Everyone knows why TVR closed. So it is strange that reasons differ so much.

In any discussion as to the final days of Peter Wheeler’s (PW) reign as owner of TVR between enthusiasts and detractors of the marque there seems to be more opinions than persons present. So here’s another one.

I’m not suggesting that this is the obvious conclusion following exhaustive research nor that all that is to follow is factual. What it consists of is reports of discussions with those involved, from workers in the factory to insiders in the aborted consortium that was beaten to the punch by N. Smolenski (NS).

Everyone has bias and that goes for those whose job it was to put the cars together as much as for those

whose cars were ensconced at Blackpool waiting for their Speed 6 to be rebuilt. And it goes for me as well. So I should come clean and say that I have a great deal of respect for PW as well as admiration for what he achieved. I have no doubt that this colours my view. But it does not make it wrong.

I’m happy, indeed look forward to, seeing evidence that contradicts some of the things I have written, but something more that conjecture please. Opinion of those on the outside is really worth no more than mine.

I interviewed Ben Samuelson (Ben) some time after the closure. He was very friendly and relaxed but it was apparent that he wasn’t going to say anything off the cuff. So in order to get an unplanned response from him I threw in a provocative question. I asked him if, at the time of the sale, his consortium would have been able to save TVR. Ben’s reply was a rather forceful:

“It didn’t need saving.”

I mentioned rumours of CCJs and Ben was soon back to being more relaxed. His reply was to the effect that this was the norm for TVR. It was the way it had been run all the time he’d been there.

Ben’s part in TVR is rather interesting. He applied for a post for the experience but he evidently hit it off with PW from the start, some suggest because the pair smoked the same brand of cigarettes, but it obviously went a lot deeper than that. Despite PW rejecting the consortium of which Ben was a member for NS’ one, they stayed close friends up until PW’s death. They raced Astons together.

Ben started the year the Cerbera was displayed at the motor show so came in at what has been reported as the halcyon days. Whether they actually were or not is too complex an argument for here and for me come to that. But there seems little doubt that even in the hay days of TVR, CCJs were not unknown.

TVR: everyone’s part in its downfall

At the time I thought this meant heath and safety, its size, that sort of thing. However, later there was a rumour of a very upset NS when an invoice for rent of the factory was presented to him by PW a month after the sale. It is one of those ‘I wish I had been there’ moments.

So it would appear that there was considerable value in TVR. Ben was as much of an insider as it was possible to get and the information he had was enough to convince LNT, albeit an enthusiast for the marque, to put money up front.

LNT has an impressive record as a businessman. See HERE for a somewhat sycophantic profile of the chap. He could see the potential in Ginetta, one that passed me by despite owning one and being an enthusiast. In what LNT has done with Ginetta is probably a blue-print for what he had in mind for TVR. That’s an opinion. No one is saying. But there is circumstantial evidence to support it.

Discussions on the sale had been going on for some time and there was some disagreement as to actual value of the company. But this is surely the norm in any large financial deal, especially one which was, in essence, a management buy-out.

One of the lead partners in the consortium was Lawrence Tomlinson (LNT), he who went on to buy out Ginetta. He raced T400Rs in various GT races and Le Mans Endurance series. I spoke with him a little while after the sale and it was clear that there was a certain bitterness.

He was normally tight lipped, to say the least, but this was at Silverstone and the racing seemed to loosen him a bit. That is not to say relaxed though. Whether it was the failed bid or the pouring rain, not his favourite racing condition, I don’t know. But I saw his most garrulous side.

I asked him if reports of £15 million paid by NS were correct. He said it was in that ballpark. I then asked him if his bid had been more or less the same, my provocative mode on. I expected a guffaw but he went quiet and then said that his offer had taken certain matters into consideration. I asked if this included debts. He nodded but said there were ‘issues’ with the premises.

Rumours persist that TVR never made a profit from the cars apart from the Griff and Chim. If you take into consideration the financial damage of the Speed 6 warranty work then this could be true. When I put it as a direct question to another insider, who has asked to remain anon, I was told that I was showing my ignorance by asking such a thing. It wasn’t that simple.

It seems it is not relevant whether the cars made a profit. All that mattered was whether the factory did or not. I suggested that tins of beans and bags of sugar as loss leaders are one thing, but cars were the main business so if they cost the company it was a disaster.

I was told that the Tuscan Challenge race series consistently made a small profit, as did the spares, servicing, and crash repair These more than compensated for any loss on the manufacturing/warranty side.

Tiff Needell in typical racing pose after an equally typical incident in a Ginetta race. It would seem that TVR’s success with the Tuscan Challenge was not missed by LNT. When he took over the struggling Ginetta he concentrated on the various race series. Many feel that this is the direction that TVR would have gone if the consortium’s bid had been successful.  

PW at Le Mans in 2004

LNT, second right, at his racing premises in Sheffield just after the sale of TVR to NS

LNT’s rather lovely T440. This was, the theory went, the production car that the racing T440Rs were based on

A Tuscan Challenge car. The attraction of the series was the enthusiasm of the drivers allied to a chassis that could not cope with all the power, especially when fitted with the AJP8.

It seems odd therefore that NS’ almost first move was to shut the racing and crash repair work in the factory. But there is no such surprise with LNT’s support of the various Ginetta racing formulae.

LNT owned the road going version of the T400R, the T440. I went up to his Sheffield racing base where he bemoaned the fact that he had placed its care in the hands of TVR as it had required major remedial work after coming back. He said that they should be placing much more emphasis on [one of?] its biggest assets, servicing.

PW took a struggling firm and made it the second biggest British-owned producer of cars in the country for some years. When he sold the company there were two bids on the table, both it would appear to be in the £ millions.

If, as some people suggest, PW’s tenure was in some way a failure I have to say that their definition of failure differs from mine.

Perhaps history will repeat itself with LNT and Ginetta.

A very wet Silverstone hosting, but without overt enthusiasm, a Le Mans Endurance Series race in 2005. There were more people in the pits that in the stands, literally. The organisers - a rather grand name for them - kept the stands locked. There was little advertising for the race. Rumours as to why abounded.

There would appear to be general support for the suggestion that if the consortium had been successful there would have been some rationalisation of the staff and production at Blackpool. The future of the Speed 6 might have been in doubt but LNT was very complementary about the engine during his racing days - at times. He told me that the engineers he used to prepare his Speed 6s said there was nothing wrong with the design of the engine but that some components were not up to the job.

It’s fair to say that he suffered a number of failures but the car was driven in racing conditions. And, come to that, fitted and repaired in the pits with time constraints.

There is no benefit from ‘what might have been. However, there is to ‘what was’.

PW took a failing company with a product that wasn’t selling. TVR went to Le Mans and finished. He built some stunning cars.

There will be a follow-up article to this, which will include experiences of those working in the factory. So keep watching.

Picture, right, a TVR press photo.

Picture bottom right, source unknown. All others copyright RV8R.