From his first sighting of this now splendid Austin Champ in 1987, Plymouth-based Tony Ashford’s restoration journey has been a circuitous one
‘Tony has undertaken a very large proportion of the work himself to refurbish what he considers a working restoration’
On Tony Ashford’s wedding day in 1987 his father Ron noticed a rather sorry-looking Champ under a lean-to halfway up the drive to the venue in Plympton, Devon.
As well as appearing generally abused, the bodywork was fire-damaged and everywhere rust could have taken hold, it had - it appeared it would take a great deal of work to put the Austin back on the road. A once-proud fighting vehicle, the Champ had been owned jointly by five students and run into the ground as a cheap runabout and beach buggy.
At the time, as a civilian or ex-military vehicle, the Austin Champ lacked the desirability of a Land Rover, being less versatile with its open tub and being much more complex to maintain. It was these drawbacks that sealed the Champ’s fate and hastened its withdrawal from service with the British Armed Forces during the 1960s.
Ron Ashford, who had driven a Champ while staff car driver to General Sir Alfred Dudley Ward, Commander-in-Chief of the Brit…
