Development of the Hillman Imp

Third cold climate test
(Scandinavia, 1964 - Production & development)

Part of Kenneth Sharpe's memories

For details of this test I am really pushing my memory. We had so many balls in the air with Imp Sport, Imp Van, Singer variants and of course more importantly current production and service problems, that I cannot recall any one particular detail of the test, not even the test team. I hope somebody out there can fill in the details. I feel sure Mike Rushall would be there and there must have been a fitter/tester as well as an engine man.
The route we took is more certain because I have some photos taken on the way.

One car we took was a Singer Chamois and the other I think was an Imp Sport.

We started out going to Rotterdam, then:

• Copenhagen
• Sweden
• Oslo
• Roros - this was the base we used for the whole test.

The area is fine for carburetion tests: the temperature is (or was) reliably low and the traffic light. For controlled heater testing it is not so good, because there are masses of small hills to make it difficult to obtain consistent stabilization of interior temperatures. Bear in mind we were using a steady 30 mph and the total time to stabilize was about 30 minutes. Driving normally at normal speeds an overall assessment was easily made.

The return trip was made via Copenhagen and Rotterdam.

KS4069: Passing some slower transport.

KS4071: Build up of snow on rear window. There were (probably still are) some strict laws about visibility through side and rear windows. Reg.: AWK 782B