Classic Opel Spares

Up for grabs is this reproduction of the sales brochure for the GT/E version of the Opel Manta A series. This was one of the last variants to leave the factory before production switched over to the Manta B series and is in many ways the pinnacle of the cars short lived production. With uprated suspension, brakes and transmission you could make the most of the extra performance that fuel injection offered.

The Opel Manta A series GT/E was never available in right hand drive for the UK market and I don't think it made it to America either. But many years ago I was offered one for something like £600 here in the UK; I was young had fewer mechanical skills than now and not much money so I turned it down, what a missed opportunity.

Sales Brochure - Opel Manta A series GT/E

Sales Brochure - Opel Manta A series GT/E

Sales Brochure - Opel Manta A series GT/E

Sales Brochure - Opel Manta A series GT/E

Sales Brochure - Opel Manta A series GT/E

Sales Brochure - Opel Manta A series GT/E

Sales Brochure - Opel Manta A series GT/E

Sales Brochure - Opel Manta A series GT/E

It is priced at £12, which includes delivery to a UK address. I can send to some European locations too, but please ask for a quote first as this could be quite a high sum.

Original sales brochures for classic GM vehicles are not exactly plentiful in the UK, stocks are very limited and I will not be replacing them, so don't hang about if this is what you need for your project.


Updates:

02/10/18 - Now sold

It caught my attention recently that one of these sales brochures for the ultra rare Broadspeed modified version of the Opel Manta A series is now listed on eBay for £48.
Consumed by avarice it occurred to me that I could sell my spare copy for £25 and be able to eat for another week.

Opel Manta - Broadspeed Turbo version

Opel Manta - Broadspeed Turbo version

Opel Manta - Broadspeed Turbo version

Opel Manta - Broadspeed Turbo version

It is priced at £25, which includes delivery to a UK address. I can send to some European locations too, but please ask for a quote first as this could be quite a high sum.

Original sales brochures for classic GM vehicles are not exactly plentiful in the UK, stocks are very limited and I will not be replacing them, so don't hang about if this is what you need for your project.


Updates:

26/09/17 - Sales enquiry from the Netherlands
29/09/17 - Sold

I dug out these front brake backing plates for a user on the Opel Manta Owners Club Forum, but his interest appears to have waned. They were saved from an Opel Manta B series (i200 model) that was split for spares many years ago and they have lived in my loft ever since.

Manta brake disc back plates - maximum diameter is 280mm

I ran over them with a fibre brush on my drill to see if there were part numbers visible under the dirt. As the photos will show, there was some surface rusting at the centre, but nothing that appears to have penetrated the metal.

Manta brake disc back plates -  mounting holes are asymmetrical

Their maximum diameter is 280mm, the “bell” section is 75mm across and the hole in the centre is 48mm. Note the 3 mounting holes are in an asymmetrical arrangement.
If any one else should be interested in these brake backing plates, you can have them for £25 posted to the UK.

Manta brake disc back plates - the “bell” section is 75mm across

Manta brake disc back plates - the centre is 48mm

Manta brake disc back plates - some rusting at the centre

UPDATE:

14/06/2014 - Now Scrapped

It's great to meet up with readers of the Classic Opel Spares Blog; Dejan from Stockholm in Sweden was on a trip to London and had time to collect a few odds and ends he had spotted. He was mainly interested in a Factory Parts Book for the Opel Kadett C series that had been on offer for a while.
He also asked if I could let him see any miscellaneous or unidentified parts, so I made a "supermarket sweep" of my loft for a selection of unidentified parts that have been hanging around for years.

Opel Ascona A over riders - part of a selection of unidentified parts

 When we met at my local train station with an oversized suitcase, I knew he meant business and wasn't another time waster.
We struck an equitable deal during coffee on the patio and enjoyed one of the finest sunny afternoons of the year so far. It was fascinating to hear about the classic car movement in Sweden, some of which were contrary to my expectations. These are:

• Classic cars qualify for very low rates of road tax - only around £30 per year
• The frozen Northern areas of the country are relatively dry and roads are not salted during the long winter months. This is the place to find a well preserved classic, but make sure you rust proof it before using it elsewhere!
• The Swedes love big engined muscle cars
• There are reputed to be more 57 Chevy's now in Sweden than in the USA

There is a good feature on the Swedish "Raggare" car subculture here who are a sort of Swedish version of Rockabilies.

Here's a beautiful item to finish off your Opel GT only recently available from Opel GT Source based in California. It is a reproduction rear resonator exhaust box with quad slash cut tail pipes, the tailpipes feature stainless steel tips, so should stay good looking for a long time too.


For any Opel GT lovers based stateside this should be a real "no brainer" as the saying goes.

Regular correspondent Anthony Drossos from Greece has mailed through a great deal on new old stock Opel Ascona A series front wings, unusually for such a rare part, the more you buy the cheaper they get.

Here's the deal:

Offer price for 1x wing is 150 Euros
Offer price for 2x wings is 250 Euros
Offer price for 3x wings is 350 Euros
Offer price for 4x wings is 500 Euros
Offer price for 5x wings is 600 Euros
Offer price for 6x wings is 700 Euros

All costs are included (shipped worldwide)

Note:
The shipment costs include normal air mail delivery. For registered EPG courier air mail courier services there is an additional cost +25 Euros per shipment per large box (1-3x = 1 Box……4-6x = 2 Boxes).
Bank deposit payment fee is +9 Euros
PayPal deposit payment fee is +4.4% of the shipment cost

For sale - Opel Ascona A series front wings - €150

For sale - Opel Ascona A series front wings - €150

Should you be tempted, here are the contact details you will need:

Anthony Drosos
Opel spare parts sales / Export Manager
Tralleon 9- Nea Smyrni
Athens-Greece-TK 171/21
Tel – Fax: (+030) 210 93 14 121 (10 lines)
E-mail: alpharm@otenet.gr
Online: Opelparts@hotmail.com
Skype: Opelparts
Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1295281756
http://www.facebook.com/opel.parts.9
http://www.facebook.com/Opel.Parts.Greece
http://www.facebook.com/opelparts

Long time correspondent Anthony has been asking me for a couple of weeks to check and see if I can find an accelerator cable for his Opel Manta A series. I really thought that I had no stock left, but I had a rummage in the loft and to my great surprise found what appeared to be the correct item.
It wasn't original equipment spec and looked to be custom made, but the metal fittings were in pristine condition, with a clean, supply and shiny plastic outer sheath.

Accelerator cable - Opel Manta A series

Anthony was concerned that, as his car has been fitted with the popular aftermarket Weber DGV conversion, would a standard cable still fit? I was able to re-assure him that this was the case, the Weber DGV carburettor connects to the stock throttle quadrant. To check the length I compared it to the one installed in my own Opel Manta and it seemed to be correctly dimensioned.

Opel Manta engine bay - does it fit?

I wasn't able to check that the fitment at the pedal end was the same, as that would have involved a fair bit of fiddling about under the dashboard. Fortunately Anthony decided to give it a "punt", so I put in the post.

I will be promoting a number of original Opel sales brochures that I have to clear and would like to kick off with this French version from 1973 and covering the full range of Opel vehicles. What a joy it must have been to be part of the team putting together the images, all those stunning locations and switching between factory fresh classic Opels, an Admiral one day, a GT coupe the next.

Les Opel 1973

Opel Kadett B

Opel Kadett B

Opel Ascona A

Opel Ascona A

Opel Manta A

Opel Manta A

Opel Rekord D

Opel Rekord D

Opel Commodore B

Opel Commodore B

Opel Admiral

Opel GT

Opel Blitz Truck

Opel Automatic Gearboxes

Opel Euroservice

It is priced at £12, which includes delivery to a UK address. I can send to some European locations too, but please ask for a quote first as this could be quite a high sum.

Original sales brochures for classic GM vehicles are not exactly plentiful in the UK, stocks are very limited and I will not be replacing them, so don't hang about if this is what you need for your project.

Updates:

10/04/21 - Npw sold

I had all of the items except the cigarette lighter, even the correctly dated Owner's manual, 3 out of 4 ain't shabby and they went in the post this afternoon.

Opel Manta A series owner's manual - pre '72

Opel "1900" script badge

Plastic cover - rear shock absorber top mount

In the 1970's around the time that the Opel brand was introduced to the UK, GM published a book entitled "Opel - Wheels to the World", no doubt to provide some credibility for this hitherto unknown European brand.
In Wheels to the World there are some lovely archive photos of the experimental rocket powered cars, I always found the image shown below both exciting and intriguing, it seems high tech for the period, whilst at the same time having a cartoon like "Wacky Races" quality to it. As it turns out this is not far from the truth, as the rocket powered cars were as much about wild publicity stunts as technical development. Sadly, the technology was to evolve from cars to gliders, then into the V1 "Doodlebug" and V2 Nazi terror weapons, these in turn, became the foundation of the first NASA space vehicles.

High tech meets Wacky Races

I was watching a "Wings of the Luftwaffe" video about the development of German rocket powered aircraft in World War II and to my surprise it showed some of the cars in action. The Opel section begins at 6'03" here is a link and I have embedded the whole documentary below.

James B is after a set of center caps for the Vauxhall Nova 3 spoked alloy wheels fitted to the; GT/e, GTi, or SRi models.  He specifically needs the ones with the 2 slots in each spoke.

I can't help him, but perhaps you can? if so, please contact me and I will be glad to pass your details on.

Vauxhall Nova GSi rally car

Darren W called today to collect a rear windscreen for his recently aquired Opel Manta A series project. He bought the car not realising just how difficult even the simplest parts can be to find now.

I was able to supply him with the right part, it even had the original rubber screen seal, although you wouldn't have wanted to re-use it, it was somewhat cracked and crusty. Screen seals used to be available through some of the German dealers for around £100, although even these may now be gone.

For the record, there are roughly three front and rear windscreens left in stock.

The Opel Manta A series, here in the UK at least, was supplied with these quite heavy duty engine sump guards as standard.

They are quite an unusual item to find fitted to a road car, but maybe the engineers at Opel thought it essential to protect the bottom of the engine and keep water from flooding into the alternator. Typically they are removed for servicing and don't get replaced. As they are made from regular mild steel and given the location where they are mounted, they are quite prone to rusting away.

This one I had powder coated in a silk black finish some years ago, it is out of my loft and is now up for grabs

Opel Manta sump guard - the dips are spot welds

Opel Manta sump guard - looking clean from above

Opel Manta sump guard - some denting is inevitable

Opel Manta sump guard - a few tiny rust pinholes

I have to confess that I have a sizable stash of "mystery parts", all unboxed, unlabelled and for applications  unknown. I worked on the principal that sooner or later they might prove useful to someone, if I could only work out what they fitted.

This bizarre air filter housing component is typical of such mystery parts. It has a few design features that the eagle eyed classic car fans might recognise. Note the ovoid mounting ring on the base, as far as I know this was a signature design feature on Solex carburettors.

Ovoid mounting ring - a signature design feature on Solex carburettors

I made a test fit with a salvaged Solex DIDTA carburettor from an Opel Manta A series and the mounting ring was of the same dimensions. The adapter would have fitted completely, but for the secondary choke vacuum actuator fitted to this carburettor, as illustrated below.

Test fit with a salvaged Solex DIDTA carburettor

The other noteworthy element is the provision of a captive nut, I recall that some Fords used an air filter housing with a single wing nut fastening to hold the lid in situ.

Some Fords used a single wing nut fastening

Could it be Opel or Ford? - do you know what it fits?

Now this quirky item has finally broken free of loft bound captivity, do you know what it fits? Could it be Opel or Ford?  Because if it doesn't find a new home soon, it will be going in the scrap bin.