Is the Austin 7 the most important car ever made? | Axon’s Automotive Anorak

Very first released in 1922, the diminutive Austin 7 swiftly grew to become Britain’s initial correct ‘peoples car’, going on to turn into one thing of an institution, this technically typical still completely groundbreaking tiny car effectively wiping out the briefly well-liked cycle autos of the era (just is its spiritual Austin 7 successor – the Mini – did in 1959, resulting in the thankful demise of the up to date and primarily grim and insufficient microcars).

The very simple facet-valve straight-4 747cc Austin 7 soon out-offered the earlier Morris (Bullnose) Oxford as Britain’s most productive motor vehicle, with virtually 300,000 examples designed in Longbridge by itself in between 1922 and ’39 in extra than 35 differing ‘factory’ system kinds, all pre-relationship Britain’s beloved Morris Small and BMC/BL Mini by decades.

The Seven also served as the basis of a couple of today’s motoring giants – BMW and Nissan – through the very first Dixi and Datsun products, developed locally below licence (at minimum in the circumstance of the previous!), together with other worldwide 7 derivatives produced below agreement by Bantam in the Usa (the originators of the Environment War II Jeep) and Rosengart in France.

In addition, other now founded and revered automobile makers past and current, these types of as Jaguar (via Swallow Sidecars/SS) and Jensen, owe their quite existence to the minor Austin by supplying fetching coachbuilt ‘alternative’ sporting and luxurious derivatives of the model in the 1920s and ’30s.