This superbly presented Roadster was subject to a professional restoration during 2014 and 2017 which included a full body strip down and back to bare bare metal respray, flat and machine polish, new mohair hood, interior wood, carpets and rechroming. It recently benefits from brakes overhaul, new oil, filter and battery. It has been unused since 2015. Six registered keepers. It is believed that the car has spent some time in France. The history file contains restoration invoices, MoT history dating from 2006 to 2019 when last issued at 74,144 miles (current mileage recorded at 74,220) also some early photographs of the car, including one with John Nettles, TV star of Bergerac, being driven in the car at a car show in the nineties (see last pic)
A landmark model in the history of the Coventry firm, the unforgettable Triumph Roadster was one of the first post-war designs to bear the Triumph name. Standard was already supplying Jaguar with a 1,776cc overhead-valve engine and four-speed gearbox for the latter’s 1½-Litre saloon, and these were chosen for the new car.
The dicky seat in the rear had its own divided fold up windscreen and was the last production car with this feature. Only 2,501 TR1800 models were manufactured and there has been nothing like it before or since. Its sweeping coachwork styling making it unique. The front had large separate headlamps and the radiator was well back from the front between large “coal scuttle” wings.
This Roadster has been retrospectively fitted with floor-mounted Central Gear Change in place of the right hand steering column arrangement which was very imprecise.
There is an exclusive Club for Triumph Roadsters which is an excellent point of reference for sourcing spares and providing technical information regarding the restoration and operation of Roadsters.
Any trial inspection welcomed. Trailered transport to anywhere on UK mainland at £1 pr mile (one way only charged)
Comes with valuable original hand tools, starting handle, old invoices, V5 and MOT until to Feb 2020..
For more info call or text John on 07909 231414.
Marque History
After the second world war Mr. John Black, owner of Standard Motor Company, was thinking about how to improve his product-line of cars. Standard delivered engines to Swallow Sidecar Company (soon thereafter to be known as Jaguar Cars) who build nice sports cars fitted with the Standard engines.
John Black saw the nice S.S. sports cars using “his” engines and decided that he had to build sports cars too. In 1945 John Black decided to acquire Triumph and what was left of it, from that day his company was named “the Standard-Triumph Company”.
The Roadster would become the bridge between the pre-war Gloria, Dolomite and Southern Cross, and the entire extended TR family. In both styling and engineering, it was a great leap forward into the past, with its huge separate headlamps, upright grille and swelling fenders, and its body-on-frame construction.
The original Triumph Roadster engine was a version of Standard’s 1.5-litre, four-cylinder side-valve design that had been converted to overhead valves by Harry Weslake and built by Standard exclusively for SS-Jaguar before World War II. The Triumph version differed from the Jaguar version in having a 6.7:1 compression ratio instead of the Jaguar’s 7.6:1 and a downdraught Solex carburettor instead of the Jaguar’s side-draught SU.
The only significant update in the Roadster’s production came in September 1948 for the 1949 models, when the 2088 cc Vanguard engine, transmission, and rear axle were fitted. A retrograde step was the fitting of a three-speed gearbox even though it now had synchromesh on bottom gear. Apart from minor modifications to the mounting points, the chassis, suspension and steering were unaltered. This later version of the Roadster was given the model designation TRA.
