Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

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rogerzilla
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by rogerzilla »

Mick F wrote:
pwa wrote:Ditto MG cars.
Not to mention the Mini.

Funny how nobody's resurrected the Allegro name.

The Vanden Plas, possibly the ugliest car ever made, has quite a following now. You'd pay £5000 for a nice one.
Boring_Username
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Joined: 2 Mar 2017, 2:38pm

Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by Boring_Username »

rogerzilla wrote:
Mick F wrote:
pwa wrote:Ditto MG cars.
Not to mention the Mini.

Funny how nobody's resurrected the Allegro name.

The Vanden Plas, possibly the ugliest car ever made, has quite a following now. You'd pay £5000 for a nice one.


Worth it for the picnic trays though :D
mcshroom
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by mcshroom »

It's a shame to see the Galaxy (and I assume any other Dawes drop bar touring bikes) go. I got into touring on a Dawes Vantage, and then moved onto a 2012 Horizon which was my go to bike for anything from Audaxing to Rough Stuff to fully loaded touring. I also thought that year the classical paint design of the bikes was one of the nicest I've seen for modern bikes.

As others have said though, there are other options out there if you're looking for a similar bike though. I'm very tempted by a Spa Tourer as a direct replacement for the broken (my fault) Horizon frame. Ridgeback/Genesis are other British names with decent tourers in their ranges.

I think the end for the Galaxy was probably on the cards a few years ago, when just about every tourer in their fleet got named a Galaxy Something. From the base model "Galaxy AL" up to your Ultra Galaxys. It felt like the Galaxy name was being stretched beyond all credibility and diluted to an extent it didn't mean what people used to think of when they heard the name.
Jamesh
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by Jamesh »

I think they stretched the name in the wrong directions.

Touring is a very niche area of cycling.

Had they made a galaxy gravel, a galaxy sportive and a galaxy commute all with the same frame but different groupsets, tyres and finishing kit I think the galaxy name might still be around.

But not to the applause of this forum!!!

Cheers James
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Mick F
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by Mick F »

Boring_Username wrote:
rogerzilla wrote:
Mick F wrote:Not to mention the Mini.

Funny how nobody's resurrected the Allegro name.

The Vanden Plas, possibly the ugliest car ever made, has quite a following now. You'd pay £5000 for a nice one.


Worth it for the picnic trays though :D

https://www.howmanyleft.co.uk/vehicle/austin_allegro
Mick F. Cornwall
Jamesh
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by Jamesh »

Mick F wrote:
Boring_Username wrote:
rogerzilla wrote:The Vanden Plas, possibly the ugliest car ever made, has quite a following now. You'd pay £5000 for a nice one.


Worth it for the picnic trays though :D

https://www.howmanyleft.co.uk/vehicle/austin_allegro



Not surprisingly very few!!!

Cheers James
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TrevA
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by TrevA »

A mate of mine had an Allegro, one day he was driving down the road and was overtaken by one of his own wheels! I believe it was also known as an All Agro.
Sherwood CC and Notts CTC.
A cart horse trapped in the body of a man.
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Jamesh
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by Jamesh »

A cousin to the Austin Monti no go I believe!! (Montego)

Cheers James
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Mick F
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by Mick F »

:lol:

As for the Mini, we had seven of them over the years.
Over five million of them sold 1959 to 2000.

That BMW abomination will never become so popular or so iconic.
Mick F. Cornwall
mikeymo
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by mikeymo »

Mick F wrote:
pwa wrote:Ditto MG cars.
Not to mention the Mini.

Funny how nobody's resurrected the Allegro name.


Oi!! I used to drive an Allegro. My sister gave it to me. Mind you, I also had a Lada, which gives you some idea of my car-buying wisdom.
pwa
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by pwa »

Mick F wrote::lol:

As for the Mini, we had seven of them over the years.
Over five million of them sold 1959 to 2000.

That BMW abomination will never become so popular or so iconic.

I regularly pass a house that has a pristine Mini (real one) outside, and I always give it an admiring glance. It reminds me how small cars used to be.

But Dawes did not make anything so distinctive as a Mini. Stripped of stickers and paint, a diamond frame steel bike looks much like another, and Dawes needed something special to keep top slot for their Galaxy. Okay, it was never bespoke, but when it was king it ticked more boxes than the off-the-peg alternatives, of which there were few. But as time went by it was overtaken by similarly priced alternatives that were beginning to make a name for themselves, and offering something extra. More braze-ons, a menu of options, more stable handling, and a chance to deal directly with the people who design and assemble the bike. The Galaxy was just left behind. And then the name was diluted by sticking it on frames that did not appeal to the original enthusiasts. A bit like the name Rover being stuck on a Metro, an act of desperation by a company that no longer knows how to make a product that sells on its own merits.

( Going very much off topic, here is a nice little piece about the Metro, later re-badged the Rover 100 to make it sound posher, which was originally seen as the replacement for the Mini. but it failed to take off like the Mini, and the Mini continued to be produced for years after, alongside the Metro)
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-b ... m-54423328
Brucey
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by Brucey »

Mick F wrote:...As for the Mini, we had seven of them over the years.
Over five million of them sold 1959 to 2000.

That BMW abomination will never become so popular or so iconic.


I have had several (original type) Minis too. However every generation has its own favourites and I can't help thinking that

1) folk might have said the same things about the Austin 7 BITD as you are saying about the original mini now, and would have been similarly appalled that the then new Mini was even called an 'Austin 7' in some variants...

Image

Image

Image

and

2) the 'new' Mini has been on sale now for 17 or 18 years or something. In most of those years they have flogged between 0.2 and 0.3M of the things, meaning that the production total will likely soon exceed 5M (if it hasn't already, I'm not sure what the running total is).

In those of a certain generation (myself included probably) the original Mini will always hold a special place. The new Mini is a different car, maybe better suited to the needs of the age, even if it sells itself using association with the original (hence also the 'new' Beetle, the 'new' Fiat Cinquicento etc) which is bound to leave a bad taste in some people's mouths.

However in purely practical terms Minis old and new are only good load luggers in Van/estate format. I had a converted van for a few years, and it was great. I switched the last mini saloon I had for a metro in the 1980s, simply because the metro was more practical. I didn't like it any more than the mini in lots of ways, but the metro was a tool to do a job. Only yesterday I remarked to a cycling buddy (who has had more original Minis than I have and has a deep antipathy for the new model) that a new Mini Countryman we rode past was 'basically a Van with windows, nicer insides and an extra door' and I really meant it; that one even had a diesel engine to match.... :roll:

cheers
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Brucey~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
hamster
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by hamster »

Mick F wrote::lol:

As for the Mini, we had seven of them over the years.
Over five million of them sold 1959 to 2000.

That BMW abomination will never become so popular or so iconic.


True, but it does start in the morning and the ignition doesn't go all erratic in the rain.
thirdcrank
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by thirdcrank »

I'd completely forgotten that the BMC Mini came complete with a pair of rose-tinted specs., and little else. FWIW, I learned to drive in one (BSM) and passed my test in one as well.

The last time I sat in one was in 1997 when I had time to kill before a job interview in Huddersfield. Suited and booted, I went into a nearby main distributor's showroom (Appleyards?) and they had a Mini on display. Still the same old drip tray underneath to catch the engine oil. Salesaman came beetling over but knew immediately it was just a trip down memory lane; apparently a lot of old men did it. Probably wondering how on Earth you could get up to so much on such a small back seat.

Has everybody forgotten they needed a grease service every three months?
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Mick F
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Re: Dawes to stop making the Galaxy due to lack of demand...

Post by Mick F »

I haven't forgotten about the servicing of a Mini. The more you service them, the more reliable they were. No rose-tinted glasses here.

Not much different to a bicycle maybe?

We have a Yaris 2014 Hybrid.
I have to open the bonnet from time to time, just to remember how it is done. Had the car nearly four years and been opened by me perhaps three times, and by Mrs Mick F never.

No reason to open it, just to see how it's done, and TBH at this moment in time, I don't know (without looking for it) where the pull-lever is.
Mick F. Cornwall
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