More Bobmobiles

Work on the Renault 6 continues at a steady pace and there will be an update soon. In the meantime, an envelope arrived a few weeks ago from Barry, who had been sorting Bob's photos and found some not just of our Renault but of various other cars he owned over the years. Looking at what he drove provides an interesting insight into his character: he seems to have been a Ford man originally before getting into Renaults, then towards the end of his life he had a couple of Vauxhalls. Even though he never married and spent his whole life living alone so he didn't really need two cars, there were times he owned more than one, and of course the R6 sat unused in the garage for more than 20 years while other cars came and went.

5485 UE - Ford Popular 100E

This is probably the oldest of the cars in the photos and may have been Bob's first car. UE was one of the local Warwickshire registration codes so although almost certainly second-hand he presumably bought it locally. I don't know much about the car, or where and when the photo was taken, but he would have been 20 years old when the 100E ceased production in 1962 and there is an Austin A40 in the background so I think it was sometime in the 1960s.

I love this second photo, from the time when the country used to get thick snow and proper harsh winter but life carried on as normal. The location is instantly recognisable as the back alley behind Bob's house in Rugby, which hasn't changed much over the years, and on the left is his garage where we found the Renault 6.

EJU 246C - Ford Cortina Mark 1

A bigger Ford and as you can see from the photo Bob definitely owned this at the same time as the Popular, meaning 5485 UE must have lasted with him at least until the second half of the sixties. I don't know whether the Cortina replaced the Popular and this was an 'old meets new' photo before he sold the latter, or he had both cars in use at the same time.

The other photo was clearly taken while Bob was indulging in his railway hobby, and rail enthusiasts may be able to date it by the rolling stock in the background. None of these Fords are on the DVLA database so they didn't survive into the 1980s, but it is apparent that this one was registered during 1965 in Leicestershire.

6806 WD - Ford Anglia 105E estate

Another Ford, older than the Cortina and about which very little is known. This too has a Warwickshire registration and it is notable that all of Bob's cars were registered quite locally in Leicester, Birmingham or Warwickshire, although it is very likely he bought them second-hand as he didn't seem the type to waste his money on a brand new car. Unfortunately none of the photos are dated; there are code numbers written on the back but these don't contain an identifiable date and mean nothing to me.

375 GOF - Morris Minor 1000

An oddity among the three Fords and possibly his only BMC product, I don't know where this fitted in Bob's car history or how long he had it. I can at least identify an exact year when it was new as the GOF series was issued in Birmingham in 1960. The photo looks to have been taken in the same place as the one of the Popular and Cortina, probably at the end of Bob's road.

CNX 375J - the mystery car

An old numberplate was found in Bob's garage bearing this registration. There is no trace of it on the DVLA system so it didn't seem to last into the 1980s, and I was hoping there would be a photo of it among those Barry sent me, but sadly there isn't so I have no idea what sort of car it was. The CNX-J series was issued to all sorts of different vehicles so checking similar registrations doesn't give any clues to what it might have been.

All that remains of CNX 375J. I wonder what it was.

JNX 134L - Renault 6 850

This is the one we know all about as it's currently sitting in our garage. It seems to fit in Bob's car history at this point as we know he bought it in 1981, but he may have had other cars in between the Fords and this that didn't get photographed, possibly including the mysterious CNX 375J. There will be more about it coming soon.

MNX 708L - Renault 12 TL

Another green Renault, seemingly the same colour as the R6 was before he painted it, and Bob definitely owned this and the R6 at the same time as the photo shows it fitted with the roofrack that came with the R6 and is still with it now. Background material here includes an Austin Princess and a pair of Escorts so probably early eighties, and I'm not sure what the load on the roof is but it appears to have come out of the van behind.

This was almost the same age as the R6 and also had an NX registration, although MNX-L makes it slightly newer, registered in May 1973 against September 1972 for the R6. It was last taxed in September 1989 so is long gone now and the R6 actually outlasted it on the road.

HUT 308V - Renault 18 TS

This was the likely replacement for the R12 and although the photo makes it look gold, it too was green so there is a pattern emerging here. Registered in Leicester in January 1980, it had a short life and has been untaxed since it was just 13 years old so this one was also outlasted by the R6. I suspect the other Renault keys Barry found may have been for this, and the fact Bob still had them over 20 years after the car was scrapped is typical of his hoarding. It appears to have been his last Renault and maybe he couldn't buy any more as he only had the multiples of 6 and there is no such thing as a Renault 24!

E417 HBC - Lada Riva 1600 SLX

The newest of the cars photographed and a bit of a departure from the previous Fords and Renaults. This one is well remembered by his MBF colleagues and he apparently bought it when still quite new. I don't know how old it was when photographed but it looks very much worse for wear and the front wings in particular had rusted badly. The 1600 SLX was the top of the range Riva, identifiable by its chrome grille, and quite luxurious by Lada standards.

It apparently sat on his drive out of use for some time before he eventually disposed of it, the last tax or SORN expiring in 2003, but even though the car is long gone he kept the keys for some reason as I found them when looking for the Renault keys. I wonder if it perhaps ended up being exported back to Russia like so many other UK Ladas in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Bob must have owned three cars at this point: the R6 in the garage, the Lada dumped on the drive and whatever was in use (possibly the Astra).  


The car I remember Bob owning and attending MBF meetings in is a gold Mark 3 Astra estate (I think it might have been R761 BAU) that he bought from Barry. There are no photos of this but it is visible on his drive in Google StreetView. His last car though was an 03-reg silver Zafira; I don't remember him having this but it was languishing on his drive when I visited, having lain unused since he went into the home a couple of years earlier. If it wasn't for asking about this Zafira we'd never have found out about the Renault hiding in the garage and it might have been scrapped without any enthusiasts ever knowing it had been there, which would have been a crying shame.