Remember These? The Alexander Black Ice Alert And Forgotten Car Accessories

There was a time when a trip to the local motor spares shop could result in coming home with something you never knew you needed.

Perhaps it was a new gear knob.

A pair of auxiliary mirrors.

One of those little bottles of Feu Orange air freshener.

Or a gadget that promised to make driving safer, more comfortable or simply more enjoyable.

We recently spotted something on eBay that brought those memories flooding back.

An Alexander Black Ice Alert.

Still in its original packaging.

And if you remember fitting one of these to your car, there’s a good chance you were driving around in the 1980s.

The seller even remembers having one on a Mk3 Ford Escort.

We’d almost forgotten they existed.

What Was The Alexander Black Ice Alert?

It was a wonderfully simple idea.

The Alexander Black Ice Alert was a small, self-adhesive liquid crystal thermometer designed to stick to the outside of a car’s door mirror.

Its job was to warn the driver when the temperature dropped into the range where icy conditions might develop.

No wires.

No batteries.

No sensors connected to the dashboard.

And certainly no smartphone app.

Just a little temperature-sensitive strip attached to your mirror.

The packaging explains that the device indicated temperatures between 0°C and -10°C, with intermediate markings at -2°C and -5°C.

The colour of the background changed according to the temperature.

Green indicated the actual temperature, while the instructions described brown as indicating a lower temperature and blue a higher one.

According to Alexander, the thermometer responded within ten seconds.

It was an ingenious little accessory for its time.

The instructions also explained that it could be fitted to a clean, dry door mirror and left in place during car washes.

Alexander recommended replacing it each winter.

Remember When Cars Didn’t Tell You The Outside Temperature?

Today, it’s easy to take outside-temperature displays for granted.

Many modern cars display the temperature alongside a little snowflake warning when conditions approach freezing.

Some will even issue an audible warning.

But plenty of ordinary British cars from the 1970s and 1980s had nothing of the sort.

You might have a temperature gauge for the engine.

You might have a clock if you were lucky.

But knowing how cold it was outside generally involved looking out of the window and making an educated guess.

The Black Ice Alert offered a little extra information without needing any modification to the car.

And because it was stuck to the driver’s door mirror, the idea was that you could check the temperature while driving.

There was, of course, an important limitation.

A reading above freezing didn’t guarantee that the road surface was free of ice.

Road temperatures can differ from air temperatures, particularly on bridges, shaded roads and untreated surfaces.

Alexander acknowledged that limitation on the packaging, warning that the device was an aid to winter driving rather than a guarantee of safe road conditions.

Nevertheless, it was a clever solution to a genuine problem.

Who Made The Alexander Black Ice Alert?

Now here’s where this little accessory becomes more interesting.

The packaging identifies the manufacturer as Alexander Engineering Co. Ltd of Haddenham, Buckinghamshire.

That name will mean something to enthusiasts of older British cars.

Alexander Engineering wasn’t simply a company selling novelty dashboard accessories.

It had a substantial history in performance tuning.

The business was established in 1949 and became well known during the 1950s and 1960s for its engine conversions and specialist equipment.

Period reports describe Alexander working on a remarkable range of cars, including Austin, Morris, MG, Hillman and Singer models.

The company developed performance modifications involving cylinder heads, carburettors, manifolds and other mechanical components.

It also supplied equipment such as Laycock overdrives for suitable vehicles.

In April 1957, Motor Sport magazine reported that Alexander had already completed more than 3,000 conversions.

Think about that for a moment.

The same name that appears on this tiny stick-on thermometer had once been associated with making ordinary British cars go rather faster.

For anyone interested in the history of tuning British classics, Alexander is a name well worth remembering.

Can We Date This Particular Accessory?

The eBay seller describes this example as a 1980s accessory, and the packaging certainly looks the part.

The bold lettering.

The blue grid background.

The orange and black graphics.

Even the little illustration showing how the device attaches to a door mirror.

It all feels wonderfully familiar.

The item carries Alexander reference number IA399 and barcode 5011552003994.

Unfortunately, the barcode does not tell us when it was manufactured.

The packaging also gives Alexander Engineering’s Haddenham address and a telex number, another nice reminder of the period before email became the normal way for businesses to communicate.

We haven’t established a precise production date for this example, so we’ll stick with the seller’s description of it as a 1980s accessory.

It’s certainly very much in keeping with the sort of aftermarket equipment that filled British motor spares shops during that era.

New Old Stock – The Stuff That Never Got Fitted

What really attracted us to this example is that it remains in its original retail packaging.

The seller describes it as new old stock, or NOS.

That’s a term we use regularly at UK Barn Finds.

Generally speaking, it refers to old stock that was never sold or fitted when it was originally available.

Sometimes it is a replacement car part.

Sometimes it is an obsolete accessory.

Sometimes it is something as simple as an unopened packet of fixings, a dealer display card or a period air freshener.

The packaging can be almost as interesting as the contents.

In this case, we can see the original Alexander branding, reference number, barcode, fitting instructions and illustrations.

All of those details help establish what the product was and how it was intended to be used.

Without the packaging, it would be easy to dismiss the little black strip as something of little consequence.

With it, we have a complete piece of British motoring accessory history.

See The Original Alexander Black Ice Alert On eBay

We came across this example being offered by eBay seller fab_fm, who describes it as an unused 1980s accessory and recalls fitting one to a Mk3 Escort.

If the listing is still available, it’s worth having a look simply to see a surviving example in its original packaging.

View the seller’s eBay shop here.

And if this has brought back memories of the old motor spares shop, you can have a rummage through classic car accessories on eBay here.

There is an extraordinary variety of old stock and forgotten automotive equipment still waiting to be discovered.

What Other Car Accessories Have We Forgotten?

The Black Ice Alert got us thinking about all the little accessories we used to see in cars.

Remember those illuminated or light-up gear knobs?

Or the static discharge straps that hung down from the rear bumper, supposedly helping to prevent shocks when getting out of the car?

Then there were the stick-on rear-window demister kits, aftermarket rear-window blinds and louvres, clip-on dashboard clocks and cassette storage racks.

And who remembers the days when a motor spares shop would have a whole display dedicated to air fresheners?

Feu Orange was one of the names many British motorists will remember.

Some accessories served a practical purpose.

Others were bought because they looked good.

And some promised benefits that probably deserved a little more scepticism than the packaging encouraged.

But they were all part of the motoring culture of their time.

They tell us something about what people wanted from their cars and what manufacturers thought they could persuade us to buy.

The Motor Spares Shops We Used To Love

This is where we start getting rather nostalgic.

There was something special about walking into a traditional motor spares shop.

Not a modern retail superstore, but one of those independent shops where somebody behind the counter seemed to know the part number for everything.

The walls were covered in accessories.

There were shelves full of oil additives, bulbs, mirrors, switches, badges, aerials and cleaning products.

There might be boxes of ignition components that had been sitting there for years.

Old Ford parts.

Austin and Morris stock.

Unusual fittings for cars that had long since disappeared from everyday roads.

And inevitably, there would be something you hadn’t gone in to buy but somehow couldn’t leave without.

The Alexander Black Ice Alert feels like exactly that sort of product.

It wasn’t expensive-looking or particularly elaborate.

But it was clever, useful and different.

The sort of thing somebody might pick up while buying a set of spark plugs.

And then forget all about until a surviving example turns up on eBay forty years later.

We’d Love To Find An Old Motor Spares Shop

One of the things we’d absolutely love to do at UK Barn Finds is clear the surviving stock from an old independent motor spares shop.

Imagine finding a storeroom that hadn’t been properly cleared in decades.

Shelves of new old stock.

Period accessories still in their original packets.

Feu Orange air fresheners.

Old ignition parts.

Obsolete badges.

Dealer displays.

Boxes of components for cars most people have forgotten.

It’s exactly the sort of material we find fascinating.

And it doesn’t have to be a complete shop.

Even a few boxes of old accessories or spare parts can contain some wonderful little pieces of motoring history.

Sometimes the items that appear least important at the time become the things collectors most enjoy finding years later.

Have A Look Through The Old Accessories Still Out There

If you remember visiting motor spares shops in the 1970s, 1980s or 1990s, you could easily lose an hour looking through classic car accessories currently listed on eBay.

We deliberately favour a broad search rather than looking for one particular product.

After all, half the pleasure is stumbling across something you haven’t thought about for decades.

And that’s exactly what happened when we spotted this Alexander Black Ice Alert.

We weren’t looking for one.

We’d forgotten they existed.

But one photograph was enough to bring back a whole era of motoring memories.

Got Old Car Parts Or Accessories Sitting In A Garage?

If you’ve got old car parts, accessories, signs or garage stock sitting around, we’d love to hear from you.

Perhaps you once ran a motor spares shop.

Maybe you’re clearing a former garage or workshop.

Or perhaps you’ve inherited a collection of boxes that nobody has opened for years.

We are interested in new old stock, obsolete components, period accessories, advertising displays, motoring memorabilia and unusual items from the British motor trade.

They don’t need to be especially valuable.

Sometimes the most ordinary little items have the most interesting stories.

And please don’t assume something is worthless simply because nobody has used it for thirty or forty years.

If you’re clearing an old garage, shop or collection, send us some photographs.

Contact UK Barn Finds here.

We’d love to see what you’ve got.

And while we’re on the subject, what obsolete car accessory do you remember buying that you haven’t seen for years?

We suspect the answers could make quite a list.