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Author Archive for Alistair Courtney
The club took the opportunity for a double-header weekend: The AGM at the National Kit Car Show, Malvern, and the 40th anniversary celebration at the National Metro and Mini Show, British Motor Museum, Gaydon.
This proved to be a success, especially for the members who drove down from Tyneside. As one of them said “having two different shows on consecutive days made the long journey worthwhile”.
As well as dozen members’ cars we were also joined by a Mini-Jem and the “Bangers and Cash: Restoring Classics” team – watch out for more news about the Bangers and Cash Midas later in the year.
With the club’s are located near the doors to the museum and backing on to the arena, we drew plenty of attention and members were kept busy all day.
As part of the club’s 40th anniversary celebration, our current treasurer, Colin Oberlin-Harris, presented the club’s founder and first club secretary, Colin Spencer, with one of our anniversary caps.
With so much to see around the show, not to mention in the museum and the collections halls, we hope that the club returns again next year.
The Midas Owners Club held its 2025 AGM at the ‘Malvern Show’ on the Saturday.
Usually the AGM is held on the Sunday, but this year we had bigger plans for 1st June, which was reflected in a smaller than usual turnout at Malvern.
A barbeque was enjoyed by club members followed by the AGM.
The full AGM minutes will be circulated to club members in a newsletter. Of particular note, our club secretary Roy Forrester had decided to stand down and the we pass on many thanks to him for his services to the club. Alastair Clarke stepped forward to fill the vacancy and he was voted in unanimously by those in attendance.
The club’s AGM wouldn’t be complete without a concours and this year it was judged by our membership secretary, John Orson, assisted by his wife Marion. The winners were:
best car at show.
Another trip to the NEC marked the start of the 2025 show season. Roy’s prize winning Mk2 Bronze was joined by an unfinished Gold Convertible for the three days – March 21st to 23rd.
Our prominent location close to the staircase between halls 4 and 5 meant that we were kept busy by a mixture of visitors. We saw some familiar faces, including several former Midas owners, and met many new visitors. Some remembered our cars from their 1980s heyday, whilst others had never seen a Midas before and were intrigued to learn about them.
This year’s show returned to its traditional May Day Bank Holiday Weekend slot and started to show signs of recovery. Last year’s show was postponed until the end of August and only one show hall was available (the other being used as a Covid vaccination centre). The weather was a bit better last August, but the turnout of kit cars was massively down on pre-covid numbers. The turnout for the Midas Owners Club reflected the trend with 10 Midas cars of all models present, up from last year’s half dozen.
Okay so this is still a long way off the 20+ that the club would get a couple of decades ago, but it is a step in the right direction. And with 10 excellent examples in attendance the club’s officers decided that we should hold the traditional concours/awards to go along with the club’s barbecue and AGM.
The “Furthest traveled in a Midas” category was won by John Orson, but unfortunately he disappeared before we could get a photo of him with Tony. However, if John had stuck around (and we had some trophies) then it might have looked like this:
After a two year absence we were back at the NEC for the PCCCR show. This year we were without club secretary Tony Moss who couldn’t attend due to an operation. This didn’t put off the club members who laid the carpet and set up the stand on the Thursday before the show :
The club presented three excellent examples of the Midas marque on a thoroughly professional looking stand and were rewarded by three days of warm interest from the show-goers. As usual we spoke to many visitors who remembered the cars from the 1980s and one, or two, former Midas owners.
Next on the calendar is the National Kit Car Show at Stoneleigh, which returns to its usual May day bank holiday slot.
Coming after the COVID-19 enforced washout of 2020 and early 2021, only a few event organisers were brave enough to put events in 2021.
Two that did were club favourites The Mini Action Day at Castle Combe and the National Kit Car show at Stoneleigh. Both events were smaller and quieter than in previous years, but both proved thoroughly enjoyable for the Midas Owners who ventured out.
Castle Combe restricted entry to car owners and direct guests, but that didn’t stop club members partaking in their favourite activities:
It was a wonder that they could put on a show at Stoneleigh in 2021. The main exhibition hall had been turned in to a COVID vaccination centre and half the parkland was being dug up for HS2. However, the Kit Car community pulled together for a show in August rather than the traditional May.
The Midas Owners Club shared a block with our friend in the Mini Marcos Owners Club:
The polls officially closed at midnight last night and the votes from both the Facebook group and the Midas Forum have been counted up.
Category 1. Best Exterior.
First Place with 11 votes on Facebook and 4 votes on the Forum is No 4. Red Mk3 Gold Convertible belonging to Richard Streets.
Second Place went to No8. Red Mk3 Gold Coupe belonging to John Orson with 12 votes on Facebook and 1 on the Forum.
Third Place went to No1. Red Mk2 Coupe belonging to Ralph Woodrow.
Category 2. Best Interior
First Place with 6 votes on Facebook and 1 vote on the Forum was N06. The unfinished White Mk2 Coupe belonging to Ian Hardy – perhaps indicating that the original design is best after all.
Second Place was a draw, both with 6 votes on Facebook, between No8, John Orson and No10, the Blue Cortez of Justin King
Category 3. Best Underbonnet
First Place with 15 votes on Facebook and 6 on the Forum went to No.4 Richard Streets’ Gold Convertible with an incredibly tidy and well presented engine bay.
Second Place with 6 votes on Facebook and 2 on the Forum went to No.7 the BRG Mk2 Decathlon of Roy Forrester.
Third Place with 4 votes on Facebook went to No 10. Justin King’s Blue Cortez.
The judged categories.
After examining the photos closely the judges have decided on the winners. There were no entries in the Most Used category, which was going to be judged on average monthly mileage.
4. Originality – closest to factory intent
First prize goes to Roger Dewsnap’s Black Mk1, now looking much like it did in 1984.
2019 
1984
The judges thought that Chris Nicholls’ Black Mk3 Gold Coupe, Ian Hardy’s White Mk2 and Roy Forrester’s BRG Mk2 Decathlon all merited a mention too, for all were very close to original except for one or two minor details.
5. Innovation – best upgrades from original spec.
First prize could only go to Justin King’s Blue Mk4 Cortez with too many upgrades to list – it took CKC two features to write up all the work that Justin has done.
The judges also thought that the improved dashboard on Jon Evans‘ White Mk2 and the re-trimmed interior of Ralph Woodrow‘s Red Mk2, were both very neatly done and worthy upgrades.
6. Most Ambitious Rebuild
Perhaps, we should have set a tighter definition for this category as the judges couldn’t decide between a finished rebuild that was ambitious in respect of working to a tight time constraint and another that has only just started and is ambitious in the amount of work required.
In the end the judges decided to call it a draw between Tim Brack’s plan to totally rebuild his red Mk2
and Sam Dewsnap‘s refurbishment of his father’s Mk1 (see Originality above) , completed in just three months. The work on Roger’s car can be seen on You Tube – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGEO4MHxZGU&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR3tON-kVOxvDBE_9A4AUpITxuoGvHgeCTR2FNFPi_lqUgChtbT3MYHmSDI
Thank you to everybody who sent in photos of their cars and thank you to everyone who voted. We may not be able to use our cars much at the moment, but at least we can still discuss them.
The first entries have arrived for the Concours event.
1. Red Mk2 Coupe
2. Black Mk3 Gold Coupe
3.White Mk2 Coupe
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4. Red Mk3 Gold Convertible
5. White Mk2 Coupe
6. White – Unfinished- Mk2 Coupe
7. BRG Mk2 Bronze Decathlon
8. Red Mk3 Gold Coupe
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9. Black Mk1 Coupe
10. Blue Mk4 Cortez
11. White Mk2 Coupe
This car is currently inaccessible due to lockdown restrictions so the owner could only submit some external photos from last year.
12. Red Mk2 Silver Coupe – Rebuild
The final entry is entered in the “Most ambitious rebuild” category only
The names of the owners will be withheld until after the voting so that the competition is decided purely upon the quality of the car.
2019 started with another visit to the NEC in March for the Practical Classics Classic Car and Restoration Show. We were blessed with our largest stand yet and managed to find five excellent examples of the Midas marque to fill it.
Once again we had many visitors including a return visit by Alex Riley of The One Show fame. In 2018 we had learned that Alex was a big fan of the Midas marque and knew the history of the cars. However, we discovered that he had never actually sat in one before and so we gave him the chance to try out Richard Streets’ Convertible for size (Alex is too tall for either the Mk1, or Mk2, without a Bulgin style floor!) So the next step for Alex is to actually drive a Midas.
The next event for the Midas Owners Club was the National Kit Car Show at Stoneleigh. Held on its traditional May bank holiday weekend, this is usually the biggest gathering of Midas cars each year and 2019 did not disappoint.
Our club area had been moved from its usual location due to the Stoneleigh showground losing a large chunk of land to HS2, but we all found our spot okay and gathered in the tent for our AGM.
This year Roy Forrester’s Decathlon Mk2 took the Best Midas award after Roy had tidied up a few areas since last year.
With the National Metro and Mini show having moved to August, our next event was a return to Shepton Mallet for the 2019 Bristol Classic Car Show. This year we had a long narrow stand so we had to park in two by two formation, which is not the best way of displaying cars, but nonetheless we had an enjoyable show capped by Meredith’s Mk2 winning a ‘Highly Commended’ award. Since these awards are voted on by the visiting public (and no Midas owners had voted since Tony had lost the voting slips) this was high praise indeed.
In July we gathered at Alternative Cars’ workshop for the annual open day and barbecue. This year we had a larger turn out with twelve cars arriving under their own steam. Comparing the 2019 line up with that of 2018 and it is notable that this year we had five Mk4s arrive, whereas none made it the previous year.
2020 is the 25th anniversary of the launch of the Mk4 and this will be marked at many of the events.
Whilst Midas owners attended both the National Metro and Mini Show at Gaydon in August and the Mini Fair at Stanford Hall in September, there was no official club areas at either event. Hopefully something to be rectified in 2020.
However, this year the club had a special event all of its own: The first Midas customer car was collected from the D & H Fibreglass Techniques factory at the end of August 1978 and to mark this important anniversary in the history of the Midas marque the club organised a gathering at the original factory site in Greenfield, near Oldham.
The current owners of the site, Robert Scott Ltd, kindly opened up their car park for our gathering where we were met by interested locals, including a former D & H employee, and a journalist from the local newspaper. After the meeting and photo-shoot we headed up and over the moors (and through a torrential downpour) to the Oil Can Cafe.
The next event on the calendar was the Mini Action Day at Castle Combe at the end of September. Usually this event is blessed with excellent weather and whilst the sun did shine brightly on occasion, unfortunately it was between rain showers. This did not deter the club members who turned up and a good day was had by all. The show itself is growing once again, with more and better trade stands and the club had a larger turn out this year.
The final event of the year was once again a visit to the NEC for the Classic Motor Show. Once again another successful show bringing an end to the events of 2019.
2020 marks the club’s 35th anniversary as well as the 25th anniversary of the Mk4 Midas and we will be kicking off again at the PCCCRS at the NEC in March.