Lancia Motor Club

Any Appia owner willing to submit their car to a Classic and Sports Car photo opportunity. Comparing to a Riley 1.5 I believe. Henley area west of London in September date flexible. No driving required.

Please email me if you are interested?

Thanks

Tim Heath
press@lanciamc.co.uk

Just back from a flying visit to the UK and picked up a copy of the May C&SC. Nice 6 page article comparing Charles Shelton's lovely 3rd series Appia berlina and an elegant Riley One point five.

Love the red leather and spot lights on the Appia

Same edition has a "spot the Fulvia saloon" (?? Simon's KPR) at Barnet college

Well done everyone !

Riddled with mistakes.

Yes there are quite a few errors in the article but so what!  Andrew isn't into the technical stuff and the article was really about how BMC missed an opportunity to capitalise on the Riley name by developing an ongoing range of modern sporting saloons so he was just using the Appia as an example of what happened elsewhere. Also just really a foil for the Riley for the photo shoot.  He is very much into British cars of the 50s and 60s but he found that he loved the Appia (who doesn't).  He is a huge man and was really surprised that there was enough space in it for him to get in and drive.  I enjoyed driving it back along the M4 holding the speedo at an indicated 80 (which is, of course somewhat less than a true 80 in case any police read this) all the way back to Wiltshire.

Interesting: I met Andrew last week and we discussed the feature at some length: Why he didn't check the facts beforehand is still beyond me.

I was interested to see on the forum comments about the C&SC article.
I had offered my Appia for the photo shoot but when I asked  Andrew for a copy of the text before publication
he refused. As I thought he might do a ‘Clarkson' on my car or get all the details wrong.   I withdrew the offer of my car.  

I think it is a nicely written piece avoiding the unnecessary car to car performance comparison, and placing the Appia on its rightful pedestal!

I agree, it flows nicely and shows a growing appreciation of the Italian Appia. However, in my view, this does not excuse the mistakes.

The mistakes are a bit odd as, in order to help with the technical background, I took with me to the photoshoot the Jan 13th 1961 copy of Autocar which has a four page road test (with tech details) of the SIII.  Andrew read it with interest and sometime afterwards told me that he had purchased a copy for his own reference.  But, as I said earlier, I don't think the mistakes matter much as those of us who know about Appias will spot them instantly while those who don't will live on in blissful ignorance while having been made aware of many of the car's excellent qualities, which is what really matters. 
Now, we still want volunteers for another article featuring S1, 2 and 3 berlinas- this time in AutoItalia - and, rest assured, if it comes off, I will ensure that Martin Buckley makes no mistakes - not that he would, in any case. Incidentally, a good example of Michael Ward's excellent photography is in the May edition of that mag which features, inter alia, a certain Flaminia convertible with an Alfa 2600.