Triumph TR7

The Triumph TR7 was a sports car manufactured from 1975 to 1981 by the Triumph Motor Company, then part of British Leyland (and subsequently, BL Ltd.), in the United Kingdom.

The car was characterized by its "wedge" shape, penned by Harris Mann, who also designed the Leyland Princess, and a curved line in the bodywork going from the door to the rear fender.

Power was provided by a 1998cc 8-valve four-cylinder engine which shared the same basic design as the Triumph Dolomite Sprint engine. There were plans to use the 'Sprint' engine in the TR7 and apparently 25 pre-production cars were made. But no production cars were built or sold. During development, the TR7 had the code name 'Bullet'.

While warmly received at introduction, the TR7's lines dated rapidly.

In early 1979, Triumph belatedly introduced a convertible version, called the TR7 Drophead, which first went on sale in the United Sates. The British market received it in early 1980.

For export, Triumph created a TR8—a TR7 with the Rover 3·5 L V8 unit. While some genuine TR8s stayed in Britain, these are exceedingly rare. Most went to the United States, where they did not fare well due to Triumph's poor build quality of the time.

As part of the rationalization introduced by BL boss Sir Michael Edwardes, the Triumph TR7 was cancelled in 1981. In total, 112368 TR7s were built along with 2722 TR8s.