We are delighted to present one of the most beautiful and original low mileage P6s we have ever had the pleasure of selling. Last sold by us in 2021 to a local customer, this warranted 51400 mile Rover 3500 auto was ordered new in the 'Huntsman' specification, an option that was offered within the Rover catalogue during the final year of P6 production before the SD1 was launched. The Huntsman specification featured colour co-ordinated vinyl roof, vinyl rear pillars and painted colour coded sills. We have the original supplier invoice dated the 30th December 1974 from Read & Sons (Cheadle) Limited showing that the car was ordered in Almond paint scheme with bronze leather upholstery. It also has the power steering option, front and extremely rare rear headrests, Aluminium Rostyle wheels as well as 'Sundym' glass which has a very subtle green tint designed to keep the interior cooler in bright sunlight. There is a large history file with original documents which both confirms the low mileage and indicates that this car has been very well cared for by its previous owners. The file includes the various original Rover handbooks, Radiomobile Operating Instructions, Rover Owner's Service Statement, Rover Price List and original Passport to Service book with services recorded by the supplying dealership Read & Sons at 1095, 4001, 9300, 17700 and 23257 miles. MOT records with the car date back almost 25 years from 37324 miles and a comprehensive file of invoices detail the exceptional maintenance. On the road the P6 is an absolute delight. Smooth and quiet, the road manners and handling are everything one would expect of a car which was designed to be more sophisticated than its contemporary rivals. The Rover is in exceptional mechanical condition and is equally as impressive in terms of presentation. HDB 8N is beautifully detailed, it would not look out of place on the show scene and has stunning bodywork and paintwork, gleaming brightwork, a superb underbody, detailed engine bay and a beautiful, superbly aged upholstery. The radical new design of the original P6 with its ‘unibody' construction was inspired by the Citroen DS. The De Dion rear axle set-up was unique in that the "tube" was in two parts that could telescope, thereby avoiding the need for sliding splines in the drive shafts. The design was a futuristic departure from the P4 which was still in production when the P6 was launched. The designers, led by Peter Wilks, Spen King and Gordon Bashford were to some extent kept in check by the influence of the Wilks brothers, Maurice and Spencer. Had it not been for their intervention, the P6 might have been even more revolutionary than it already was. The Rover Board ruled out the possibility of the Hydropneumatic suspension the engineers wanted, but they agreed to a body and chassis design that were a big departure from the norm. A unique feature of the Rover P6 was the design of the front suspension system, in which a bell crank (an L-shaped rotating bracket trailing the upper hub carrier joint) conveyed the vertical motion of the wheel to a fore-and-aft-horizontally mounted spring fastened to the rear wall of the engine compartment. A single hydraulically damped arm was mounted on the bulkhead for the steering. The front suspension was designed to allow as much width for the engine compartment as possible so that in time Rover's gas turbine engine could be fitted. In the event, the gas turbine was never fitted and it was a licence to produce Buick's superb 3528cc V8 that eventually gave the P6 the greater power and performance it needed to compete with other executive cars of the late 1960s and 70's. It is that superb suspension system which gives the Rover P6 the wonderful ride which few other cars of the period can match. In all respects this is genuinely a ‘specimen' example which we are sure will delight its new owner.