Where is it now

sogood

Given that I'm blown away by the wealth of knowledge, by some people here on the forum about practically every pre 80's form of motorised transport, I thought maybe someone could satisfy a little curiosity of mine............

Many years ago, in the mid to late 80's I was a bus driver with CIE. I worked on the number 16A route which had its southside terminus at the Bottle Tower pub, at the Churchtown Road end of Rathfarnham. I had often noticed an interesting shape under a heavy tarpaulin in the driveway of a house just about 100 yards from the terminus and one day while stretching my legs I investigated it a little further.

Lifting one corner (cheeky, I know!) of the tarp, I saw what appeared to be an old Riley possibly. It was black, with big bulging rounded front wings and "Beetle like" headlamps, The grill was chrome, consisting of a series of vertical slats, with the top horozontal section slightly raised at the centre. If I remember correctly, I think it also had running boards and had a short, sloping (about 45 degrees) boot. It had been there for the 4 or 5 years that I had been driving the route, but I never saw it uncovered. I also remember it had a sort of light dusting of rust all over it, but not actually in the metal, which was rock solid to the touch. Does anybody know of this car, what it was, were it went etc? I lost touch soon after when I changed jobs and a few years ago when I was in the neighbourhood, it was gone. Just an idle curiosity, but I recall thinking at the time, what a waste and what an excellent restoration project.

carchaeologist

sogood wrote: »

Lifting one corner (cheeky, I know!) of the tarp...

Nothing wrong with that!
Curiosity may have killed the cat,but im not feline!:)
Sounds like an interesting one,im sure someone will know something..

shaywest

i remember it well i went to school in the area in the 60s it was there then.
if iremember correctly eventually the tarp. rotted away .then it suffered very badly,i think the old boy who owned it eventually died ,then the house was sold the car disapeared soon after. but by that stage it was completely arsed
this is by hazy memories of her, i could be corrected though.
great memory jerker though!

shaywest

your'e right.it defo was a reilly!

trevorbrady

nevermind, I thought it might have been a DKW, it's been confirmed as a Riley above...

sogood

Definitely wasn't a DKW. I knew two guys who had a passion for these cars back in the early to mid 70's and they had about 4 or 5 between them, always swapping parts from one to the other, so they always had at least one running! Putt putt putt, coughing in the cloud of blue smoke, putt putt putt..................

dutchcat

it was one of these,belonged to an old boy called ned dunphy,had another 3 in the back garden, he drove triumph heralds for years,always had a couple out front,brown bread now i think.....another bit of usless information

carchaeologist

Ah,an RM,lovely cars,my uncle had one for awhile.