Innocenti died in 1966; his son took over, but lost money and British Leyland bought the company in 1972.The Bertone design house then created a modern, angular hatchback based on Mini components, and it was launched in 1975. The same year, De Tomaso bought Innocenti and by 1982 the Bertone Mini had a Daihatsu engine. By 1993 it was all over after the company’s sale to Fiat in 1990, but the name lived until 1996 on cast-off Fiats imported to Italy from Brazilian and Yugoslavian outposts.Defining model: Bertone Mini 90 and 120, the modern hatchbacks British Leyland never had.They said: A little added style goes a long way.We say: Strange that the Italians built better British cars.. When Gordon Brown got up in the House of Commons the other day to deliver his Pre-Budget Report he said something that was truly terrifying. No, it wasn’t the bit about him borrowing £176,000,000,000 over the next six years.
Nor was it when he discussed the Gershon review of public sector efficiency, which sounds deeply ominous. Nor even was it when he started talking about mucking about with the housing market. It is a great pity, because the case for drivers turning to LPG is, or was, an extremely powerful one, and still could be if Mr Brown would only resist the temptation to lob another grenade at the long-suffering British motorist. So let try to me explain why, even with Mr Brown’s twitching, tax-grabbing fingers, LPG might still be a good idea for you. I speak as a convert.I had always thought, perhaps like you, that LPG was a rather cranky sort of thing to be “into” With reason. When I was at school we had a chemistry teacher who resembled the “nerdy professor”played by Griff Rhys Jones in those Vauxhall ads.
He had one of those beards-without-a-moustache arrangements that, when combined with a bald pate, makes the wearer look as though he’s accidentally put his head on upside down that morning. Anyway, back then, after the great oil shock of ‘73, our chemistry teacher had his blue 1967 Rover 2000 converted to LPG, and we all thought it, well, a bit cranky and the sort of thing that only a chemistry teacher from Leicester would go in for. We were right.It wasn’t long before he was explaining that LPG is the generic name for commercial propane and commercial butane. These are hydrocarbon products produced by the oil and gas industries. Commercial propane predominantly consists of hydrocarbons containing three carbon atoms, mainly propane (C3H8).
Commercial Butane predominantly consists of hydrocarbons containing four carbon atoms, mainly n- and iso-butanes (C4H10).They have the special property of becoming liquid at atmospheric temperature if moderately compressed and reverting to gases when the pressure is sufficiently reduced. Advantage is taken of this property to transport and store these products in the liquid state, in which they are roughly 250 times as dense as they are when gases. I got a B in my O level, you know.But 30 years on, and – hey presto – last week I found myself driving the spiritual successor to the Rover 2000, a Rover 75 in Tourer form with, yes indeed, LPG power. How spooky is that?Now, I’m no crank, and I don’t have a funny beard, but I do have to declare that LPG is great.
