Cars Of The Club

1958 Riley One-Point-Five

- Dominic Temple

Welcome dear readers, fellow enthusiasts, and friends, to a segment I have coined: “Cars of the Club”. Here, I will bring you my opinion of various classic cars, all of which are generously loaned by members of the Classic Car Club of Hong Kong. This is not strictly a review section. Instead, I would like to focus my attention on the one thing classic cars have over all others, and the thing that makes them individually special: their character.

Today, I bring you a real gem of a car. No, it’s not a Lamborghini Miura, or a Ferrari 250 TDF. Nothing as obviously exotic or evocative as that. No, it’s a 1958 Riley One-Point-Five. Rest assured, this is a very, very special automobile.

But how can that be? This is after all a car which makes use of a Morris Minor floorpan, suspension, and steering setup. Nearly 40,000 were built by Riley and just over 103,000 were built by Wolseley. Sure, this car, being a Riley and not a Wolseley, makes use of a 1489cc B-Series engine with twin SU carbs, endowing it with a mighty 68 horsepower. But what, beyond its charming and amiable design, makes this car so special?