Soarer; so you are the guy we go to for the "why did they do/how did they...." :-) Priceless info. I had one of these as a "get around while I rebuild a Jaguar" car. Cost me $700 mid 80's. Shows how you can be lucky/unlucky with a car. For $700 ours hadn't been mollycoddled....... I had it for a week and as I arrived home there was a rattle. I turned it off and there was a "clunk". The timing chain had worn far enough for the tensioner to fall out (some cars, Stag for example, have a "catch plate" that stops that.) Anyway, no damage, new chain and tensioner, all good. If that had happened while car was running at high revs, my only experience with a P6 would be "had it a week = blew up". Biut of course you take your chances with old cars. The only other thing was when I got it the rear brakes were totally frozen up, not working at all; front discs quite large, so previous owner hadn't noticed, but fronts locking up on hard braking gave it away. Once I fixed that, it was great. We had it for about 4 years as a "spare car" and drove it everywhere. Two things I remember about it - everything "different" - not "bad" different, but different, like springs that are horizontal and work through bellcranks back to the core of the car, and the De-Dion rear end. And the ride - lounge chair comfy - helped by the actual lounge chairs inside. We sold it and got our money back. Guy who bought it had a new (late 80's) Commodore, and had had it for 12 months and had had it back under warranty for umpteenth EFI problem. He raved on about how good the Commodore was. He drove the Rover and wasn't that impressed. I said for $800; I'd just keep it. His wife drove it (it was for her) and she said "We'll take it - it is better to drive than the Commodore is!!" I couldn't help but laugh; when I told my Dad that, he said (straight faced) "Of course it is better to drive than a new CDRE - it's a Rover!!!. Again - my uncle had an XE Falcon that he bought near new. Dad took him for a drive in the Rover. He said "This is more comfortable than my car!!!". He was amazed, dad wasn't. Very comfortable cars - quirky, (instruments looked like a clock radio on the dash??? :-) ) - but comfy.