By 1972, the SR Rallye cost £1,543, while a Capri 2000 GT XLR was £1,377, although the two had very different images. Some Manta owners dismissed the Ford as a vehicle for “medallion men”, while they appreciated fine wines and Belgian chocolates. The Sunbeam Rapier H120 for £1,624 was another British alternative to the Manta, but it looked slightly ungainly compared with the Opel.
There was also the Vauxhall Firenza Sport SL for £1,372, a form of in-house rival since Opel and Vauxhall were both part of the General Motors empire, although the two marques had separate dealerships and model line-ups. The Manta’s svelte appearance was known to induce envy in certain Vauxhall outlets, with one salesman complaining that the Firenza resembled a “bubble-top Viva”.
The Manta B replaced the Manta A in July 1975 after 498,553 units, with more than 170,000 sold in the US. Baker owned two variants of the Opel in the 1980s – “and I vowed to buy another”. He finally acquired the green SR at the end of 2024, after waiting for its previous owner to sell it for more than a year, and it is possibly the sole surviving automatic version.
Baker found that his Manta attracts many comments, usually along the lines of: “What is it?” He regards the optional automatic gearbox as “very smooth and precise”, although he prefers the manual box as better suited to the 1.9-litre engine. As for the Opel’s most appealing aspect, “it has to be its appearance”.