Curbside Classic: 1962 Riley One-Point-Five – Old-Fashioned Charm

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– Posted on February 10, 2025

You have to hand it to the BMC boys. They were masters at badge engineering, at stretching a bodyshell’s life to its extreme limit and at glamorizing the dullest econobox into a miniature Jaguar. There were many examples of these skills on display, from the ‘50s right through to the British Leyland era. Today’s illustration will be wearing the renowned Riley badge, and comes with a lot of hyphens.

One-point-five, all spelled out and in cursive. That’s the official moniker. You don’t see the hyphen on the script, but they’re there in every single advert and period review. This is a BMC product though, so you could get the same thing (or virtually so) under another appellation, as we shall see. But as we’ve not had this model or any of its aliases on CC before, let’s start with a few basics.

The Riley One-Point-Five and its lower-spec sister model, the Wolseley 1500, were introduced in 1957. The Wolseley was unveiled first in the spring, and the Riley followed at the London Motor Show in the autumn. The chassis was a typical BMC mix’n’match affair: the frame and suspension came from the Morris Minor and the 1.5 litre B-Series engine came from Austin, by way of the MG Magnette.

The car’s original mission actually was to replace the Minor (by then almost ten years old), but since the Morris’ sales were still very strong, and what with that whole Suez business, BMC elected to turn their new small family car into a sporty and upmarket model. Hence the use of Wolseley and Riley badging and the 1.5 litre B-Series.

Being the lower-spec model, the 42hp Wolseley had a simpler dash, but the interior was still wood and leather galore, except in the so-called “fleet” model. None of that base trim stuff for the Riley, whose even nicer dash included a rev counter, being that the marque had a sporting reputation to keep up. The One-Point-Five did benefit from a much hotter 58hp engine (up to 60hp by 1962) with twin SU carburators, making it quite a performer. Enough to make one’s bowler fall off, at least.

Early models like the one shown in the 1958 brochure above had external bonnet and boot hinges, which disappeared with the Mark II in 1960. In late 1961, a more extensive facelift gave the car a new grille and taillights, as well as improved interiors. Production carried on with minimal changes until April 1965, when both the Wolseley and the Riley variants were put to pasture.

With BMC being deeply ensconced into their badge-engineering phase, the same car with yet more grille arrangements was also produced and sold in Australia as the Austin Lancer and the Morris Major between 1958 and 1962, then as the Morris Major elite (sans Austin equivalent) until MY 1964. Neither VandenPlas nor Innocenti got a piece of the action though. Close, but no ADO16.

Again, you have to hand it to BMC: they sure could lay on the wood and leather in that cabin. And with that twin-carb 1.5 pulling a tarted-up Morris Minor, the Riley was quite the performer, as well. Really, the invocation of Jaguar is not as far fetched as it seems.

The Riley scored very favourably in contemporary tests as to its suspension, speed, steering and presentation. The decision to keep the gear lever on the floor was also seen as a plus, given that a trendier column shifter would not have served much purpose – three abreast seating was never on the cards, given the car’s narrow body.

Which brings us to the model’s demerits: seating was cramped, headroom included (tall drivers need no apply, apparently). Said gear lever commanded a box whose synchromesh was prone to failure and the B-Series’ sound, while not unpleasant, was deemed a tad invasive.

Not mentioned in contemporary tests was the car’s overall aesthetics. It looks rather dumpy and upright, like many smaller British cars of the period, but at least it has rather handsome features. The most striking thing, though, has to be how dated the design was for the late ‘50s.

Had it debuted in, say, 1953 or 54, the One-Point-Five would have seemed decently up-to-date. But it was born a lot later than that and had to last well into the ‘60s. BMC could have done something a bit edgier. The Australian variants sprouted fins from 1960 onwards, strangely enough, but the home market models never received anything of the sort.

But ultimately, the Riley’s main attraction was its badged and the promise of a sporty little saloon. It was a very successful competitor in the British Saloon Car Championship between 1958 and 1962, and several were also raced on the Continent, scoring a number of class victories.

The question of the price remained a major sticking point, though. It fluctuated quite a bit year-on-year, but the Riley was typically 15-20% dearer than the Wolseley, pitting it against a lot of larger and more modern-looking cars, as well as some interesting imported alternatives. You know where this is going…

At £800 in 1963, the One-Point-Five was interesting performance-wise, but a few sterling more could get you a far larger Morris Oxford or the new MG 1100 – BMC had you covered, in those days. But Singer, Renault, Ford or Simca also had a lot to offer for (sometimes) less money.

That goes some way to explain the Riley’s modest sales: according to the Riley Motor Club, just over 39,000 units were made between 1957 and 1965 (compared to over 100k Wolseley 1500s). However, that does give the One-Point-Five the distinction of being the most popular model of the marque’s history, so everything is relative. It may have been a little old-fashioned and somewhat expensive for its size, but isn’t it a charming way to kick off this British ‘60s Saloon Week?