[list.british-cars] `autobook' manuals

richard welty <welty@lewis.crd.ge.com> (02/27/90)

    From: garnett@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu (Roger Garnett)
    On 'Autobook' repair manuals: 
		    Does anyone know of a bookseller/autoplace in this country that
	    sells/mailorders repair books from the British 'Autobook' series ? ?
	
    I don't think that these are availble new anymore. (haven't seen any) I've
    managed to pick some up at used book stores & sales. They aren't quite as 
    good as Bentley's, (which tent to be factory reprints) but are written
    independantly, more like Haynes, with some different content than either.

i have the Autobook manuals on early Saab 99s and early 105 series
Alfa Romeos; i'm generally not impressed with their quality relative
to Haynes manuals.  they're still in print in England, under the
`Motorbook' label; i just got a copy of their current 105/115 series
book for Alfa Romeos, and it still has the same mistakes that it
had in its `Autobook' incarnation.  the engine section of their Saab
99 book is awful; when they wrote it they still hadn't seen the 2.0
liter B engine yet, and they simply assumed that it was a straight
forward enlargement of the Triumph-Standard 4 instead of the major
redesign that it was.

as regards `cover bugs' in Haynes manuals; the discussion inspired me
to look at the cover of my Saab 99 book, and sure enough, there are
a few gaffes in the drawing.

ack,
  richard

richard welty <welty@lewis.crd.ge.com> (02/28/90)

    From: richard welty <welty@lewis>

    they're still in print in England, under the
    `Motorbook' label; i just got a copy of their current 105/115 series
    book for Alfa Romeos,

i may be wrong here; i looked more closely at my `motorbook' copy
last night, and it appears to be a one-off reprint done in
conjunction with the GB Alfa Club, and not a repackaging as part
of a series.

oh well.
  richard