Reliant Scimitar - a super cool 1970s sports car (Princess Anne's favourite car!)

RELIANT SCIMITAR

For many, the name Reliant conjures up images of Del Boy and his van, but realistically, the jewel in the crown of the Reliant range is the lovely Scimitar. Made from 1964 to 1986, these are delicious sports cars so alluring, that Princess Anne not only owned one but EIGHT in total - with the first being a present from her parents for her joint 20th birthday and Christmas present.

Her last, 1420 H, clocked in over 110 thousand miles before being sold and put on show at the Great British Car Journey museum in Derbyshire. If you’re wondering what the plate signifies, it is a nod to her role as the Colonel in Chief of the 14th/20th King’s Hussars.

Anyway, back to the Scimitar, the car was made for a smidge over two decades and started with the GT SE4 which was launched in 64 and then replaced by the SE5 and SE5a in 1972.

The initial car was a coupe inspired by the styling of the Daimler SP250 prototype combined with the chassis of a 64 Reliant Sabre. The Ford engines were used straight from the top - the early cars were powered by the same 2.6 straight six they’d used in the Zephyr and Zodiac - so it makes perfect sense that the engine in this is the 3 litre V6 Essex engine.

The brochures of the time advertise it as being able to exceed 125mph, with 144bhp and a fuel consumption overall of 28 miles per gallon for the 3 litre - which is only 4 below what’s advertised for the 2.5.

The Scimitar isn’t the only non-Ford to use this and you see them used in TVRs and Marcos too.

This particular example we’re out in today is a very late SE5 - so late in fact you might look at it and think ‘wait a minute, the early SE5s don’t have that’ but as it draws to a close in 1971, there are bits being pinched from the SE5a boxes to fulfil orders.

The SE5 was in production from 1968 until 1972 and the body design was very much the world of Tom Karen at Ogle design - now this is a name you’ll have definitely of heard of before because he was an underrated genius who devised the design of many 20th century memorable icons such as the Bond Bug, the Robin and the Raleigh Chopper.

You might think Tom and his team at Ogle spent several years on this overhaul, but in fact, they transformed the car and created the GTE SE5 in less than 12 months and it sported longer chassis frame, revised suspension, relocated 20 gallon fuel tank and various other small revisions such as putting the spare wheel under the bonnet to give more space in the back.

Becca, the co-owner of this particular car, tells me that some owners of the era found this placement of the spare to be problematic and it caused overheating problems.

In terms of the suspension, it is exactly as you might hope with independent double wishbone coil springs and damper units and anti roll bar. The rear is coil spring, damper units to axle located by trailing arms and laterally by Watts linkage.

The chassis on these is a box section pressed steel with cruciform, double dipped in protective paint.

It’s got rack and pinion steering and brakes are servo assisted discs to front and drums to rear, all finished with a fully synchro 4 speed box with optional overdrive.

The list of options on these is plentiful and includes, as stated in the brochure, radio/stereo cassette, fog lamps, electric windows, electric aerial, leather trim, duotone paint, electric mirrors and for the GTE, optional sunroof.

There’s also the section marked ‘normally fitted’, again, additional costs but ones which were opt out not opt in and these included the tinted glass, power steering and wolfrace slots.

The SE5 was replaced with the SE5A in 1972 and production on the Scimitar ended overall in 86.