Austin Montego - Extra Ordinary (1985 1.6 L Estate Road Test)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 10 พ.ย. 2020
- It’s easy to belittle the Austin Montego for its quality and reliability issues, but Joe reckons this much maligned fleet car favourite is a deserving classic!
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Another great video! great channel for fans of the affordable classics
Thanks for watching! 😁
Less than 140 on the road! Wow! They were as common as dogs mess only 25 years ago.
Amazing to think how many there were!
Values dropped like a stone, most would have been scrapped once the first big repair bill came as it wasn’t worth bothering. A lot of 1980s cars are rising in value but most BL motors aren’t. I guess due to reputation. Shame, I’ve never owned one but have travelled in a few and they were no worse than Ford/Vauxhall etc of the era.
One of the best looking estates. Glad it's being restored.
I had one used it as a cab never had any of the problems you quoted. It was the easiest car I ever worked on. I replaced a clutch at 180,000miles in under 2 hours, sold it at 249000 miles lost count of the number of passengers that said "this is a nice car" when told it was a BL montego it was always "oh well it won't last then". I had the last laugh. Would buy one today especially the MG version if I could afford it.
This restorer has the correct attitude. Someone's gotta do it x
I bought a montego deisel brand new and ran it for 65000 miles in four years. It never even blew a bulb ! It could pull a house down. Did have slight rust starting on one of the cills when I sold her though 🤓
Loved my Montego! A 1.6L -
My father got the first registered estate overhere in Holland, he had an old school friend who was a BL manager overhere who arranged demo's for him This proved to be a very reliable car.
As was the 2 liter Princess with the 'O' series engine.
Remember mate had Countryman estate, surprising how comfy it was. Also had Prima engined saloon, bit noisy, but pulled like a train.
used a 2.0DSL Saloon as a 'Runner' car on our Hire Fleet, nice in Montego guise, but gave you a headache in an empty Maestro van. Paved the way for me to go Diesel long ago
I had a diesel countryman estate in green as a company car back in the day.
Over 160'000 miles in 4 years the list of problems was.
Saggy drivers seat base
Weak exterior door handles(prone to snapping off in a frost)
At around 120'000miles it started blowing a cloud of black diesel ' cloud' under hard acceleration.
And the join on the sills both side started to go flakey.
On the plus side,it pulled like a train,had bags of room inside ,kids liked the back facing boot seats.
I remember a family friend had fairly new one of these. Leant on it after a walk and the car was dented. Another one couldn't cope with 3 kids in the back. Horrific burning smell from rear end meant they had to drive back home and come back and pick us up in an ancient dihatsu charade with a dodgy clutch. Never found what was wrong with the Montego.
With no visitors occupying the rear it was fine. And that charade felt more trusty wheezing it's way up the hill the montego failed to climb. Montego was roomy though and handling and ride was nice. Always comfortable but never wallowed. For nostalgia alone it deserves classic status. Most people who were kids in 80s will remember them
My Dad had the estate model in beige as a company car from British Gas. It was around 1989/90 and it was nice to drive as I remember.
My dad had a C reg blue Montego estate for a while in the 90s, I miss that car. Last taxed in 1997 according to the DVLA. RIP C441 MWE
Great car Joe!
I passed my test in my own Montego estate K774AVV in October 2003. Sadly long gone now, it was the Perkins diesel estate.
Good thinking, there’s no way the examiner can fail you if they can’t note down any faults because they’re holding onto the ‘oh sh!t’ handle the whole time, fearing for their life.
I remember seeing this on eBay. You got a great project car I think. With nostalgic eyes, this is really lovely!
I had an MG Turbo, it was eighteen months old when I bought it as a trade in at the BL dealer where I worked at the time, I only intended to keep it for about a year ended up keeping it for nine years only problem I had was with the sunroof which was quite common.
My company GTI (hollow laughter) estate was a pretty competent car. No ball of fire, but it was perfectly reliable, and did several cross-continent journeys pretty effortlessly, with nothing worse than a failed connection to the fuel pump, thanks to a vast pothole near the Bois de Boulogne. (Oh, and a parking ticket in Poggibonsi, which remains unpaid over 30 years later!). But it was delivered new with rust showing on the A-posts and a wonky number plate lamp surround.
remember the short-lived 'Advantage' trimmed model in BRG? And maybe Burgundy too, with white vinyls. 2.0litre, 4 speed Autos, so much nicer than the 3speed Auto; a nice drive.
My father's friend bought a brand new Mayfair estate in 88 in a nice dark metallic blue. As awful as they are, I think they look great and I am proud to say that as a child, I sat on the rear facing seat.
I thought the saloon especially was quite a handsome car. Better looking than the Sierra in my opinion.
And the interiors were far better than anything else on the market with their valour seats. Austin cars were known for shit engineering and rust but their interiors blew anything else in the market away!
@@matty6848 agreed. The Austin Rover badge was also really nice and they'd be on most BL products from the mid-80s on. All glossy and swish looking.
Phwoah. What a car! Great review Joe.
I had a G reg Montego, post facelift, unleaded engine estate, a 1.6L in Henley Blue for 3 years, 1990 to 1993.. No PAS, but it drove well, had an excellent gearchange and the most simple and best roof rack system I've ever seen on an estate. Also it looked really nice, the body style suited the estate version better than the saloon It's a pity they never made a hatchback version, people had to make do with the smaller Maestro. My missus had one (a 1.6 L) around the same time as I had the Montego, both were unfairly maligned cars.
The 2.0Litre Vanden Plas EFi, in Moonraker Blue metallic was a very impressive looking version. Drove superbly, and was very well equipped, with a lovely, plush interior. As for the manic 2.0Litre Turbo, what a beast! Torque steer like you wouldn't beleive, but that just added to the sense of fun. A very fast car.
As the old adage goes, if BL could have kept the oil in, and the water out, they would have had an excellent car. I well remember stripping most of the interior, to remove the roof cloth (on the estate, mostly), remove, seal and refit the sunroof mechanism, and re-seal the roof-rail mounting points, which were a common source of water leaks. But they were easy to work on. And all were geat to drive, comfortable, and had loads of room.
The MG version in white with grey trim and red seatbelts,looked fast when parked.
The Ital finished production in 84, the Montego started production at the same plant in 84, the triumph acclaim had nothing in common as that was just a rebadged Honda being used to try and save Triumph.
I bought a Montego diesel brand new and ran it for 5 years covering 60000 miles and it was 100 % reliable it never even blew a bulb ! it did however start showing a bit of rust in my last year of ownership.
We Didn't have the estate version, We Had The Normal One And It Was An Automatic And It Was Fast And Powerful. 😃👍.
i had one in the 90 i loved it
I thought this was an Aprils Fools video till I saw the issue date..I'm a happy subscriber love the channel and always learn something new .....as I did today. My uncle traded in his Montego estate for a Lada and never looked back. He did say though the Montegro was better in winter keeping his hands warm with its heated rear window when he was pushing it .
I picked up a monty estate once, when doing recovery work.. Bloke had loaded his shopping into the back, and said the rear end just dropped. When i turned up to recover it.. the rear suspension turrets on both sides, had completely come away from the inner panels.. the thing was as rotten as an old banana.. Looked ok on the outside, but under the skin, completely different story.. I was in a spec lift truck, so had to call for a flatbed, as i didn't want to risk rear lifting it, incase i pulled all the suspension completely out when towing it..
I owned an A reg (1984) Montego that I bought used in 1989. Being a mechanic who did an apprenticeship at a Rover garage, it never bothered me that reliability was not the best. However, that car did keep me fully occupied during my ownership. I still have fond memories of that time though.
I own a 1987 1.6HL which I have been using as a daily for the last 3 years, it’s a great car, I also own 2 estates too
I’ve been in the back of one. During the 90s was a work horse. Many a school run for me. pick ups were quite common until 1997. the odd run down to the beach and woodland walking. Funny enough it was a cream looking montego. Might have had a simmer number plate. Usually it was me the dog and one of my brothers. It would be hilarious if my old mans car Is one of the surviving examples.
Love to have this ...would have to put a Perkins init tho ..
Lovely bit of styling to these, and incredibly practical, delayed 7 years wow!! If there was any justice or real sense of being 'Eco Friendly' people would keep old cars like these on the road. Like your style of presenting too
Thanks Julian! It’s a crying shame there aren’t more preserved
At no point was this car “delayed over 7 years”. The LM11/LM12 project hadn’t even started 7 years earlier.
I'm fond of the unloved montego.up untill 2006 we had a diesel estate as the farm workhorse ,the bodywork was very rusty but it never let us down.would do 60mpg and was surprisingly good to drive .in my student days I took it all over the country for lads weekend away.it was more reliable than my discovery 3 at the time.
The turbo blew and ran away on its own oil 14 years ago ,I remember being gutted. It had 390k on the clock.
Yes the 2.0 turbo diesel Perkins engines were actually very good engines.
This would be a very boring car in the 1990s especially in beige seeing one driven on a rainy winter day. But now it is so exciting to look at.
The 1.3l (A+ 1275cc) versions were truly appalling, with the 4 speed box evern worse, (I had a 1984 Maestro 1.3L in the 80s for a year before replacing with an Escort 1.6LX mk4). Why on Earth did Austin Rover persist with the way outdated, under sized and under powered iron OHV lump belonging in the 1950s? The 1.6l S series, and the 2l O series with carb or better still injection and 2l Perkins diesel, were actually good cars, more drivable than the 1.6l pinto Sierra, though not as good as the 1.6l or 1.8l injection mk 1 Cavalier in my experience at the time. If the Montego had a hatchback version, may be wold have been of greater sales appeal? Rust was a problem though especially in the sills and rear wheel arches. At least the Rover 200 and 400 cars were a huge improvement, despite the headgasket failures (had several of them myself) on the K series engine. Still have my MGF VVC (head gasket replaced of course) in my collection.
Most brits who were lada owners went over to the montego! In nutshell putting two fingers up to VW! They thought if the krauts are going to change the rules on emissions (for us to find out 20 years later they were actually breaking them themselves) then we'll spend a little more than we'd like by buying our own :-D
A much maligned, but strangely attractive car, I always liked the looks myself.........
We've warmed to them too, Simon. Something oddly charming about them, isn't there?
Not in "artificial limb" beige it isn't!
I would guess a lot of issues were caused by owners not looking after them, missing scheduled services and an apathetic attitude by some dealers too. Depreciation would also ensure that by the time they reached the 3rd or 4th owner, any notion of preventative maintenance was ancient history.
As far as rust goes, Ford Escorts, Fiesta's and Sierra's of the same era dissolved at the mere mention of rain. A Cavalier with anything more than one Mot under it's belt would have scabby arches too. Montego's, Maestro's, etc., were considered crap, more by proxy than anything else.
Ένα από τα καλύτερα αυτοκίνητα, θα μπορούσαν οι Βρετανοί να πωλήσουν πάρα πολλά Μοντέγκο Εστέιτ αν πρόσεχαν την ποιότητα. Η ποιότητα των Μοντέγκο / Μαέστρο ήταν ισάξια των τότε ανατολικών αυτοκινήτων, αλλά η τιμή ήταν άκρως βρετανική!
Can't believe back in 1990, I sold my Metro Turbo and replaced it with the Montego 1.6L
I had a 2ltr Mayfair automatic
Seemed a great car at the time
It way stolen off my drive in 1997
Never seen since
A beige Austin Montego Estate is so un-cool, it's actually really cool. I dig that in a car. And let's be honest, you can't get 3 kids and a brace of labradors in a Ferrari 308, can you.
We agree, Matthew! The Montego has been significantly tidied up since we shot this, stay tuned for an update ;)
My dad 1 Austin Monte go and 2 rover montogs
Similarly, I get so many comments about my Ford Granada Scorpio... far more than my Stag or M5 !
I always thought the Maestro and the Montego Estate were quite good looking cars (not the Montego saloon, though). But admit I'm a little weird when it comes to car styling. I frequently like those car which others would say look bland.
These were very good cars. I don't know where people get the bad stories from. Bmws known for head gasket problems. Yet nobody mentions that lol
Good on you for restoring it. Monteago design is excellent the production of the car poor!!
That car screams top gear.
I drove a B reg 1.6 Estate as a company car B933LAO.
I had an annoying habit of pulling itself onto full lock after three quarters lock was reached.
On twisty roads if you trailed the throttle in a bend it felt as if the back end was about to swap places with the front, you had to keep the power on.
The early 1.6 engine was horrid, it had the oil return from the engine top drop back in right in front of a spinning conrod which encouraged the oil emulsify.
This blocked the engine breather system and then it would leak from everywhere, it was common to see the crankshaft oil seal blown out of place and the oil contaminating the clutch.
The engine electronic control was poor too, it would constantly advance the ignition timing till the knock sensor told it to retard, it's the only engine I've ever heard pink loudly on
part throttle.
Then they began rusting, firstly in the doors, then everywhere else.
The 2 litre "O'' Series was far better even if it was an old design, Great fun as the 2.0 EFI.
I don't think that these were much worse, if at all, than the Cavalier & Sierra.
Cavalier had a limited estate range, Sierra used old-nail iron block & head engines.
I think that the Cavalier estate was only available as a 1.6L.
IMO, ARG should have made estate versions of the MG 2.0i & Turbo.
3d printed parts I have a estate needs repairs like yours any help would be great
I drove a couple of these back in the day and the improved versions ('86 onwards I think) in 1600 guise were always better to drive I thought than the equivalent Cavalier or Sierra. I owned a 2.0 EFi VDP too and that was a fine car.
My friends step mum had a H reg 2.0 estate. One morning it wouldn't start so she poured boiling water over the engine. That didn't work.
What? My Grandad had three and they were all pretty reliable... apart from the one that set itself on fire outside a BMW dealership. Perhaps it was trying to tell us something.
As ever with BL, by the time they stopped making it (after way too long!), the Montego had finally become the car it should have been in the first place. My Mum had a G-reg 2.0GTI estate for eight years and (save for head gasket replacement at about the halfway stage) it was faultless. We sold it locally and saw it around regularly well into the 2000s, always looking in pretty good nick. Of course that had the later dashboard (a huge improvement on the 70s monstrosity in this one), the O-Series engine, the PG1 gearbox with a usable shift mechanism, better-quality plastics, better paint and better fit and finish. Plus the Prima diesels by then, too. If all that had been in place in the early 80s then the Montego would have had the success it deserved since the fundamental design was pretty good - very good in some areas.
Some would argue typical BL - too little, too late :/
@@ClassicsWorldUK Not even a case of 'too little' - that's what makes the whole BL saga so frustratingly compelling. If the Montego had been in production for 11 years and all they'd done in that time was fit a better-looking dashboard, then it would just be an under-developed, badly-built car and that would be that. But for the Montego - and most of the other stuff they made - it was more a case of "a lot, too late". The Montego underwent a lot of improvements and by the end of its life it was a good car. But unfortunately it wasn't a good [enough] car in 1984. Same with the Maestro. Same with the Rover SD1, same with the Princess, same with the Marina/Ital. Even the Allegro and the Maxi were better cars when they ended than they were launched. The only BL/Rover Group products which were 'right' straight from the box were the ones which were actually Hondas...
I owned estates, a new one in 1986 and replaced it with a lightly used one in 1992.
Loved them both and generally nice quality, especially the interiors, but...
The 1986 car rotted so quickly that it was MoT failure material within 6 years, while wheel bearings, shock absorbers and exhaust were very cheap and nasty and were regular consumable items. The 1.6 used to p**s oil from every pore, while the external oil plumbing used to clog with “mayonnaise”.
The 1989 2.0 (late pre-facelift) was a much better car.
Unfortunately, although people usually say that the quality “gets much better over time”, that’s generally not the case post the 1989/1990 facelift, where it lost its high quality interior to rampant cost cutting. For instance, there was no comparison between the early, high quality, Phillips electronic tune radio cassette and the later, Rover branded, market stall quality, piece of junk in the later cars.
Bumpers didn’t crack in the frost.
I had 2 estates, both from new. First one i had for 155,000 miles, traded it in for a Rover Montego 2 litre which was an improvement. Was also better than my beloved Cortinas
I Bought a Montega Estate in 1964
It’s nostalgic in the way chickenpox is nostalgic.
Seriously lads, a white, 1980’s Montego? I’d rather boke in my hands and clap.
This particular Montego is so very much HunNut standard😁👍
My dad had a 1.6 HL and it was a fine family car for many years only towards the end (and to be honest he didn’t really look after it that well) did it start to play up - rot wasn’t too horrendous but was starting to set in at around 10years old. His being an 88model the quality was improved and it took in many a holiday even over to France. He even snapped the cambelt on it - being his first belt driven car and not realising it needed changing - but thankfully, the s-series was a non-interference engine so all it took was a 30minutes change and all was well again - it was unfairly criticised as a car normally by owners of cars that weren’t any better. I’d love one now but they’re so hard to find
My parents had one and it was pretty faultless. Actually great to drive compared to their traded-in Cortina Mark 5.
I bought a 1985 Austin Montego 2 litre estate in 1990, it served me very well for 10 years, Good economy, good handling and ride, I used it for my business and as a family car, I only sold it because I needed a van, One time after a Ferrari day at a racing circuit I was driving home just cruising along going uphill and a Mercedes and BMW past me as if I was standing still, I changed down to 4th and put my foot down, then looked at the speed, 100 mph, it just felt so good.
mONTEEGooOoooOOOOo
They were not that bad their was loads I. The car trade low and high mileage
Can’t say iv driven a bad one
The most interesting one was an ex m.o.d
Saloon ,turbo diesel with 4 flexi reading lamps
Talks in a Top Gear style.
You’re lovely
How could you do this video without mentioning the MG versions, specifically the MG Turbo which on launch was quickest 0-60 car in its class. Eventually beaten by the Renault 21 Turbo I think.
So much beige
With militant Unions intent on destroying UK industry and weak incompetent management what should have been a fine car was undermined. My boss had a top spec white estate that looked fab with roof rails.
Now an mg turbo version .......
Just took a look on the 'How Many Left' website. 12 on SORN and none taxed and on the road.
The montego could have been a great car if vw built it instead of just haveing vw golf gearbox ! It looked good still does drove very well modern by comparison to cavalier which was good car but sogy allthough safe predictable handling and sierra ! It was awfull an improvement from cortina but still loose i actually prefered a lada for driveing fun than sierra ! 😂😂 and ladas were better in snow unless you had 2 concrete paving slabs in sierras boot 👍👍😅.Seriouslly though driveing a 1.6l montego from brand new estate was nice car its just soon after myb a year or so things went downhill struts wheelbearings carb steper motor autochoke ! Just poor british quality!Now if it had been built to vw standards it would have been the passat which especiall in estate form was a very simillar car and yet passat then right upto 1995 was 1 of the best cars ive known and owned 3 passats 2 saloons 1 estate 2 montegos 1 sallon 1 estate.Britain had motoring history i know BUT britain as much as im ashamed to say HAS NEVER actually made a good car allways shoddy poorly built unreliable and WILL breakdown !! pretty much FORD JAGUAR LANDROVER RANGE ROVER VAUXHALL EVEN TODAY !! 😂😂😂😂😂
Sorry but that old chestnut of blaming the workforce can't be allowed to pass. It took 7 years to bring to market because of management inertia and under investment. It was a deadly dull design which could not compare to the equivalent Sierra.
Possibly the worst car,s ever produced lol BOMBERS,ROTTON ROCKETS, SHOCKINGLY TERRIBLE.LOL
Scrap men didnt even want them lol
@@gerrygoodfellow5321 True! I eventually got £50 for mine - and that was only because someone wanted it for the perfect condition gearbox.
I had one used it as a cab never had any of the problems you quoted. It was the easiest car I ever worked on. I replaced a clutch at 180,000miles in under 2 hours, sold it at 249000 miles lost count of the number of passengers that said "this is a nice car" when told it was a BL Montego it was always "oh well it won't last then". I had the last laugh. Would buy one today especially the MG version if I could afford it.