What a Lota Biota

[mk1]

This was tucked away in the WTF ebay posting, but I reckoned it was worthy of discussion separately.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Biota-MIni-BM ... 1e878b4d41

That really is a fantastic opportunity for someone to get into some serious Biota-ing.

M

[Vegard]

Too bad they are so hideous

[Pandora]

I recon the asking price is something of a bargain. Not likely to be a business selling new kits, but to finish off the cars included and spares for others.

[mk1]

I agree with both comments above.

I think they are ugly as sin, but I reckon that £14,000 for 4 cars, moulds, paperwork, history & the rights are a bargain.

M

[mk1]

I do

[cookie1071]

The blue one with S rims that showed up at the (2012?) MiniWorld Action Day at Coombe looked quite sensible...

...i could be way off the mark here but I recall it was owned by Derek Wilkins??

Niall.

[WMU 211G]

I do

I really wish you hadn't posted that Mark. Sort of....

Been watching UFO on dvd recently, a very pleasant way to wipe away the last forty odd years!

[Pandora]

Will she be at the mk1 trackday? Or her granddaughter, in the tinfoil suit?

Al

[Pete]

Will she be at the mk1 trackday?

Her and Monica Dietrich said they'll get a 'ring and ride' to the Blyton if Stirling's there and we put some bingo on.

[Pete]

The blue one with S rims

I think that was a Harewood regular and possibly a championship winner in days gone by.

[Pandora]

that would be Jhn Haughton's own car which he shared with a competitor in the final event of the championship? I think it also had the patented combined brake / throttle arrangemnt which was an option.

I've spoken with the vendor of the cars, but sadly (or perhaps luckily!) none of them are now fitted with the arrangement, but I'm intrigued and really want to see the set up as Sid Marler credited it with responsibility for him crashing the Mink first time out!

I've searched for the records of the patent, but without success

Al

[goff]

I lived at Thurcroft for 17 years were the Biota was made and remember its launch , In Thurcroft was a BMC garage dealer called Kingsforth garages, They had a new show room built opposite to the main garage They had a open day come show and the Biota demonstrator was on display , Aluminium body pop rivited ,Yellow paint ,
They were built a few hundred yards up the road at M&H mining & tunneling, The initials stand for Mathews & Houghton, As you can see that tunneling was the main interest, In fact they had a fabrication side that made tunnel shields ect , Mathews , houghton and the Taylors ( Anita and Trevor ) were all friends in the motor racing trade,
I had a mini Jem at the same time and had a crash with it, So i went to see John Houghton for is advise as to rebuild it as he was then making the car body with fibreglass , He gave me a in depth tour of the workshop as they were making Chassis, Explaining everything and then said why have you bought one of those Mini jem things and starting laughing, anyway he sold me the glass, resin and cat to repair my car and told me how repair the car properly,
M&H went bust in the 70s , I don't think John would have ever made any money making the Biota , Probably M&H subsidized it, I often wondered what happened to John , His photo cropped up last year at a hill climb in Yorkshire with a couple of Biota's , A real gentleman, Pete have you invited John Houghton to Blyton ?????????Would be nice to see him and Dave Mathews + Anita Taylor there as well !

[Pete]

Funnily enough I was only talking about the Taylors with Nev Hodkin (who had his 997 race car prepared at BRT but knew them well) and how underated Trevor was, he just didn't get the right breaks at Lotus F1. It'd be great to invite both Houghton and Mathews and a great honour if Anita would come along. I only have contact details for the latter and incidentally I've also invited the owner of the beautiful Aurora BMC sports racer Mike Taylor built for Trevor and Anita to race in the mid 60's (later ran by Mick Clare).

[Pandora]

Pete, did I send you John Haughton's email address? If not, I can dig it out for you

Al

[goff]

Pete
The Taylors had a Garage at a place called Hellaby ,right next to the M18 Junction 1 , It was called The Steering Wheel , I new Mike as i used to call in often , The garage is long gone ! They ended up Citroen agents before it being knocked down , Its a filling station now ,and second had car dealer at the rear ,
I thought Dave married Anita maybe i am wrong, Trevor passed away a few years ago, John used to live in a house right in front of the works called the ' Avalon ' , But i guess he moved years ago, Kingsford main garage turned into a restaurant, They had one of those cut away 1275 engines in a perspex case that would turn , Dave told me that the apprentices at BL made them, then sent out to main dealers.

Goff

[Pete]

A naked Aurora BMC with the Taylors ...



With it's clothes on...



1071 powered, later grew an 8 port as well.

[goff]

Nice one Pete, The first photo looks like it was taken behind the garage , As there is some spare land with bungalows at the side That's over grown and i think they ( Taylors ) used to do some testing there in the early days, I was told that it was motor bikes as well, But i never seen anything, The land is still the same today as it was in the 60s, Try and get Mike to come as well,
Did Anita race a Anglia for a while ????

Goff

[Pete]

Yes though she raced Minis with Trevor in '64 and '65 she was lured pretty quickly by Ford's publicity dept and became Ford's glamour puss thereafter in Superspeed then Broadspeed Anglias. She featured on the recent Ford docu if you saw it ? I arranged to do an interview with the much overlooked Trevor Taylor a few years ago but as you say he sadly passed away before that could happen.



I'm looking for any images of their garage if you've ever seen one ? Here's an old ad when it looked like they were selling a lot of their cars and two transporters including the VW flat bed that they used to take the Minis to the circuits with, all colour co-ordinated in their blue/grey team colour.



Another of the Aurora ...

[surfblue63]

A Biota at Beaulieu

[fricsman]

Too bad they are so hideous

Well I LIKE them, not hideous at all!
What an interesting thread developing.