Production totals

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dollysprint
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Production totals

Post by dollysprint » Tue Oct 29, 2013 5:36 pm

I have recently had confirmation from Gaydon that they hold no information on Production Totals for the 800. That is to say we know the total built but this cannot be broken down into body types and models, which is what I was hoping to achieve.
Actually even the total build numbers differ by some 4000 on the Mk1 and nearly 5000 on the Mk2.
On the Mk1 the 4000 missing chassis numbers could possibly be explained by Rover building some 3000+ Legends at Cowley and Honda building a similar number of 800's in Japan during 86/87. However the same cannot be said when it comes to Mk2 production, no such cross building took place.
In the same way there is no explanation why Rover started Mk2 production at chassis number 100001, built consecutive to 117697 then in the middle of 1992 suddenly missed nearly 33000 chassis numbers and restarted at 150001.
What has been confirmed is that the last 800, which once resided at Gaydon but now sold into private hands, held chassis number 260898 and was built on the 17th September 1998. It was a 2.5 Sterling auto in White Gold with cream and burgundy interior if memory serves. The 800 production lines were then turned over to full on 75 production.
The recently advertised for sale Fastback Sterling V878JPU has the chassis number 260878 so you can see how late it is and sadly I know at least half of the last 25 built have already been scrapped.
The database I have been compiling for the last 3 years now numbers some 5500 cars( or 4.6% of total Mk2 build) this may not sound like many but its more than the Daily Mail would use in a Mori-poll for a general election and they are usually accurate within a couple of percentage points. I can use the database in the same way to tell you when your car was built and how many of the body style/models were made. Clearly this is never going to be accurate to the enth degree but with the recent confirmation from Gaydon this is all we have. However it is somewhat annoying that the SD1 enthusiasts can tell you how many diesel SD1's were built or how many 6 cylinder models left Cowley. But in what was a computer age we will never know the exact number of 800 Vitesses built other than saying it was around 17500 and roughly breaking that down into saloons, fastbacks and coupes. However on a brighter note, Tim (Whitelion) almost certainly owns one of the earliest Mk1's known to survive and the recently advertised V878 is almost certainly one of the last.

Dave
1988 Sterling saloon 2.7 Auto Pulsar over gunmetal
1990 Sterling Saloon 2.7 Auto black over storm
1993 Coupe 2.7 auto white gold 1
2005 Ford Transit 2.4 lwb, Club van
2007 Jaguar X Type 2.2 manual Estate

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Re: Production totals

Post by vito » Tue Oct 29, 2013 7:34 pm

Great work Dave, like you say such a shame there's no more accuracy available, but nonetheless as accurate as it can be thanks to your consistent efforts, a valuable resource for time to come.
Gaz (or Gary if we're being formal)

2004 Streetwise Diesel 5 Door in Silver.

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Richard Moss
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Re: Production totals

Post by Richard Moss » Tue Oct 29, 2013 8:46 pm

Would any of the missing chassis numbers be explained by CKD kits sent to New Zealand?
Out in the desert with a 1998 Grand Cherokee V8, 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee 4L and a 1997 Chevy Tahoe V8. Back home: 1969 MGC GT

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Re: Production totals

Post by Very Tall Brad » Tue Oct 29, 2013 10:31 pm

Always a great read, Dolly. You're our very own Carol Vorderman/Peter Snow when it comes to the stats.
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Re: Production totals

Post by dollysprint » Tue Oct 29, 2013 11:06 pm

Richard Moss wrote:Would any of the missing chassis numbers be explained by CKD kits sent to New Zealand?
Good thought Richard
Do we have any New Zealand members that could supply chassis numbers or confirm build of CKD in that region.
Or anywhere else that the Rover may have relied on local build of kits.

Dave
1988 Sterling saloon 2.7 Auto Pulsar over gunmetal
1990 Sterling Saloon 2.7 Auto black over storm
1993 Coupe 2.7 auto white gold 1
2005 Ford Transit 2.4 lwb, Club van
2007 Jaguar X Type 2.2 manual Estate

dollysprint
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Re: Production totals

Post by dollysprint » Tue Oct 29, 2013 11:16 pm

Very Tall Brad wrote:Always a great read, Dolly. You're our very own Carol Vorderman/Peter Snow when it comes to the stats.
Bradders if I was Carol Vorderman I'd be playing with curves not stats, I shall now stop thinking of curves and get back to stats, I reckon about 38 28 32 in the horizontal position.
How did we get on to this and where's my swing-o-meter!

Dave
1988 Sterling saloon 2.7 Auto Pulsar over gunmetal
1990 Sterling Saloon 2.7 Auto black over storm
1993 Coupe 2.7 auto white gold 1
2005 Ford Transit 2.4 lwb, Club van
2007 Jaguar X Type 2.2 manual Estate

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Re: Production totals

Post by Richard Moss » Wed Oct 30, 2013 2:29 am

dollysprint wrote:
Richard Moss wrote:Would any of the missing chassis numbers be explained by CKD kits sent to New Zealand?
Good thought Richard
Do we have any New Zealand members that could supply chassis numbers or confirm build of CKD in that region.
Or anywhere else that the Rover may have relied on local build of kits.

Dave
This says that there was a long history of CKD assembly out there: http://www.aronline.co.uk/blogs/around- ... w-zealand/
Out in the desert with a 1998 Grand Cherokee V8, 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee 4L and a 1997 Chevy Tahoe V8. Back home: 1969 MGC GT

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Re: Production totals

Post by MG Mal » Wed Oct 30, 2013 9:33 am

Have asked Wayne Satogi off AR Online FBook page if there is any info he can Gather for us even if it's just a single chassis number from a breakers yard.

He lives down there and is a major ARG / MGR fan.

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Re: Production totals

Post by SJG » Wed Oct 30, 2013 1:13 pm

Dave, once again, thank you for all your efforts. I know it is partly to satisfy your own interest and curiosity but it really is appreciated and fascinating.
Simon

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Re: Production totals

Post by Paul Worthington » Thu Nov 21, 2013 12:59 am

Hi.
Just reading this post. It may be of interest that I recently [summer 2013] aquired 260714 which was converted to a 800 Sterling to a Regency LSE by MacNeillies. the official Rover coach builders and has the short [12"] Limosine extension. It is Oxford Blue on a 'V' plate with Tan Brown leather interior and had one owner from new. When I aquired it earlier this year [2013] it came with ALL the paperwork from the bulders, invoices, brochures, letters, everything, and has only 42000+ miles on the clock. Currently awaiting [Nov 2013] the dreaded headgasket job, one of many I have to repair. Done so many I now do these in my sleep!!!!! :shock:
Paul
Rover Sterling x 5 1997 [Y? Coz We Can!]
Rover 825 Si 1999
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dollysprint
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Re: Production totals

Post by dollysprint » Thu Nov 21, 2013 5:52 pm

Thanks for that Paul and welcome to the Forum. Perhaps if you have the know how and you dont mind a scan of the paperwork may be of interest to members and could be placed in the archive section.
From my point of view I would be interested in any delivery date from Rover to the coachbuilders. As far as I am aware this may be the last 800 limo built by McNellies. As far as a Rover build date goes it would be around first week of September 1998.

Dave
1988 Sterling saloon 2.7 Auto Pulsar over gunmetal
1990 Sterling Saloon 2.7 Auto black over storm
1993 Coupe 2.7 auto white gold 1
2005 Ford Transit 2.4 lwb, Club van
2007 Jaguar X Type 2.2 manual Estate

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Re: Production totals

Post by BennyVitesse » Thu Nov 21, 2013 9:59 pm

Gaydon is inconsistent at best and lazy at worst. It may even be worth a second prod to someone a bit higher up. I am aware of them telling the MMOC the following excuses....

"No records left"
"The Microfiche is damaged/ no longer readable"
"We barely have anything on Montego"
"You'll need to come down to Gaydon in person and read it"

This went on for ages and eventually they decided they had everything and now offer it under their Heritage Certificate scheme!

If they have records for a car built until 1994 in Cowley then in theory they should have them for at least the XX.
Ben

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dollysprint
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Re: Production totals

Post by dollysprint » Thu Nov 21, 2013 11:22 pm

Benny I hear what you are saying and you may well be right, its why I dealt with Gillian Bardsley, so started right at the top. I am being told that at the time 1998/99 Rover became useless at passing over information,yet strangely every chassis number for the Rover BRM is known, but maybe that had more to do with the Owens, I dont know. I offered to spend a couple of days at Gaydon sorting through the records myself.Her reply was there were no records to sort, but like you I am sceptical. I have been asking now for 2 years and my last approach(last month) was after a fellow anorak tipped me off that the last of any archive material was sent from Longbridge to Gaydon in September 2012.
So for now thats what we have, I shall contact Gaydon again next year to see if that situaton has changed. There is also one more avenue and thats to contact the company holding the EKA records. However at the moment its a commercial business and for us it would tell us nothing prior to 1995, so pretty minimal. I haven't given up yet.

Dave
1988 Sterling saloon 2.7 Auto Pulsar over gunmetal
1990 Sterling Saloon 2.7 Auto black over storm
1993 Coupe 2.7 auto white gold 1
2005 Ford Transit 2.4 lwb, Club van
2007 Jaguar X Type 2.2 manual Estate

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Very Tall Brad
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Re: Production totals

Post by Very Tall Brad » Tue Jan 28, 2014 7:08 pm

Someone asked me a while ago about American Sterling sales. Here are the official figures:

1987 - 14,200
1988 - 8,901
1989 - 5,907
1990 - 4,015
1991 - not known but, I would assume, not very many at all.

Brad
No longer an 800 owner!

dollysprint
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Re: Production totals

Post by dollysprint » Tue Jan 28, 2014 8:54 pm

Very Tall Brad wrote:Someone asked me a while ago about American Sterling sales. Here are the official figures:

1987 - 14,200
1988 - 8,901
1989 - 5,907
1990 - 4,015
1991 - not known but, I would assume, not very many at all.

Brad
Nice one Brad, I have figures of 1878 sales for 1991, nearly all of them heavily discounted and left over from shipments the previous year.
I have been trying to find out Acura Legend sales for the same year, without success. However 1992 Honda US sales totalled 768,845(all models)

Dave
1988 Sterling saloon 2.7 Auto Pulsar over gunmetal
1990 Sterling Saloon 2.7 Auto black over storm
1993 Coupe 2.7 auto white gold 1
2005 Ford Transit 2.4 lwb, Club van
2007 Jaguar X Type 2.2 manual Estate

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