceased to exist.
Now let’s meet Simon, who dug up this relic from a garage and intends to bring it a small screen near you…
10 окт 2020
