AUSTINS BIG 3-LITRE

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31986, 13 May 1969, Page 23

AUSTINS BIG 3-LITRE

For many years the Austin range has included a large, comfortable luxury

i saloon, and with the demise of the Austin 6/110 and the Princess 3-iitre R this position is now held by the hydrolastic Austin 3-litre. The 3-litre is a worthy successor to the big 110, with adequate performance, a tasteful and comfortable interior well-insulated from road and engine noise, and a high standard of handling and roadholding. The 3-litre bears a family resemblance to the Austin 1800, but it has a longer bonnet and a much longer and better-looking boot. The sixcylinder engine, whieh is a new unit and not merely a new version of the old 3-litre, ;is mounted in the conven- • tional north-south position at the front of the car, and drives the rear wheels. SUSPENSION The suspension, however, is hydrolastic. with the addition of an automatic hydraulic levelling device on the rear suspension which ensures the car rides level no matter I what the load. The car tested was a manual model with overdrive, this version costs $4976, the manual model without overdrive is $4830, and the automatic car is $5103. The 3-litre’s comfortable 1 seats are particularly well shaped, giving good support ' during cornering. The backs of the front seats are adjustable for rake, and there is a 1 good range of sliding adjust-, ment. Even with the driver’s seat ' adjusted almost at the rear ' extremity of its travel, leg- ' room in the rear seats is generous. It is the unusual < roominess of the 3-litre which will attract as many customers as almost any other fea-' ture.

INSTRUMENTS The dash is of polished walnut, as are the door cappings. All other surfaces are padded. There is a very large glovebox on the passenger’s side of the dash, and there is also a parcel tray under

the dash on this side. The central part of the dash holds an electric clock, flanked by alternator charge and oil pressure gauges, and the gauges for fuel tank contents and water temperature are in the square "window” of the strip speedometer. The ashtray, cigarette lighter, and controls for the heater and face-level freshair vents (swivelling outlets at-either end of the dash) are also in the central part of the dash.

The speedometer window is flanked by warning lights for alternator charge, oil pressure and filter condition, handbrake, brake servo vacuum and main beam, and the speedometer includes a trip-meter. Three completely unlabelled switches under the speedometer ' operate the washers, efficient two-speed wipers, and the park and headlights. There is a manual choke. The'customary B.M.C'. indicator stalk on the right of the steering column works the dipswitch and headlight flasher as well, and a small lever on the left of the column works the overdrive. There are large mappockets in the doors, and the interior door-handles are of the recessed safety type. The front doors include opening quarter-lights, and there are extractor windows with overcentre catches in the rear quarters.

Visibility is generally good, although the falling boot-line makes it impossible to see the rear extremities of the car when reversing. The Pipers clear a good area of the screen, and the rear-vision mirror could well be wider.

STEERING All the controls are pleasantly light, and the powerassisted steering, which is a standard fitting on all 3litres, has just enough feel. There are about 3.5 turns of the steering wheel from lock to lock, and the steering is more akin to the very iight steering fitted to some small cars, rather than the excessively light and indirect

mechanism with a rather “disconnected” feel sometimes encountered on American cars.

In the city, one soon notices how quiet the car is, and how smooth and flexible is the big six-cylinder engine, which will pull away quite happily from little more than 12 m.p.h. Unfortunately this quietness is not maintained on the open road, for as speed rises the level of wind noise in the test car became annoyingly high, most of it apparently generated by the front quarter-lights. OVERDRIVE

It was on the open road that another fault became apparent: the lack of any indicator for the overdrive switch. The switch itself is moved down to engage overdrive, and up to disengage it. But it always returns to its central position after being used, so even by looking at the switch one cannot tell if overdrive is engaged. There is no warning light, and the engine noise is sufficiently well insulated for it to be difficult to- detect the change in note when changing in and out of overdrive. Overdrive works on both third and top gears. The gearbox, on the other hand, is particularly pleasant, with very effective but completely unobstructive syncromesh on all four forward ratios, and a smooth, precise action. The test car did blot its copybook by jumping out of third gear several times, but it was thought minor selector adjustment would cure this.

■lt is interesting to note that all Austin and Morris models now have syncromesh on first gear. Minis and 1100 s with this feature arrived in New Zealand only recently. On a hilly, twisting road, two facets of the 3-litre's character quickly became apparent: first, that it could well do with more power to give better mid-range acceleration, and second, that the ride and handling both reach very high standards. The suspension copes admirably with all bumps, even on corners, and the ride can best be described as a mixture of Austin 1800 and Citroen ID/DS —well-damped, absorbing even the worst potholes remarkably well, and free from excessive roll or pitch. HANDLING

The handling is pleasant and safe, allied as it is to a high standard of road-hold-ing. The car’s noticeable but slight understeer persists until fairly high cornering speeds, when it changes to a

i gentle oversteer after only a I brief neutral period. Although the oversteer appears earlier than in some cars, it appears so gently dnd progressively that the total effect is very good. The handling is also good on shingle, with any movement of the tail immediately detectable and easily corrected.

The brakes are light and progressive, and although they smelled strongly at the end of the fade test they showed no other signs of overheating. The clutch is light and smooth, but the accelerator’s first quarter-inch or so of movement gave rather sudden throttle-open-ing.

The Austin 3-litre cruises effortlessly at speed on the open road, and would cruise particularly quietly were it not for wind noise. The acceleration is adequate rather than noticeably good. The engine is said to produce 123 b.h.p., which is not a high output' for 3000 c.c. these days. The car’s 0 to 60 m.p.h. acceleration time of about 15.5 seconds is about the same as that of the old Austin 6/110. Under the bonnet, plugs, distributor, oil dipstick and other service points are all accessible, and the boot is particularly large, with ample room for luggage. In sum, the Austin 3-litre is a very roomy, well-finished comfortable saloon with adequate performance, some very advanced features—such as the suspension—and some which would benefit from more thought. TECHNICAL

Engine.— Six - cylinder, overhead valves; bore 53.3 mm., stroke 88.9 mm; cubic capacity 2912 c.c.; compression ratio 9:1; maximum b.h.p, 123.6 at 4300 r.p.m.; maximum torque 1611 b ft at 3000 r.p.m. Seven-bearing counterbalanced crankshaft fitted with external vibration damper. Cooling System.— Pressurised with expansion tank, assisted by pump, fan, and wax-type thermostat. Fuel System.— Twin S.U. carburetters fed from rearmounted 141-gallon fuel tank by camshaft-driven S.U. mechanical pump. Transmission. Diaphragmspring clutch with hydraulic actuation; four-speed, all-syn-cromesh gearbox with remote, centre-floor gear change. Optional extras overdrive ,or automatic transmission.

Steering.— Sack and pinion, with power assistance.

Suspension.—Front, upper and lower wishbones with Hydrolastic displacers (interconnected front to rear); rear, semi-trailing arms with Hydrolastic displacers and self-level-ling hydraulic rams operated by engine-driven pump.

Brakes. Vacuum servoassisted. Front, discs, self-ad-justing; rear, drums. Central pull-up hand brake level operating on rear wheels.