Super Mini that challenged Alex Issigonis’s classic Austin/Morris Mini

Jointly designed by two young Rootes stylists in the late 1950’s, one of whom was Tim Fry and married to my first cousin, the other Mike Parkes who achieved notoriety racing Ferraris.
This pair came up with the same concept as Issigonis’s Mini which saw the need for a small family car to seat four, achieve 60 mph and 60 mpg.
In many respects, the Imp had better features than its rival though production costs and build quality ultimately led to its downfall. It was not helped by Government insistence that part of the production be at Linwood Scotland to help regional unemployment in exchange for grants. This meant part-built cars were transported over 300 miles from Coventry and then back again for final finishing. Utter madness.
It featured a lightweight aluminium Coventry Climax 875cc rear engine tilted over to help centre of gravity which gave superb handling. Both Tim Fry and Mike Parkes were robustly built gentlemen so the car had decent size doors and interior space. Fold flat rear seats and opening rear window were just some of the novel design features.
1963- 1975 saw Sunbeam and Singer variants including Imp Sport and a compact Imp van. Survivors are much loved classics today.
Thinking of a motor manufacturing career as a teenager, I visited the Rootes factory with Tim Fry and saw the whole shooting match including the new Hillman Hunter assembly line and yet to be released Humber Sceptre, again based on the same design platform which was essentially badge engineering. Not my bag at all.
What did impress me was Tim’s access to countless cars from other manufacturers for assessment purposes and invariably driven mercilessly to within an inch of their life in the name of research. Volvos, Jaguars, Rovers and Renaults. This had much more appeal to me and is why I started my career at the Earls Court Motor Show in 1969 on the Crayford stand.
Years later I remember with much joy thrashing a Bentley Turbo down the A38 with my passenger Tim Fry grinning from ear to ear.
Boys and their Toys!