TVR Buyer's Guide

TVR at auction remains gloriously itself: our four tracked sales run from an S-Series at £4,793 through two Chimaeras (median £9,106) to a modern-era Tuscan at £20,812, with Tasmin-era wedges waiting in the live listings for their moment.

The story, briefly

Blackpool built fibreglass sports cars from the fifties onward, but the marque the market knows was forged in the Rover V8 era: the S-Series, then the Griffith and Chimaera of the nineties, muscular, light and sold without ABS, airbags or apology. The Speed Six engine powered the later Tuscan and Sagaris generation before production ended in 2006. Depreciation finished years ago; the wedge and V8 cars have been climbing quietly since.

Which TVR, for what money

The S-Series under £6,000 is the entry, a V6 or V8 roadster with simple underpinnings. Chimaeras around our £9,106 median are the volume and the value: Griffith pace in a friendlier suit, with the Griffith itself commanding a premium above. The Speed Six cars (our Tuscan at £20,812) deliver the wildest styling and performance, with an engine whose early frailties are now well understood and mostly engineered out in surviving cars.

What goes wrong

The outriggers and chassis tubes hide under the fibreglass and rot where the eye cannot reach: a crawl underneath or a specialist's report is the purchase decision. Rover V8s are robust and cheap to sustain. Speed Sixes need evidence of a rebuilt or properly maintained top end; the invoice is worth thousands. Electrics are hand-assembled and behave like it. There is no dealer network, but the specialist and club scene is devoted and national.

Our view

A Chimaera 400 or 450 with a recent chassis inspection at £8,000 to £11,000 is one of the great analogue bargains left: V8 noise, 1,060kg, and values with only one plausible direction. Buy on chassis condition and walk from anything without underside photographs. The Speed Six cars reward those who buy the engine history rather than the paint.