CarBrandLogos archive · Austin · 1980

AustinMetro

British Leyland's last serious roll of the dice, built by robots at Longbridge.

Photo: Charles01 · CC BY-SA 4.0

The story

A defining chapter in Austin history.

Explore the ideas, engineering and context that shaped the Austin Metro, then continue into its specifications and place in the marque's lineage.

Origins

A decade of abandoned Mini replacements preceded it. The programme that finally reached production, reworked after customer clinics rejected an earlier proposal, launched in October 1980 as the Austin Metro, and the company spent heavily to build it, installing a large automated body shop at Longbridge that was as much a statement about British Leyland's future as the car was.

1982MGMetro-interior · dave_7 · CC BY 2.0

Design and engineering

The engineering was conservative: the A-series engine again, Hydragas suspension again, a four-speed gearbox in the sump. What was new was the packaging. It was a three-door hatchback with a folding rear seat and a genuinely useful boot for its size, and it drove well enough to hold its own against the Fiesta and the Renault 5. The launch campaign was unashamedly patriotic, with advertisements showing Metros repelling foreign imports, and the car sold strongly in Britain.

1980 Austin Metro 1.0 L interior · Peter Barclay · CC BY 2.0

In production

The MG Metro and MG Metro Turbo added performance, and the Metro 6R4 Group B rally car shared little beyond a silhouette, having a mid-mounted V6 and four-wheel drive. In 1990 a thorough re-engineering brought the K-series engine and a much better rear suspension, and the Rover Metro was a genuinely good car; renamed Rover 100 in 1994, it was killed in 1997 after a poor Euro NCAP crash result made it unsellable. Just over 2,078,000 were built, which makes it one of the more successful things British Leyland did. The Mini it was meant to replace outlived it by two years.

1984 MG Metro 1300 · grassrootsgroundswell · CC BY 2.0

At a glance