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Sunday 28 August 2022

Good Runner



Princess Diana's Ford Escort sells for £650K at auction

A car which was used by the late Diana, Princess of Wales has sold for £650,000 at auction.

Princess Diana, who died nearly 25 years ago, drove the black Ford Escort RS Turbo for nearly three years from August 1985.

She was pictured with the car outside the boutique shops of Chelsea and in Kensington.

The car, registration C462FHK, was eventually sold by Silverstone Auctions in Warwickshire to a buyer in Cheshire.

I never understood the sentimental fog surrounding Diana. Still don't. We sold our Ford Escort for about £250 although it wasn't an RS Turbo had a high mileage and was a swine to start on cold, damp winter mornings.

Imagine driving to Tesco in Diana's car, nobody would know what it was. Even if it had a auction house provenance document in the window, there would still be a credibility problem.

9 comments:

James Higham said...

Agreed. Neither Diana nor the car were much chop.

Sam Vega said...

I sometimes look back on the 1970s and 80s to get a pleasant sense of how wonderful progress is, at least in some respects. Waking up on a cold morning and wondering whether the car was ever going to start before you flattened the battery. Knowing which of the neighbours had a trickle-charger, who had jump-leads, and who had greatness of heart as well as body and could be asked to push-start the bastard thing...

Doonhamer said...

I remember thinking at the time that all the money spent on putrefying flowers would have been better spent on "The Peoples' Princess Memorial Armco Barrier in Paris underpasses and tunnels.

Tammly said...

Actually, cars (although just as ugly now as they were in the 70s and 80s) are amongst the few things I can think of that have improved. I would guess a large minority of things in our lives have deteriorated including in that group the monarchy.

Tammly said...

Actually, cars (although just as ugly now as they were in the 70s and 80s) are amongst the few things I can think of that have improved. I would guess a large minority of things in our lives have deteriorated including in that group the monarchy.

Tammly said...

I didn't say that twice did I? Did I?

A K Haart said...

James - yes, both had reliability problems.

Sam - I remember being quite shocked when we replaced the Escort with a Nissan Sunny and I realised how superior it was to the Ford. Still had rust problems, but it just worked.

Doonhamer - that would have been a fine idea which could even have improved Anglo/French relations.

Tammly - yes cars have improved enormously since those days, although too much complexity may send things the other way.

If it's worth saying, it's worth saying twice (:

dearieme said...

Good motorbikes appeared in the sixties. Hondas. I know, I bought one. And then another in the seventies.

A K Haart said...

dearieme - I recall two motorbike showrooms in Derby. One had British bikes on display with a tray under each crankcase to catch the oil leaks. The Honda showroom didn't need them.