bond 875 just came up for grab

[plas man]

I would have thought the Bond 875 would be worth restoring - maybe not in value but as motoring heritage , company out of production , around 3,500 made (that includes Mk1 Mk2 and vans) , less than a couple of hundred survived , only a handful roadworthy .
What ever is decided Radial tyres are a must

[steven mandell]

No no. The steering yolk allows the front wheel to turn, as normal, but as it takes on more angle it leans it over. More like a motorcycle.

I was thinking that you meant caster, but now see how you were saying that increased cater affects camber progressively with turn in.

To your suggestion that I buy a Bond 1,000cc - in addition to liking my three wheelers to stay right side up,  I also require them to avoid inclinations towards the vertical.

[plas man]

Bond steering don't have a King Pin.
Careful on copying Minicar steering its patented .

(I was once failed MOT on a King Pin ? , I argued , in the end it was the working floating back plate that the examiner had never seen - it passed ! )

[steven mandell]

A picture or drawing of the mechanism used by Bond could be illuminating here.

[AndrewG]

All I could find in a short search was:

[steven mandell]

Thanks Andy.
Is it a full fiberglass monocoque?
Even if so, it does not appear robust enough to ease worries.
I would at least add a triangulating member to the leading arm, and a large aluminum plate to back up the smaller steel one that mounts to the firewall.
Might also add some thin plywood and big washers one the occupant side of the firewall to absorb and spread out incipient stress loads over a wider area, and thus closer to the strengthening flanges at the perimeter of this flat in the casting.

What have others done in this regard.
If others have failed in use or accident - what did the failure look like?

[Big Al]

The construction has some commonality with the Berkeley, I think. It has aluminium  panelling in the floor structure, probably with steel stiffeners , and pick up points where there is stress, I forget. The rear takes its cues from the Imp donor. It is of course a closed car, so gains strength from that., meaning that the floor is a light structure.

Modifying the structure. I do not know about the bulkhead and if folk have made efforts to improve its strength. We are back to the point that it is adequate for what the car is designed for. It is not, if owners choose to do things it is not designed for. Back in the day, that was the owners problem and responsibility to other road users. Nowadays it seen as less so. I think that is a wrong move, but shortly we will be banned from even driving cars, relying on computers to create all the accidents. Is that progress? If your thick, or useless, I guess it is. But encouraging ignorance is anti Darwinism in action.

What I do know is that some cars had extra radiators, moved battery and even concrete kerbing section bonded into the front of the car to move the centre of gravity forward and improve cooling at the same time. I do not know if the MkII version had a more central centre of gravity as part of the facelift. It certainly would not be a great problem to beef the bulkhead up.

[plas man]

Al is right about the body with box section aluminium built in along with a few steel bits , bulkhead strength is accomplished with full width parcel/glove shelf .
Also it must be born in mind that the prototype was all that one could wish for , BUT when Bond submitted it to the government for testing it failed on the weight , coming in at over 9 hundred weight instead of under 8 , so drastic measure's at the drawing board took place , starting with the mudguard/floor area around the front wheel , petrol tank, along with other weight saving items , the glass fibre doors with triplex winding windows was replaced with flimsy alloy ones with PX sliding windows , side and rear windows was replaced with PX, seat frames modified , smaller tyres fitted ,  heater pipes reduced from 1/2 inch to 3/8th's , the list goes on ! , and finally they fitted a low compression engine .
thus you got what you have to-day . the 875 unit pushing 8 cwt along instead of the 12 cwt of the Imp/Husky van .   

[steven mandell]

On its "government testing - it failed on weight".  Meaning it was too heavy, and many parts of the design that were needed for structural/ occupant safety, as well as reliability/ durability of the vehicle got functionally down graded for the sake of light weighting.

I am all for sensible light weighting, but am shocked that a government would require modifications to an already minimal design that reduced crash integrity, and hence both occupant safety, and durability / reliability of a vehicle.
This is so completely opposite of what legislators have required in increasing doses  for the last near half century in the US, that I cannot conceive of what your beaurocrats were thinking.

Somebody please fill in the big blank here.

[Rusty Chrome (Malcolm Parker)]

In pre-Ralph Nader days structural/ occupant safety was not a factor. Government constraints/ regulations on general design at this time were more about brakes, lights and steering. The weight limit was nothing to do with safety, it was to do with the rate of tax payable - both annual (vehicle excise duty) and on purchase. In 1965 the annual tax on a 8cwt three-wheeler was £8 a year (@$206 today). If it was over 8cwt (or had 4 wheels) it would be £17 10s (@$415 today)

[DaveMiller]

And beyond the tax difference was the difference in licence required.  Below 8cwt (~400 kg) the car could be driven by those who had just a motorcycle licence.  Above that weight, and despite its three wheels, it would require a car licence.

[steven mandell]

Thanks for the explanations.
In the US we get taxed on vehicle value only.
At least for the older vehicles that have not exchanged recently for significant sums, this amount is quite a bit less than you Brits are being charged.
However for a well known high value vehicle, registration can be quite expensive here also, although the DMV's assigned valuations are typically more influenced by a depreciating scale that uses the last of the actual vehicle's reported sale price as a set point.
I believe this to be true even on appreciating, but not recently sold vehicles.

[messyman]

Wow a fair bit of reading material to go through ....well to keep u upto date the 875 has landed today
Plus over last weekend I managed to bag a reliant realto se

[Big Al]

The tax on the road for vehicles has changed several times in its rating sources since the '60's. The great thing is pre 1973 cars attract no road tax now. Pre 1960 require no MOT either. So you only need insurance. I do not do modern cars so I have lost touch with the latest tax regime. It based on artificial CO2 production statistics. I think.

[messyman]

Well I try and get some pics up for the weekend of the project s that are going on