BMC was British Motor Corporation which was made up of Austin, Morris, Rover, Wolseley and Riley who all made cars. Tractors were Nuffields of course. Trucks and vans were Austin and Morris. The cars were standardised with the names denoting different trim and option levels depending on the name. Top car of the ranges wasd the Austin Princess 4 litre Rolls Royce which was an top of the range Austin Princess with a 4 litre Rolls Royce engine. Land Rover and Jaguar were also in there for a time but they got sold off to Ford then BMW and finally to Tata the Indian steel makers.
The whole lot were nationalised and the cars they produced rusted to bits and there was little or no development, the tractor division was starved of money and its profits ploughed into the ailing car division. Tractor production was then moved to Bathgate in Scotland, to a new truck and tractor factory with a new workforce. The warranty claims went through the roof as the workforce were not as skilled as the Ward End ones and tractor quality dropped off.
The losses carried on and eventually the whole lot was sold to the Leyland Truck company and reformed as British Leyland but again no development and the losses haemorrhaged taking down British Leyland. All was not helped by a workforce that went on strike at the drop of a hat.
The tractor division was sold off to Charles Nicholson who owned Marshall and for a time, they produced an excellent tractor. They also developed a range of higher horsepower versions, the 100 Series, but the market for tractors had gone and we had too many larger manufacturers and foreign companies selling into the British market. Marshalls were sold to a couple of different companies and limped on for a few years selling badge engineered Austrian Steyr and Turkish built smaller models.
This is a very rough idea on what went on, my friend MJ will put me right on any aspects I missed.
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Today's Featured Article - History of the Nuffield Tractor - by Anthony West. The Nuffield tractor story started in early 1945. The British government still reeling from the effects of the war on the economy, approached the Nuffield organization to see if they would design and build an "ALL NEW" British built wheeled tractor, suitable for both British and world farming.
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