Introducing our Club of the Month: The 1100 Club

It’s a big month for anniversaries this month with the MG MGB and Ford Cortina celebrating 60th years! Another fondly remembered model celebrating its diamond anniversary is the Morris 1100 and we’re marking the occasion by announcing The 1100 Club as our Club of the Month. The Morris 1100 was one of Britain’s most popular cars of the 60s and has a very active following and fan base. We caught up with the club to find out more about how it all started…

The 1100 Club began one January day back in 1985, following a rather damning magazine Buyers' Guide which painted a very negative picture of 1100s - something needed to be done! Catering for the Austin, Morris, MG, Vanden Plas, Riley and Wolseley examples of the marque in both 1100 and 1300 form meant that membership enquiries came in thick and fast, and within three months of the first meeting there were 53 members and 63 cars - the Bromley Pageant in June 1985 was the 1100 Club's first outdoor show, then as more members joined the idea of a National Rally was hit upon. The first such meet took place at Weston Park in September of that same year.....and the rest is history!

Since then the 1100 Club has gone from strength to strength, always 100% volunteer run by enthusiasts for enthusiasts, and now with over 650 members across the world plus a Facebook page followed by nearly 4000. The club provides six editions per year of its journal, Idle Chatter - a full colour, 44 page A4 sized paper publication (with digital PDF version alongside) that was highly commended at the Classic and Sports Car Club Awards at the Lancaster Insurance Classic Motor Show for three years in a row before finally winning the top award in 2018. It also offers access to a members' area of the club website, containing PDFs of every Idle Chatter ever produced since 1985, a fully searchable database of technical articles, part numbers and a wide range of scanned manuals and technical documents - it has been shortlisted in the 'Outstanding Online Presence' category of the National Car Club Awards for this resource. There's a National Rally every year, at least one other regional event and a network of local meetings and area contacts.

In recent years the club has played a more direct role in helping to preserve and maintain the 1100 and 1300 range, notably by purchasing, recommissioning and operating some of the original BMC factory tooling to make brand new front wings, and by producing and supplying original spec exhaust systems. Various member to member services are also on offer, including a DIY kit to rehose hydrolastic displacers, aftermarket front to rear hydrolastic pipes and rebuilt steering racks on an exchange basis. Heritage is important too - the 1100 Club owns and has restored a unique cutaway 'Skeleton' car that was on display at the 1966 Earl's Court Motor Show, plus an original cutaway engine that is frequently on display at events.

All in all, there's lots going on! You can find out more and join the 1100 Club on their website or visit the club on social media - on Facebook, @the1100club on Twitter, on Instagram and on YouTube.