I posted my laminated original 1981 TR8 window sticker on my office wall the other day and happened to notice two interesting facts.
First the EPA estimate fuel mileage is 16 mpg, I get around 17 mpg mostly city driving. Haven't tested for highway mileage yet. Secondly the annual fuel cost for 15,000 miles was $1,453 based on a price of $1.55 per gallon.In today's price it would be $3,365.

Attached is the window sticker and two links if your interested in finding Non-Ethanol Stations and Top Tier Stations.

http://www.toptiergas.com/licensedbrands/

https://www.pure-gas.org/

Another thing to think about is $12,995.00 in 1981 dollars is an approximate equivalent of $34,994.00 in 2017 dollars. She was a pretty expensive car.

Yet another reason for the demise of British Leyland. The US was far and away the largest market for Triumph, MG, Jaguar, etc and the steady erosion of the dollar, along with crippling strikes, under capitalization and quality lapses meant Leyland's days were numbered.

To keep it all in perspective, there were few if any comparable cars at that price point. The Corvette was $14,000 at that time. So for a drop top roadster with a V8, the TR8 was more than competitively priced.

Vance

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1980 Platinum Metallic TR8, navy blue interior
Bare metal respray, Crower cam, raised compression
ported heads, modified Zenith carbs, 0.060" overbore

But it was little, and for only $1000 ($2700) One could get a big sports for for big American tastes. And that's a good thing because many current drivers of 1981 Corvettes would not be able to get in or out of a Wedge.

The '81 Corvette was a big sports car that's true but for it's size the interior was not very roomy and there was almost no storage space. I looked at the Corvette in 1980 while I was shopping for my TR-7. My impression was " how do they make something this big with such a small interior".

There were many pros and cons. And the 1980 Corvette styling left me cold, and given that the Corvette was the bleeding edge of GM tech - sort of a production test mule - Corvette reliability was notoriously poor. Anti-lock brakes, cross fire and then tuned port injection, carbon fiber drive shafts, fiberglass leaf springs, cross flow cooling, aluminum cylinder heads on an iron block, etc. all were implemented first on the Corvette to determine the performance/reliability of their designs. Some worked, others did not. The Cross Fire injection was derisively nick-named 'Cease Fire Injection' for example. The original fiberglass transverse leaf spring was brutally harsh on the first iteration - another swing and a miss on GM's part.

My point to all of this was that the TR8 was competitive in design, price and reliability at the time.

Things have come a long ways since then, with CAD, sophisticated direct injection. OHC, multi-valve designs, and so on, cars today have never been better.

Cheers,

Vance

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1980 Platinum Metallic TR8, navy blue interior
Bare metal respray, Crower cam, raised compression
ported heads, modified Zenith carbs, 0.060" overbore

Like most, I really never thought much about that Corvette as a platform for development. Looks and horsepower is what I looked at and what I saw was a pretty good looking car, styled up about 25% too big and with lackluster early '80's HP. Opel GT's of a few years earlier had that 'Corvette' styling in spades but to me looked a bit narrow, and tall on it's wheels to pull it off.

I have owned two Corvettes 1978 and 1999. The 78 was built up to about 400 HP. The 99 came from the factory with 300 (or maybe 325 HP). The 99 was my all time favorite car, (triple black convertible) fast, comfortable, great options (stereo, AC, etc...) ...........sorry I sold it.

The 1980 Corvette was a lackluster car (so was my 78 in stock form). I didn't care for the larger bumpers on the 80 either. Mid 70's to mid 80's were the worst years for american cars. Performance and quality was down.

IMHO what hurt the TR8 was the early TR7 reputation and the exchange rate pound to dollar.

When the TR8 was introduced I wanted one bad, but being a new college grad all I could afford was a used Spitfire................ I am glad I finally got my TR8 a few months ago.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2018-01-03 12:42 PM by RossL.

Hello Eric
I am slightly jealous at you having the original paperwork hanging on your wall! My car being an early "dealer evaluation" car , I can't even get a copy of my cars window sticker. Sometimes I feel as though the early cars where just orphans. If I didn't have a foot of snow on the ground I would have to console myself with an extended joy ride ! Ah, winter in New England. And Happy New Year to everyone, Jim

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" Enjoy the Drive", Jim

When I was shopping for my TR-7(Mar. '80) as I recall the sticker was on the driver's side window of my car and had a price of about $9300.00 and change. After we made a deal they prepped it for delivery to me, when I drove it off the lot it had no sticker or drivers handbook, I was so excited I didn't even think about it until many years later.
Looking back the interesting thing is, I shopped two different British car dealers that were both located on the same street less than a half a mile apart, imagine that! As I recall there were about three or four TR-7s at one dealer and four or five at the other(coupes and convertibles) I don't recall there being any TR-8s on either lot.

Is that the car you still have? Is it FI and do you have a handbook now?

Peter,

Yes the car pictured is the original TR-7 I purchased new from Boulevard Buick (yes they sold Brit cars too). No, it's not a FI car, while I purchased it in March of 1980 it's a '79 and I'm not positive I don't think FI was available in '79. I'm not positive but I think all the TR-7s on the lots were '79s.

I never got an actual handbook because the Bentley Workshop Manuel I got shortly after purchase includes one.