Description
Author: Don Pither, Hardbound, 128 Pages, ISBN: 9780750925211, 1st Edition, 2001
he Reliant Robin is one of the most popular three-wheeled cars of all time. This distinctive, simple, efficient, cheap, small car has been a familiar feature of Britain's roads for the last thirty years. Often over the years these unsophisticated vehicles have been maligned and ridiculed, and the tiny Reliant company has frequently faced financial difficulty, but the car and the company have survived to become a fascinating piece of Britain's motoring heritage.
In this detailed and highly illustrated history, Don Pither tells the Reliant story, from the pre-war three-wheeled vans, through the Regal, the Rebel and the Bond Bug, to the Kitten, the Rialto and the Robin saloon. His book is an essential reference work for all Reliant owners and enthusiasts and makes revealing reading for all those who have a serious interest in automotive history.
Many of the established car-makers evolved from companies that built bicycles, then motorcycles. Reliant, too, arose from such small beginnings in 1935 when founder Tom Williams left a secure job as design engineer at Raleigh cycles in Nottingham to set up production of a three-wheeled small commercial van.
Author Don Pither describes how, after the Second World War, production resumed and in 1953 Reliant's first saloon -three-wheeler, the Regal Mk I, was introduced. Three years later came the Regal Mk III, which featured a moulded fibreglass body fitted to a box-section chassis. This form of construction has been maintained to the present day through a series of very successful designs that culminated in the famous Robin. .
But the book also records how Reliant brought out four-wheeled economy cars — the Rebel saloon and estate of 1965 and then the Kitten of 1975 — which were less successful than the company's three-wheeled products. And it describes how the company diversified by producing the Ant commercial vehicles in the 1970s and by taking over Bond Cars in 1969, a• merger that resulted in the unforgettable Bond Bug.
Reliant has survived many financial upsets over the years and has remained an independent manufacturer because of its self-sufficiency and loyal clientele. However, the company decided to cease production of the three-wheeled range of vehicles in December 2000 and import similarly sized four-wheeled cars from Europe to replace them. Production of such vehicles at their factory will also be possible in the future. Don Pither's book celebrates the achievements of this remarkable company, which has been one of the most underestimated car-makers in Britain.
Don Pither is a Reliant enthusiast and long-standing Scimitar owner, and he is the leading authority on the history of the Reliant company. His first book, Scimitar and Its Forebears, is the' definitive narrative history, and he has written a pictorial history of Reliant sports cars published by Sutton in 1999.
