-----Original Message-----
From: fred thomas <frede.thomas2@verizon.net>
I have never understood why a lot of T/R owners quote from Bill Piggot,
he is
a writer making $$$ from our cars, he was not a factory emplyee (we
have them
on this list though) and his books are filled with "misinformation", I
also
believe we have list members with more knowledge about our cars, yes
and most
of you are aware of these members, just my thoughts on facts about our
LBC's.
"FT"
==AM==
<rant>
I have a lot of respect for Bill Piggot...perhaps more so than for a
number of other Triumph "experts" who have authored books on same (even
some ex-employees). One significant problem I've seen with his
perspective and that of most of these other authors as well is that
their viewpoint is decidely home market. That's fine to a point, but
what's so often lacking is much of any understanding of the other
markets for which these cars were built. In the case of most of the
postwar "sporting" Triumphs, the vast majority of these cars were built
for and sold in the US.
In fairness, even Standard-Triumph was guilty of this slanted
viewpoint, with owners and other technical manuals and literature that
often ignored the features that were specific to our market. And that's
been perpetuated in recent years by those who have chosen to reprint
some of these manuals. For example, S-T did create a US market-specific
owners manual for the introduction of the original 948cc series Herald
in the US in 1960, but they never did the same for the later 1200
series, nor did the Workshop Manuals show details specific to US-spec
cars. S-T did also create specific owners manuals for the early
Spitfires, but that fact seems to have been ignored by those who have
reprinted owners manuals in recent years. I've yet to find a reprint of
the early Spitfire owners manual that has a correct wiring diagram for
the US-spec cars.
One other observation about books written by the Piggots, Robsons and
others. Apparently neither they nor anyone else ever carefully
proofreads the manuscript and photo captions before the books go to
print. It's incomprehensible to me how some of the more absurd errors
("misinformation") found their way into final copies.
</rant>
--Andy Mace
*Mrs Irrelevant: Oh, is it a jet?
*Man: Well, no ... It's not so much of a jet, it's more your, er,
Triumph Herald engine with wings.
-- Cut-price Airlines Sketch, Monty Python's Flying Circus (22)
Check out the North American Triumph Sports 6 (Vitesse 6) and Triumph
Herald Database at its new URL: <http://triumph-herald.us>
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