As the 1990s dawned, MG was in a pickle.
New owner British Aerospace had finally provided the budget to create the new roadster it had long known the public wanted, but the F wouldn’t be ready until 1995, while Mazda was having huge success with the new MX-5 and a burgeoning TVR was set to rejuvenate its roadster.
Its solution? Restart production of the iconic B – already dead for a decade and dating from the early 1960s – after mild modernisation on a shoestring budget.
British Motor Heritage made a B shell for classic restorations, so MG took this and fitted it with new bumpers and wings, wider tracks, new dampers, Rover’s 190bhp 3.9-litre V8 and a much classier wood and leather cabin.
MG readily admitted the new RV8 was “a recreational pursuit that just happens to take the form of a motor car”, which was a very good thing, as we found that “for those who buy British sports cars for their dynamic ability, the RV8 rules itself out of the running almost immediately”.
After giving it just two stars for its terribly outdated feel (although conceding it would be ideal for a certain type of driver), we pitted it against TVR’s new Chimaera, a development of the Griffith with a 240bhp 4.0-litre version of the same V8 for £800 more, at £26k.
“The TVR not only has the MG beaten hands down in virtually every dynamic area,” we said, “it also has a far bigger boot and a roomier cabin and creates a lot less wind noise.” Sky is blue. Water is wet. And just 330 RV8s were sold in the UK.
Asian royals spending billions on hoarding rare cars
Brunei enjoyed an economic boom after gaining independence in 1984, and its royals spent lavishly on luxury life – including Sultan Hassanal and Prince Jefri secretively building up a vast collection of luxury cars, many of them bespoke.
In 1993, we heard the royals had more than 100 Rolls-Royces, a similarly vast number of Ferraris, including five F40s, three of the seven Cizeta V16Ts built and no fewer than 63 new Mercedes-Benz 600 SECs – to be gifted to dinner guests. The Bruneian embassy soon called us to downplay the collection’s size, but undeniable glimpses and whispers continued to leak out in the following years.