The best of Bicester

Sunday 22nd April was the annual 'Drive It Day' so that meant no shortage of classic car shows. My choice of destination once again was the Sunday Scramble at Bicester Heritage, one of the largest and finest events of the year. Even in the twelve months since the last Scramble I attended, the site has continued to develop and expand, and its world-class reputation grows year by year. The place truly is a petrolhead's paradise and the great weather helped this Scramble become the biggest ever, with over 4000 tickets sold and more than a thousand visiting cars.

The spirit of Onslow is alive and well

There has already been a lot of media coverage, but these features always concentrate on the exotic stuff with arty photos of multi-million pound Ferraris and Bentleys. That's not my style so my self-declared mission was to search out the mundane everyday classics that so often get overlooked yet hold far more personal memories. There were plenty of these quietly hiding among the exotica, so here's my own round up of the highlights, a very different take on the event from what you'll read elsewhere.

A Hull of an auction

How could any car lover ever forget that famous moment in 2014 when Jaguar Land Rover announced they had purchased the entire car collection amassed by dentist Dr James Hull for a rumoured £100 million? This was believed to be the country's largest private collection and consisted of no less than 543 cars, which Dr Hull would only sell as one lot as he wanted it to remain intact with the new owner. Four years on, there was much excitement when news broke in February that a hundred surplus vehicles from this collection would be sold in a dedicated 'Affordable Classics' sale by Brightwells at Bicester Heritage on 21st March.

Just a small selection. Not what you might have expected from Dr Hull's collection.

I unfortunately wasn't able to attend in person but I've crunched some numbers and come up with my analysis of the auction. All figures quoted are the hammer prices, to which VAT and a 10% premium had to be added so the final costs were significantly higher.

Scrambling for Drive It Day

Bicester Heritage is somewhere every classic car fan really must visit. Based on the former RAF Bicester site, this unique place is a mecca for vehicle enthusiasts and aims to be the UK's first business park dedicated to classic motoring, hosting car clubs, workshops, dealers, storage facilities, driving experiences and much more. Sunday 23rd April was the national Drive It Day and one of Bicester Heritage's three annual 'Sunday Scramble' open days held in January, April and October, and being just a few miles from home it was a nice little run for the Maxi. It had been a couple of years since I last visited, and both the site and the event have grown massively since then. It has been suggested that more than 4000 tickets were sold and the majority seemed to be for exhibitors so there must have been well over a thousand cars on display.

When did you last see a Vauxhall Viceroy? This bland-looking saloon was one of the rarest cars there.