Reliant Engineering Co. (Tamworth) Ltd., Tamworth, Staffordshire. UK 1952 -

Reliant Motor Co. Ltd., Tamworth, Staffordshire. UK 1963 - 1995

Reliant Cars Ltd., Burntwood, Staffordshire. UK 1998 to date

(Imported vehicles and parts supply.)

The Reliant Engineering Company was started in 1935 by T. L. Williams, who had been responsible for the design of the Raleigh three wheeled car. Raleigh, who were bicycle manufacturers, had built a number of experimental motorcycle based three wheeled vehicles over the years. It was not until 1933 that they went into production with the Raleigh Safety Seven. Williams purchased the manufacturing rights from Raleigh in 1935 and the Raleigh ceased production in the following year.

Initially the Reliant was a delivery van with a single front wheel and an Austin 7 engine coupled to a 3-speed gearbox driving the rear axle by means of a propeller shaft. When the Austin 7 was discontinued in 1939 Reliant acquired the tooling and subsequently made their own version.

The first passenger car was introduced in 1952 as the Reliant Regal, a four seat open tourer. The body was made of aluminium and mounted on a steel box section chassis, and used the side valve 747cc Austin derived engine, giving only 16bhp, it was only capable of the same performance as the pre-war Austin 7 and struggled to make 60mph. It's main advantages over rivals such as the Bond Minicar were the ability to carry 4 people in reasonable comfort and it was similar to any other small car except for only having three wheels. This had advantages as it was in a lower taxation class so that it was very economical to run.

By 1956 the Regal Mk III had fibreglass body panels attached to a traditional ash frame. The styling had become less angular and there was a saloon version alongside the open tourer.

The first major change came in 1962 with the introduction of a new engine of Reliant own design. It was a neat little overhead valve unit of 598cc with all the castings made of aluminium. The new body was now an integral fibreglass moulding known as the 3/25 and the open top model was discontinued. In 1967 the engine was enlarged to 701cc and was designated the 3/30.

The Reliant Robin replaced the previous model in 1973 and the engine was enlarged to 750cc. The body was styled by Ogle Design of Letchworth headed by Tom Karen. A further increase in engine capacity to 850cc came about in 1976.

The Reliant Rialto was introduced in 1981 with revised styling by Ogle Design and became the Robin in 1999.

 The van version continued to be produced in parallel with the other three wheeler cars and was made famous by the TV series "Only Fools and Horses”.

 Reliant were also responsible for the manufacture of the Bond Bug after they acquired Bond in 1969. This Ogle Design used the Reliant engine and transmission.

The four wheel cars:

In 1954 Reliant developed a relationship with Autocars of Haifa to enable them to assemble the 3-wheel van from kits of parts. By 1958 they were building a car of local manufacture in Israel using Reliant designed and produced body moulds and proprietary engines and drive train from Ford. This first model was the Sussita estate car.

Reliant also produced similar packages for other countries which did not have a local motor manufacturing industry. There was Anadol saloon for Otosan Industries of Turkey, the Mebea pick-up truck for Greece and the Sipani Dolphin for India.

In 1960 Autocars embarked on a bold plan to build a sports car for the American market. Mr. Shubinski the managing director of Autocars had seen the Leslie Ballamy designed chassis for the EB Debonair and the fibreglass bodies available for kit cars and made by Ashley Laminates of which Mike Eyre was a director. Shubinski suggested to Ray Wiggins of Reliant that a marriage of these two components could be made into an effective sports car for his project.

The first 98 Sabra cars were built at the Reliant factory and two were made with right hand drive and exhibited at the 1961 Earls Court Motor Show as Sabres.

In the following two years about 200 Sabre 4s were built of which 55 were sold in the UK.

There was a twin SU carburettor conversion for the Ford Consul engine to increase the power output to 90bhp, but this was not sufficient to satisfy it's critics and so the 2.6-litre Ford six-cylinder engine from the Zephyr/Zodiac range was fitted to the restyled Sabre in 1963. With improved suspension and a GT coupé body the Sabre 6, as it was now called, could reach 108mph and in this form it won it's class in the 1963 Alpine Rally and a sister car was second. In all 77 of these Sabre 6s were made of which 2 were open sports cars.

In 1962 David Ogle Design were showing a prototype based on the Daimler SP250 floor pan. This car was built for John Ogier who had taken over as chairman of the company after David's tragic death on the A1 at Old Welwyn when he was trapped in the wreckage of his racing Ogle Mini on the way to race at Brands Hatch in 1961. The car caught fire and he was burned to death because the fibreglass body was not fire retardant. Following this all fibreglass cars had to made with a fire retardant mixed into the resin.

The result was the SE4A, which retained the straight 6 engine of the Sabre 6 , and was to be better known as the Scimitar, which sold 296 up to 1966 when it was replaced by the SE4B with the V-6 Ford engine with 3-litres and followed by the SE4C economy model with the 2.5-litre Ford engine. This coupé was made from 1964 to 1970 and a total of 1,003 were made during this time.

The Scimitar was the start of a long standing collaboration between Reliant and Ogle Design and a number of experimental body styles were tried out on the Scimitar chassis. In 1965 there was the GTS (Glazing Test Special) which had an estate car style of sports body with curved Triplex Sundym heat absorbent glass panels in the roof. The car was displayed at all the European Motor Shows before being bought by HRH the Duke of Edinburgh. After about 18 months he sold it back to Triplex, but it was obviously well received by the Royal family as subsequently Princess Ann had a series of 8 Scimitar GTE models.

In 1970 an automatic gearbox option was made available, and in 1971 there was an overdrive option on the manual gearbox. With a top speed of 125mph and the ability to carry four adults and luggage, here was a sports car for the family man. The result was a significant increase in sales to about 50 a week. In all there were 9,416 of the earlier GTE model made between 1969 and 1975.

Reliant’s other venture into the mass market was with the Rebel, a small 4-wheel two-door saloon introduced in 1964. It used the little Reliant 598cc engine but was not a match for the Austin Mini or even the Ford Anglia in equipment or price. The engine was enlarged as on the 3-wheelers, but by the time it was superceded by the Kitten in 1975 only about 700 had been sold.

The Kitten, with the larger 848cc engine was a 4-wheel version of the Robin. It was more attractively styled and with better performance it sold 4,074 before being withdrawn in 1982.

The 1,300cc unit gave 69bhp and was attached to a 4-speed gearbox whereas the 1,600cc engine gave 96bhp and the gearbox was a 5-speed unit, and in this form it was capable of 110mph. It was available from March 1985 but although the target of 3,000 units a year was planned it only sold 550 were sold in the first 9 months. Sales were even slower subsequently with 277 in 1986 and only 183 in 1987. The introduction of an 1,800cc Nissan Silvia engined model which increased the top speed to 125mph did nothing to lift the dismal sales figures.

There were a number of problems which conspired to spoil what was quite a nice little sports car. Firstly the Michelotti design was fine in the styling buck and in the aluminium, but large flat fibreglass panels show every tiny blemish and give a poor finish. The early cars had un-galvanised chassis which rusted very quickly and there was a design fault with the attachment of the torque arm from the differential which tore out of the chassis mounting. The CVH overhead camshaft engines were supplied from Ford's Industrial Division and there was always a suspicion that they were underperforming.

In 1988 the body was restyled by William Towns and the car was now called the SS2 and there was a further revision in 1990 and was called the SST. These were nice little cars, but the demand had reduced to a trickle, and the Tamworth factory was sold in 1988. Production was continued at Kettlebrook alongside the three-wheelers and the last version was the Sabre with an 1,800cc Rover K series engine.

The company went into receivership in December 1995 and was purchased from the receiver by Jonathan Haynes (son of William Haynes of Jaguar fame). The Robin was reinstated in May 1996 and production rose to about 20 cars a week. There were plans to build a new sports car but these were dropped when Haynes left the company in September 1998.

 The company changed hands again and was acquired by Glen UK with plans to import various microcars and three wheeled trucks.

There had been a contract with Ford to build the RS200 Group B rally cars for the 1985-1986 period but this project was abandoned when the cars were banned from European rallies.

In 1989 the company became the suppliers of the Metrocab for the London taxicab operators.

Bibliography:

Bibliography:Reliant-the Scimitar and it's Forebears, by Don Pither, published by Court Publishing, 1987