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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple style='word-wrap:break-word'><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:#1F497D'>Wow! Just more examples of how the golden goose was doomed to die. How sad.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:#1F497D'>Thanks for sharing!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:#1F497D'>Alex Thomson<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #E1E1E1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>From:</span></b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'> Triumphs <triumphs-bounces@autox.team.net> <b>On Behalf Of </b>John Macartney<br><b>Sent:</b> Wednesday, March 11, 2026 6:03 PM<br><b>To:</b> Dean Tetterton <tr3a58dean@gmail.com><br><b>Cc:</b> triumphs@autox.team.net<br><b>Subject:</b> Re: [TR] "Inside Track on How It was Done" article<o:p></o:p></span></p></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal>Jonmac’s long reply.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>Dean, <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>Thank you for your kind words and I’m glad you found the story of interest. I hope you don’t mind but I’ve copied this reply to the rest of the list as your query touches on one of many similar issues that people periodically ask me to comment on. Hopefully this wider reply might solve a few other related/unrelated queries.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>In the overall production process, where badges or odd bits of trim actually got fitted was not necessarily a constant in terms of actual location. To a certain extent, it all depended on the availability of ‘qualified’ labour to do a certain task. The UK in the sixties, seventies, eighties was hidebound by the power of trade union control. Within the overall motor industry, there was a mass of different unions and union membership was mandatory if you were one of many fishes in a large pool where things were made. Union names that spring to mind are Transport & General Workers, National Union of Vehicle Bodybuilders, General Municipal and Boilermakers, National Union of Teachers, British Electrical, Associated Union Engineering Workers - and many more. All of those were authorised by common and mutual agreement to undertake certain tasks within the production process. One way and another, we had enough people belonging to different unions who, by working together, could somehow contrive to build a complete car.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>Re the figment of your badge and letters.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>Fred Bloggs who is an NUVB member is paid to fit badges and certain brightwork - and that’s all! One day, Fred isn’t at work because the night before, he spent most of his wages in the pub, went home piddled out of his head and woke up the next morning with the mother of all hangovers, so decided to stay in bed and Mrs Bloggs called the factory to say he was ill. But because Fred is one of only two NUVB members on his workstation where certain badges and brightwork are fitted, his mate has to do Fred’s work as well as his own. As every single assembly task is time measured anyway and piecework pay rates have been abandoned in favour of Measured Day Rate, the NUVB foreman negotiates with other union foremen to run the track slower so Fred’s mate can do both jobs without getting stressed out. To us, the obvious remedy is to get a member of another union to do Fred’s work. <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>But you can’t do that. Against union rules. Only NUVB members can do Fred’s work and if there aren’t enough NUVB members on hand, then tough titty. Run the track slower. End of story. It’s amazing we ever managed to make anything at all.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>In my days as an Apprentice at Jaguar, I was working on the track one day when I noticed the main plug to a headlamp was dangling in the bodywork and so I put it back and ensured it was firmly fitted - but I got seen by a Shop Steward who immediately stopped the line because a non unionised Apprentice was “doing the work that should only be done by a member of British Electrical - and no-one else”. The track stopped for over thirty minutes, and boy, did I get bawled out! And that’s how bad it was. If you weren’t in a union, you NEVER used your initiative to sort a problem if you saw one happening or likely to happen. You looked for a man in a white overall with a blue or red collar and told him instead.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>So back to the question of who and where were badges fitted? <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>Answer, by anyone within the relevant union who happened to notice items were missing. Missing badges and Triumph letters got fitted somewhere, somehow but not necessarily in the location where they *should* be fitted and if the car reached the end of the line without them, a red SHORTAGES label got slapped on the screen and a handwritten note was made on the production tally and shortage list. Somehow, the system seemed to work - sort of - but it was time-consuming, wasteful, inefficient and an absolute effing nuisance.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>And because of those practises, that goes a long way to explaining why all the UK car manufacturers of substance today are owned by foreign companies. Same goes almost for our former motorcycle industry, shipbuilding, aircraft, mining and a raft of everything else. The power of the unions and management hierarchies who were terrified of confrontation, caved in and we threw it all away.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>JM<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><br>On 11 Mar 2026, at 13:21, Dean Tetterton <<a href="mailto:tr3a58dean@gmail.com">tr3a58dean@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<o:p></o:p></p></div><blockquote style='margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt'><div><div><p class=MsoNormal>John<o:p></o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal> Thanks for the great article. It sure opens my eyes about the complexity of building so many different<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>varieties of the "same car". I have scanned a lot of images that are in the VTR Mike Cook archives and have a<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>nice collection of production line images. The ones I have of TR4's being built show that the TR4 emblem on the<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>boot lid must have been installed near the end of production. I have attached a few of them and go from the<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>rocket room to tops being installed. None have an emblem on the boot. Is that because some were sent out<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>with different one's or none? <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal> I really enjoy your articles.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal> Dean Tetterton<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal> <a href="mailto:tr3a58dean@gmail.com">tr3a58dean@gmail.com</a><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal> <o:p></o:p></p></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><div><p class=MsoNormal>On Wed, Mar 11, 2026 at 8:11<span style='font-family:"Arial",sans-serif'> </span>AM JOHN MACARTNEY <<a href="mailto:johnbmacartney@gmx.com">johnbmacartney@gmx.com</a>> wrote:<o:p></o:p></p></div><blockquote style='border:none;border-left:solid #CCCCCC 1.0pt;padding:0in 0in 0in 6.0pt;margin-left:4.8pt;margin-right:0in'><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>This is a long one but hopefully opens a few 'new doors' to walk through? Enjoy!<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'> <o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>Jonmac<o:p></o:p></span></p></div></div></div><p class=MsoNormal>** <a href="mailto:triumphs@autox.team.net" target="_blank">triumphs@autox.team.net</a> **<br><br>Donate: <a href="http://www.team.net/donate.html" target="_blank">http://www.team.net/donate.html</a><br>Archive: <a href="http://www.team.net/pipermail/triumphs" target="_blank">http://www.team.net/pipermail/triumphs</a> <a href="http://www.team.net/archive" target="_blank">http://www.team.net/archive</a><br><br>Unsubscribe/Manage: <a href="http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/triumphs/tr3a58dean@gmail.com" target="_blank">http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/triumphs/tr3a58dean@gmail.com</a><o:p></o:p></p></blockquote></div></div></blockquote><blockquote style='margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt'><div><p class=MsoNormal><IMG_20250605_0003.jpg><o:p></o:p></p></div></blockquote><blockquote style='margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt'><div><p class=MsoNormal><IMG_20250605_0004.jpg><o:p></o:p></p></div></blockquote><blockquote style='margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt'><div><p class=MsoNormal><IMG_20250605_0005.jpg><o:p></o:p></p></div></blockquote></div></body></html>